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LLVM relicensing update and call for help

blog.llvm.org

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Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#191

Post by snovv_crash »

fn-mote wrote: post #138
snovv_crash wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"without giving back" is a bit of an exaggeration. You could have a giant 20M line proprietary codebase, and if you incorporate a 20-line function from a GPL source, GPL says you need to relicense the whole thing. I prefer the MPLv2, it lets commercial users actually use the code, but they still have to contribute back any changes they make.

> I prefer the MPLv2, it lets commercial users actually use the code, but they still have to contribute back any changes they make. Sure, but how is this verifiable? Not verifiable = not happening. Anyway, the idea of using a 20 line function in a 20M line codebase is a total strawman. Think of it from the 20 line function author's point of view - free money for corporate? They lack the expertise internally to write…

Companies have a legal department to make sure this kind of thing is followed, otherwise they have potentially huge liabilities.

For things that have a single author, the relicense option is possible, yes. But how about projects that have several?

To me the great thing about software is that other people can use the code I wrote without it costing me anything. I understand the various attitudes of wanting others to be bound by some terms of sharing the work they do too, or paying for a license, but at least from my experience it limits the adoption of my code, and I'd rather my code be useful in as many places as possible, with the only requirement being that if you fix any bugs or extend the functionality in a deeply intrusive way, you contribute that back.

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#192

Post by Firehawke »

kayamon wrote: post #165
Firehawke wrote: post #43

MAMEdev hit this problem a few years back as well. Thankfully, the end result of code that needed to be ripped out and rewritten ended up being pretty small comparative to the whole project. A lot of that came down to there being no corporate interests involved, so no corp VS author arguments-- the worst ones to deal with were contributors who were adamant about keeping the original non-commercial license on their co…

Did they? That's interesting. No one ever contacted me about my contributions and whether I'd like to relicense them or not. I also noticed someone went through a long time ago and scrubbed a lot of names out of the source code entirely. Which is nice.

As far as I know, anything that they couldn't find an author on was eventually rewritten from scratch. That's the only time a name would be removed from a driver-- a complete redo.

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#193

Post by Firehawke »

Firehawke wrote: post #192
kayamon wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did they? That's interesting. No one ever contacted me about my contributions and whether I'd like to relicense them or not. I also noticed someone went through a long time ago and scrubbed a lot of names out of the source code entirely. Which is nice.

As far as I know, anything that they couldn't find an author on was eventually rewritten from scratch. That's the only time a name would be removed from a driver-- a complete redo.

Expect to have someone reach out to you soonish, though, so we can be absolutely sure of what happened and correct any mistakes on our part that may exist.

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#194

Post by tarsinge »

systemvoltage wrote: post #180
tarsinge wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying that corporations prefer something they can profit from without giving back vs something they can not is circular reasoning to me. Conversely if you look on the other side you'll see developers bitten by permissive software licences (MongoDB, Elasticsearch, ...).

Not all corporations are assholes. Many give back, many people contribute code often becomes the reason for the project to exist. They give life to open source projects by buying support and sustenaining their livelihood. I am sick of this constant myopic view that all corporations are evil and people working there have no regard for open source development. The truth is probably closer to being opposite than the ant…

I was only commenting on the reasoning. It's not a question of evil, just of basic business incentives.

> The truth is probably closer to being opposite than the anti-corporate crusader zeitgeist of HN. The point of the original comment was to express that behind all the corporations, there are just real people like you and me.

I'm a (small) business owner so I'm fully conscious of that. But it's a reality that past a certain size a corporation will optimize for its best interests given the current set of rules (law). If a company contribute to open-source it's not because they are nice, it's because the added value in marketing/hiring/commoditizing their competitors makes business sense, otherwise no matter their convictions people would get punished in their performance review, and the stock value would tank. Only specific corporate structures allow people inside a company to go against the baseline.

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#195

Post by bumblebritches5 »

Doctor_Fegg wrote: post #90
vortico wrote: post #3

This might be the largest contributor relicensing project of any IP category: 2800 people and companies. 94% progress is impressive.

OpenStreetMap’s relicensing (from CC-BY-SA to the Open Database Licence) involved more contributors and, unlike Wikipedia’s, wasn’t assisted by a licence hack.

Tell me more about this license hack?

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#196

Post by bumblebritches5 »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #5

> The copyright owner can be either an individual, for example the person who wrote the code originally; or a company, for example a company that employed the person who wrote the code. Here, there be dragonnes... I can easily see an IC agreeing to a relicensing, thinking they had full rights, but their employer, at the time, had a "shower clause," and trying to (and maybe succeeding in) getting that section of licen…

> the LLVM

NO.

just like Batman, it's a proper name, "the" does not belong.

Re: LLVM relicensing update and call for help

#198

Post by sangnoir »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #187
sangnoir wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The main issue of GPL comes from the risk to the original creator itself The risk of abiding by the license? The GPL ensures user have access to source code provided under the license, so I'm assuming by "commercializing" you mean hiding away source code that used to be public? The calculus is simple: if you want to make money by doing an open-source bait-and-switch, do not license your code under GPL.

Commercializing can happen in many ways. GPL code in itself can’t even be published on the app store without violating the license. If you are not the complete copyright holder you can run into issues very quickly.

> GPL code in itself can’t even be published on the app store without violating the license

Did you mean without violating the app store EULA? Because the GPL places no restrictions on how generated binaries are distrubuted, only that the source be transmitted to any user upon request.

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