The OSS community has always had an uneasy tension between a) for-profit enterprise which provides most of the man-power and b) anti-commercial poor adolescents of all ages who simultaneously think that contributing to OSS is a moral obligation and that the license and copyright assignment they fetishize includes a "All contributors will be made happy despite their total lack of business sense" clause, somewhere.
Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
21–30 of 75 posts
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#22decided they should be paid for their work. There is one slight problem however. Growl is Open Source Software. So? You can sell open source software. Just because software is GPL/BSD licenced doesn't mean you can't sell it. Open Source ≠ Non-commerical. Closed Source ≠ Commmerical. You can change for open source software. If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software i…
If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software is open source, everyone who buys a copy is allowed to sell the software themselves and they don't have to give the original author any money. They also cannot stop someone taking an older version of the code and distributing it.
You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to sell it or even redistribute the source.
"Open Source" is not a license. GPL, BSD, MIT, Apache etc. are all open source licenses with very different rules. Here's a list of licenses many people consider "open source licenses": http://www.opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical
Conversely, you can have closed source applications which allow you to redistribute them or even sell at will. Closed source software is just more likely to have a license which is very strict about redistribution, that's all.
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
To my knowledge, the source to the 1.3.x release isn't public. I wonder whether it's a complete rewrite from scratch or whether 1.3.x still contains patches from external contributors and whether they agreed that their work be sold for money.
They agreed that their work would be sold for money when they contributed to a BSD licensed project. If they cared, they could release their patches.
BSD is irrelevant here. If it was a GPLv3 licenced work it could still be sold. The agreeded to their work begin sellable when they contributed to an open source project.
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#24decided they should be paid for their work. There is one slight problem however. Growl is Open Source Software. So? You can sell open source software. Just because software is GPL/BSD licenced doesn't mean you can't sell it. Open Source ≠ Non-commerical. Closed Source ≠ Commmerical. You can change for open source software. If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software i…
If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software is open source, everyone who buys a copy is allowed to sell the software themselves and they don't have to give the original author any money. They also cannot stop someone taking an older version of the code and distributing it. What? I really don't get why so many people don't understand that "Open Source" does not mean yo…
You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to sell it or even redistribute the source.
Not really. It depends on the exact licence but just about every 'open source' licence, and the Open Source Definition from the OSI and the Free Software Defintion from the FSF will requite that the licence lets the people who get the software to be allowed to redistribute it.
Just look at the link you provided for 'open source definition': "Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code. The distribution terms of open-source software must comply with the following criteria:", and №1 being: "The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different sources. The license shall not require a royalty or other fee for such sale."
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
So the question is. Can you make a fork and call it "Growl" or would the "new" growl try to sue the hell out of you?
If you use the latest BSD released version then you're ok. The code is free for public use. Were you to make it commercial though I think you would be liable as you would need the explicit permission of the original owner to do so. EDIT: It seems after further research the license that was being used prohibits the name "Growl" being used to promote any derivative works of the same name without explicit permission fro…
Were you to make it commercial though I think you would be liable as you would need the explicit permission of the original owner to do so.
Just about every open source licence, include the BSD released code, explictly gives you the permission to sell the software. If the original author released Growl 10 years under an open source licence then they gave you the permission to sell it commerically then.
The name is complicated and usually falls under trademark law, and hence you probably could be sued for claiming that your fork is "Growl" when the average person thinks that only $ORIGINAL_AUTHOR can release "Growl".
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#26Drama. He only got a one month ban. The mailing list is not community owned so when subscribers do things that the owners don't like they're free to do whatever they want. Fork the mailing list.
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software is open source, everyone who buys a copy is allowed to sell the software themselves and they don't have to give the original author any money. They also cannot stop someone taking an older version of the code and distributing it. What? I really don't get why so many people don't understand that "Open Source" does not mean yo…
You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to sell it or even redistribute the source. Not really. It depends on the exact licence but just about every 'open source' licence, and the Open Source Definition from the OSI and the Free Software Defintion from the FSF will requite that the licence lets the people who get the software to be allowed to redistribute it. Just look at the link…
The OSI was founded in 1998, but companies such as SAP provided their ERP systems with full readable source code much earlier than that, and it was called "open source" (as opposed to "closed source" which was more common with COTS).
However, it is explicitly forbidden in the licence to re-sell it or re-distribute it.
The term pre-dates the organisation's re-definition of it for their own purposes.
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#28decided they should be paid for their work. There is one slight problem however. Growl is Open Source Software. So? You can sell open source software. Just because software is GPL/BSD licenced doesn't mean you can't sell it. Open Source ≠ Non-commerical. Closed Source ≠ Commmerical. You can change for open source software. If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software i…
If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software is open source, everyone who buys a copy is allowed to sell the software themselves and they don't have to give the original author any money. They also cannot stop someone taking an older version of the code and distributing it. What? I really don't get why so many people don't understand that "Open Source" does not mean yo…
"Open Source" [...] just means you can view the source.
No. See, for example, the Open Source Definition [1] by the Open Source Initiative [2] which opens with the statement "Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code." Wikipedia states that their "definition is widely recognized as the standard or de facto definition." [3]
You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to sell it or even redistribute the source.
Again, no. The Open Source Definition states that "The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software" and "The program must include source code, and must allow distribution in source code as well as compiled form."
Note that the term "Open Source" isn't trademarked [3] (YMMV), so you can call pretty much anything you want Open Source (IANAL), but that doesn't mean that anyone else would be likely to agree with you. In much the same way, I can point at the small wooden giraffe on my bookcase and call it a delicious slice of blueberry cheesecake, but you probably wouldn't agree with me and it is unlikely to taste good.
Microsoft once wanted to achieve something similar to what you wrote. But even ten years ago they recognised that their goal wouldn't be recognised as "open source", and so they called their program "shared source." [4]
"Open Source" is not a license. GPL, BSD, MIT, Apache etc. are all open source licenses with very different rules.
This is true as far as it goes (although the use of "very" is certainly arguable), and it is even worth remarking that open source licenses are often mutually-incompatible. However open source licenses all have certain features in common [1], and when talking about these commonalities, it is not unreasonable to use the phrase "open source license" rather than writing "GPL, BSD, MIT, Apache etc." each and every time.
[1] http://www.opensource.org/osd.html
[2] http://www.opensource.org/
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software#Definition...
[4] http://www.microsoft.com/resources/sharedsource/default.mspx
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to sell it or even redistribute the source. Not really. It depends on the exact licence but just about every 'open source' licence, and the Open Source Definition from the OSI and the Free Software Defintion from the FSF will requite that the licence lets the people who get the software to be allowed to redistribute it. Just look at the link…
The OSI was founded in 1998, but companies such as SAP provided their ERP systems with full readable source code much earlier than that, and it was called "open source" (as opposed to "closed source" which was more common with COTS). However, it is explicitly forbidden in the licence to re-sell it or re-distribute it. The term pre-dates the organisation's re-definition of it for their own purposes.
Yes, and "gay" used to mean a different thing. Nowadays the only widespread definition of Open Source is the one defined by the OSI. Using it to mean something else is deceptive.
Re: Growl fork maintainer banned from Growl mailinglist after fixing bugs
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
If something is open source you can't complain if someone sells it. Obviously if the software is open source, everyone who buys a copy is allowed to sell the software themselves and they don't have to give the original author any money. They also cannot stop someone taking an older version of the code and distributing it. What? I really don't get why so many people don't understand that "Open Source" does not mean yo…
"Open Source" [...] just means you can view the source. No. See, for example, the Open Source Definition [1] by the Open Source Initiative [2] which opens with the statement "Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code." Wikipedia states that their "definition is widely recognized as the standard or de facto definition." [3] You can publish your code open source, charge for it and still forbid people to s…
You are right, very good points.
So maybe I was wrong but I dealt with open source earlier than the OSI came up with the definition. What they call "Open Source" is more "Free (as in freedom, libre) Software" to me.
I guess my definition is outdated but I still feel "Open Source" should just mean, well... open source :) What's the difference between "Free Software" and "Open Source" as coined by OSI?