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Getting forked by Microsoft
621–630 of 1001 posts
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#622Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't see why they wouldn't pay it. Oh I do. The person that wanted to setup the meeting likely has no budget control. Big corps like to keep the ability to pay for stuff out of the hands of individuals and isolated in bureaucratic nightmares. You'd be more than reasonable to demand "$1000/hr with 1 hour minimum" for such a consulting and I'd see HR in MS doing an immediate "hell no" to that.
One of the prerequisites for a successful negotiation is the willingness to walk away. This applies to both sides. I did consulting for a few years, years ago, and you'd be surprised what people are willing to pay. You'd also never know that unless you named your rate and were willing to walk away. I'm pretty sure any manager at Microsoft could easily swing a couple K. The main complication would be that this wouldn'…
> you'd be surprised what people are willing to pay.
At least in my company, it very much depends on who's initiating the meeting. If one of our VPs did, then easy, any amount could be approved. However, if it's a team lead, we'd be told to pound sand.
I assumed other companies would be pretty similar.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#623My personal thought is that we need a new kind of license: community open source. No corporations, just community. The problem this addresses is not that Microsoft forked this project. The problem is that when a corporation like Microsoft does this, they harm our community[0]. Open source thrives because a bunch of individuals and groups collaborate. Microsoft, is built around the concept of profit for stock owners a…
But what is the practical difference between that and Spegel's situation? Where is the deterrent?
Microsoft is currently violating the license, and the author's recourse is this HN post.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#624Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, charity. That's exactly what these trillion dollar empires think of those open source maintainers. Microsoft pulled this same stunt multiple times on os maintainers.
Open source has been hijacked by trillion dollar hyperscalers. It's time we switch to "fair source" or "equitable source". Put MAU/DAU/ARR/market cap limits in your license. Open to everyone with a market cap under $1B or revenues under $100M. All others, please see our "business@" email. Place viral terms like the AGPL that requires that all other systems touched by your code to be open - especially the backend/serv…
Those companies can produce legal abstraction hacking solutions faster then you can develop shielding ones. You needs something poisonous ,costing money or work with each usage preventing mass adoption without a complete rewrite .
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#625Earlier quoted context omitted.
> (A)GPLv3 does not prevent their projects from being used. It really does. It stops it being used by people who need or want to use other licences. I believe it stops it being used on iOS and (probably) Android apps. The GPL world and the permissive licence worlds are walled off from each other in significant ways for lots of reasons. Source: I maintain an app where I didn't choose and can't change the licence. And…
> I believe it stops it being used on iOS and (probably) Android apps. The GPL world and the permissive licence worlds are walled off from each other in significant ways for lots of reasons. I fully agree that (A)GPLv3 code effectively stops code from being used by many large companies (every place I’ve worked in the last decade has a near blanket policy on refusing to use code licensed that way except in very specif…
> but the advent of dynamic linking of libraries in iOS
I'm not sure you can dynamically link to GPL in this case (LGPL maybe )? And I recall that there's also issues around signed bundles used on the various stores.
But the fact that we're not sure and the fact that we're having this conversation rather proves my point. People who aren't fully in the GPL world usually have to steer clear of GPL code entirely. This goes double for hobbyists and small orgs who can't afford a legal team.
> even if they aren’t available on Google Play.
As much as it's regretful this is a huge issue for most people who want to make apps that other people can use.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#626Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, charity. That's exactly what these trillion dollar empires think of those open source maintainers. Microsoft pulled this same stunt multiple times on os maintainers.
Open source has been hijacked by trillion dollar hyperscalers. It's time we switch to "fair source" or "equitable source". Put MAU/DAU/ARR/market cap limits in your license. Open to everyone with a market cap under $1B or revenues under $100M. All others, please see our "business@" email. Place viral terms like the AGPL that requires that all other systems touched by your code to be open - especially the backend/serv…
Yes when projects like Alpine Linux are in the ropes due to lack of funding something needs to change.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#627[deleted]
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#628Earlier quoted context omitted.
They most likely understand, they don’t trust their engineering coworkers to not ignore it. Blanket ban is an easy sell when upside is limited and downside is basically unbounded.
My experience talking to big corp IP lawyers is they have a set of policies ("open source bad; protecting our IP good") and will make up any justification to support those policies, even if their justifications are plainly incorrect given the license text. Usually they just stop responding when you point out the obvious contradiction. It'd be one thing if they just said "no" with no justification, but my experience i…
Well, it's great that you have that understanding. But the internet is full of FOSS types fantasy IANALing based half-forgotten RMS FAQs, even in places where they really should know better. Most of these nerd arguments are pretty much worthless if it came to a courtroom.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#629Earlier quoted context omitted.
If it's GPL-like its usage would be mostly confined to open source projects.
That's the whole point. If you build something on top of open source code, your code should be open source too.
Even if this is the case I might not want my library or application to be copyleft. Or even if I do - I might not want everyone else in perpetuity who uses my code to have to use a copyleft licence.
This goes back to the fact that not everyone can choose to use a GPL licence and in a world of compromise and collaboration, that can be a blocker.
Re: Getting forked by Microsoft
#630I want to make a point that might be misinterpreted, so I want to make clear I am not at all defending Microsoft.
That said, Microsoft isn't a person and has no agency by itself. It is specific persons/developers/managers violating the licenses and stringing along open source developers in bad faith.
Who are these people? Why is the blame not falling on them, specifically?