Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Single vendor is the new proprietary

opensource.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 98 posts

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#11

Post by [deleted] »

Spivak wrote: post #9
RyanHamilton wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OSI isn't the software industry. It's sponsored by Google, amazon then ms via github in order of sponsor donations. It's financed by the hyperscalars. https://opensource.org/sponsors

This is such a crazy retelling of history that it's hard to take seriously. Open Source was not some brainchild of megacorps but very much so a mission of the wider software industry to band together to have an alternative to hugely expensive proprietary software vendors -- namely Microsoft and Oracle, and to prevent people from imposing their will on users via software in a manner that users had no possible redress…

[deleted]

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#12

Post by havilland »

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #7
gavinhoward wrote: post #6

If it is, then Open Source has won, right? And we can disband the OSI, right? I suspect that's not the message they intended to send. (I read the article, btw.) As the author of source available software, this article merely seems to be screeching from big players that they can't exploit some software anymore.

I'm not following; how does an onslaught of fake FOSS mean FOSS has won? If anything it sounds like it needs more defending than ever.

How is fake FOSS different from FOSS ?

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#13

Post by Spivak »

Retric wrote: post #10
Spivak wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a crazy retelling of history that it's hard to take seriously. Open Source was not some brainchild of megacorps but very much so a mission of the wider software industry to band together to have an alternative to hugely expensive proprietary software vendors -- namely Microsoft and Oracle, and to prevent people from imposing their will on users via software in a manner that users had no possible redress…

OSI is from 1998 so it’s much younger than the open source movement. BSD was approaching 20 and Linux was what 7 years old at that point?

The free software movement is for sure older than that but I can't find any verifiable source of "open source" being used in its current form earlier than the 90's.

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#14

Post by dartos »

havilland wrote: post #12
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not following; how does an onslaught of fake FOSS mean FOSS has won? If anything it sounds like it needs more defending than ever.

How is fake FOSS different from FOSS ?

Is fake kindness different from real kindness?

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#15

Post by bee_rider »

I somehow still don’t get what single vendor open source code is, even after reading the article.

Is it code that is open source but the license says “no forking.” And maybe the license says they are allowed to fork it and chance the license to proprietary?

Or is it code that is open source, but nobody has ever bothered to fork it. With the potential spin that sometimes code is just so specific that nobody would bother forking it because it is super tied to some platform or hardware.

The former, that just seems like looming proprietary code. The latter, I dunno, can’t blame people for implementing niche projects I guess.

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#17

Post by AnthonyMouse »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #8
gavinhoward wrote: post #6

If it is, then Open Source has won, right? And we can disband the OSI, right? I suspect that's not the message they intended to send. (I read the article, btw.) As the author of source available software, this article merely seems to be screeching from big players that they can't exploit some software anymore.

I thought the article was arguing that say Redis was while “open” the codebase is owned by one company and hence that’s no different to proprietary. To which I say, yeah we know. I mean I can fork Linux kernel tonight and announce my big new plans, and there will be zero installs. Big FOSS software is there because they built a reputation of constant quality over years (as successful proprietary companies should and…

There are tons of forks of the Linux kernel. For example, Debian ships their own, and Ubuntu, which is based on Debian, ships a different one. These are kept mostly in sync with upstream but it's completely plausible that if upstream made a change they didn't like they'd just revert it.

The actual problems are with things like systemd, which are enormous and lack standardization but get integrated into numerous parts of the system. Then you can't replace a piece of it or your piece has to integrate with all of the things the original did, but since none of the integrations follow any standards they can change at any time and people can add new ones that only work with the original and -- surprise -- your replacement is suddenly broken.

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#18

Post by gavinhoward »

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #7
gavinhoward wrote: post #6

If it is, then Open Source has won, right? And we can disband the OSI, right? I suspect that's not the message they intended to send. (I read the article, btw.) As the author of source available software, this article merely seems to be screeching from big players that they can't exploit some software anymore.

I'm not following; how does an onslaught of fake FOSS mean FOSS has won? If anything it sounds like it needs more defending than ever.

It means that the expectation is that the source is open. The default used to be closed source, so in essence, Open Source has won.

Personally, I don't see source available as a bad thing. [1]

[1]: https://gavinhoward.com/2023/12/is-source-available-really-t...

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#19

Post by vinceguidry »

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #7
gavinhoward wrote: post #6

If it is, then Open Source has won, right? And we can disband the OSI, right? I suspect that's not the message they intended to send. (I read the article, btw.) As the author of source available software, this article merely seems to be screeching from big players that they can't exploit some software anymore.

I'm not following; how does an onslaught of fake FOSS mean FOSS has won? If anything it sounds like it needs more defending than ever.

Nobody is discussing FOSS here, only OSS. The only solution to capitalistic shenanigans is the software commune, OSS isn't a commune, FOSS is. OSS is, essentially, a software cartel disguised as a philanthropic enterprise.

Advocates of OSS want to live in a world where bigcorps and little guys can coexist, this has always been a pipe dream, since day one. FOSS locks the bigcorps out of the discussion, or rather, forces them to compete on the same playing field as the little guy, which amounts to the same thing.

So you see these articles come out every now and again bemoaning capitalistic greed. Communist utopia is right there bro. Just open your eyes and stop letting bigcorps eat your lunch every couple of years or so.

Re: Single vendor is the new proprietary

#20

Post by lmeyerov »

bee_rider wrote: post #15

I somehow still don’t get what single vendor open source code is, even after reading the article. Is it code that is open source but the license says “no forking.” And maybe the license says they are allowed to fork it and chance the license to proprietary? Or is it code that is open source, but nobody has ever bothered to fork it. With the potential spin that sometimes code is just so specific that nobody would both…

I like to think of Open Governance vs Open Source on topics like, if someone adds SSO to the OSS repo, will the main vendor behind it reject the PR because it breaks their OSS core business model
Post reply on HN