Live data from Hacker News

Lerna relicences to protest ICE

github.com

111–120 of 162 posts

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#111
post #108

Remember when people were apprehensive about using React because Facebook might weaponize your usage of it? This project is explicitly stating it can: you might not be on this list today, but there's nothing preventing you from being on it tomorrow. So do you want to commit to integrating it to your stack? While I'm not against their stance at all (at the end of the day, they've gotta do what is going to help them sl…

Indeed. I'll stick with unadulterated Open Source Definition licenses. I know those; I know how to integrate; I know how to comply. They're known entities, and licensing is well aware how and what they are used for.

This tirefire of a license is untested and a "Social Justice of the Week". Frankly, the further I am away from the likes of these, the better.

I also greatly appreciate what Stallman said, here: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/programs-must-not-limit-freed...

" There would be programs banned for use in meat processing, programs banned only for pigs, programs banned only for cows, and programs limited to kosher foods. Someone who hates spinach might write a program allowing use for processing any vegetable except spinach, while a Popeye fan might allow use only for spinach. There would be music programs allowed only for rap music, and others allowed only for classical music. " - RMS

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#112
post #109
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it politics when human rights are violated? I don't think it's "politics" to oppose children separated from their parents.

I fully support peoples' efforts to protest the current US administration, and any other administration. I don't support usurping other people's speech to push protests. Copyleft is a wonderful thing, but we have to treat it with respect and play by the rules, else we risk diluting its legal potency. If this was a single maintainer, or a project that got the rest of its developers to agree on the sublicense, then tha…

I can agree about one maintainer vs many

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#113
James Kyle who did that license change is one of the biggest attention seeker in open source. He is jubilating right now on Twitter and it looks like he got what he wanted as Vice wants to interview him https://twitter.com/jamiebuilds/status/1034883723273990144

James also though he likes to lecture people is also one of the biggest bully in open source, even the creator of Ember called him out https://twitter.com/tomdale/status/937618418471198720

Let's not give this toxic person more attention.

As for the license change, it is useless as it is already being forked. Also, if we are going to ban every company that does business with evil government institutions, there would be no one left to use the software. This just looks like what a 12 year old would do, James is kind of too old for these kind of things. Oh well.

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#114
1 point by sbr464 3 minutes ago | parent | edit | delete [-] | on: Lerna adds clause to MIT license blocking certain ...

I respect their decision and rights, but I don't really understand this move. I also believe this sets a dangerous potential pattern within the developer community. I personally don't agree with certain statements/immigration/ICE etc. but I'm more put back by this.

Coding is becoming easier and will increasingly include more of the general population (which is a good thing). This means it's about to become much more diverse in regards to religion, political beliefs, personal morals, citizenship, etc.

I don't mean this in the political/philosophical sense. I mean soon people will start showing up in Github/twitter comments, contributing pull requests, with a genuine interest about coding, who look like people you personally dislike. Maybe they are wearing a Trump t-shirt in their profile photo, but their code is great. Are you going to reject their pull request or ignore their comments?

Governments & company policies change frequently. There's also an unlimited combination of potential beliefs, moral stances, crimes by an unlimited number of people and companies. At what point would you decide to add or remove amendments to your license?

I also feel it's hypocritical to use a product owned by Microsoft (github), while calling them out in your license by name. I mean, are you protesting Microsoft or aren't you?

How do you know that an upstream dependency you are benefitting from wasn't created by one of these companies?

To highlight the humor of this line of thinking, why not block oppressive regimes, serial killers (>= 6 people, <6 are ok), certain religious groups with worse principals than ICE?

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#115
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main goal is less to hurt the companies that are supporting ICE by not allowing them to use an open source project, but actually bring a lot more awareness that these companies DO IN FACT support ICE. I had no idea Palantir was working on the technology to help deport people https://theintercept.com/2017/03/02/palantir-provides-the-en...

I'm honestly glad you are now aware of that fact. Now that we are both aware, let's talk about their license. Is it now a non-free license? How does it affect their current non-Palantir user base? Is it enforceable? Was it meant to be enforceable? Are there ways in which a license written by people who aren't themselves lawyers can come back to bite them? This entire digression goes away completely if they put the re…

part that gives me pause, even though I'm 100% okay with being against the current policy of separation: what next? Totally silly, but what if it comes out that some food company is engaging in behavior that is deemed immoral. Lerna then tacks that onto the next revision of itself. But I, myself, really like food company's product and don't feel the controversy is warranted. Then what?

I understand the motivation with wanting to protest in the best way you can, but I think in this case, it is going to do more harm than good.

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#116

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, not wanting your work to be used for purposes you deem evil seems commendable. On the other hand, imagine how a trend of this could look. Library X is off-limits for companies doing GMO. Library Y is off-limits for advertising companies. Database X can't be used by anyone who contracts with the defense department. And the restrictions are updated as various issues come into the…

And thus you see the issue... Open source isn't open source if your beliefs of who uses the projects are involved.

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MIT allows sublicensing explicitly. It's why you can include MIT licensed code in proprietary software, something that the GPL is designed to prevent. What you can't do is retroactively apply this to old code. The named entities could use older versions of the code, but in newer versions the new license would apply.

What stops someone from forking it and re-sublicensing it back to vanilla MIT?

Nothing :D https://github.com/LernaOpenSource/LernaOpenSource

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#118
post #59
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, when you phrase something without context it's easy to make it sound insane. When you include the context where they need to verify that it's not human trafficking and that children are separated from their parents every day when the parents are arrested for any other crime, it's not quite as insane.

I believe you are the one lacking context. I'll assume your are not being intentionally malicious and are just naive. Abuse is almost certainly occurs in the presence of power structures with severe disparity. Children are being placed in the custody of people who lack appropriate training, background checks and supervision. Children can not defend themselves and they are separated from the people who do protect them…

Is there human trafficking going on on the border or not? If yes, then the detention policy and separating kids from their handlers upon ingest is happening for legitimate reasons.

> forcing children into these systems, especially when there is no real need for it, is abhorrent behavior

HOW that detention is being executed is definitely worth debating and certainly how individuals are treated can verge into tragic territory. Your disagreement extends into the WHY, possibly for noble political reasons, but which turns a blind eye to a serious humanitarian crisis.

> I am disgusted by the lack of empathy ...

This is where I got snarky, and deleted what I was going to say. I'll just note that south of the US borders, there is a LOT of human suffering to be disgusted about caused by failed approaches to government there.

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm getting tired of bigots crying about censorship right around the point where they face consequences for being bigots.

I'm getting tired of being called a bigot for disagreeing with other people on complex policy issues.

If you think marriage equality is a “complex policy issue”, then the issue is you.

The other examples listed are not exactly good hills to die on if you want to be perceived as a serious thinker rather than a knee jerk bigot.

Beyond that, if you find youself personally getting called a bigot a lot, you should probably stop and reflect more.

Re: Lerna relicences to protest ICE

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trying to keep politics out of things isn't apolitical, it's the politics of status quo.

Perhaps you're failing to properly appreciate how wonderful the status quo actually is because you're comparing it to a fantasy instead of plausible alternatives. I don't know your specific politics but I bet you don't constantly find ways to inject it into every conversation and every relationship.

Holy strawman Batman!
Post reply on HN