My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL • Hacker News Board

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#141

Post by zzzeek » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:04 PM UTC

I think the distinction between "download and run" software vs. "libraries used to build new programs" should always be stated in this GPL vs. not discussion.

For "download and run" software, having it be GPL IMO doesn't limit too much who will ultimately be using your software. But if you are writing a programming library that would be used to create new software, GPL and even the LGPL will scare away a lot of commercial users, as well as projects that themselves hope to attract commercial users. If you don't care about commerical users, then it doesn't matter. But I think most people that write programming libraries care a lot about this.

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#142

Post by CJefferson » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:06 PM UTC

c0l0 wrote: post #122

CJefferson wrote: post #111

My problem with the GPL is more low level. It (in my opinion) doesn't work well over very long periods. I work on an open source system which is over 20 years old. For a long time it was GPL v2. We had to either go GPL v2+, which assumes the FSF will never go crazy, or stick with GPL v2, which is incompatible with v3, which causes various problems. The GPL v2 and v3 are really strict compared to most other licenses,…

> [...] We had to either go GPL v2+, which assumes the FSF will never go crazy, [...] This is a rather common common misconception. If you use the "Version 2 of the GPL or any later version"-clause in your specific GPL licensing lingo, then any re-distributor may CHOOSE to distribute under GPLv3, or GPLv4 (if it ever exists), or, for that matter, also GPLv2. You're not bound to re-distribute under GPLv${latest} becau…

A future GPL v4 could say "Your code can be converted to the MIT license", or even "your code can be used by company X" in the event of a takeover (which I don't consider an impossible option).

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#143

Post by simion314 » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:07 PM UTC

wrs wrote: post #96

simion314 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>First, I'm not a lawyer, but I've always seen the MIT license as being more "free", If you are a lawyer can you maybe be more clear about "more free" , more free relative to what? AFAIK GPL protects the user freedom and I think you are referring at the programmers freedom, GPL is a license that respects the users/society as a group, most people here are developers sothey will say that this is less free for them as a…

If “users” = “not programmers” (which I think must be the definition here) then neither license gives users anything except the freedom to hire programmers to do something they want more cheaply. (I include buying software and downloading free-as-in-beer software in “hiring programmers”.) With MIT/GPL the programmers can afford to charge a lot less to do the same job. It’s fundamentally programmer freedom in either c…

You are correct if I am using an MIT/BSD program as a user I have all the freedoms the issue is if someone forks it and closes it up making it proprietary.

You need to think at the larger picture, compare Linux kernel and BSD and how the licenses affect the projects and all of the users. With Linux GPL prevents parasitic use, like you get Linux, put your proprietary thing on top, close it off and give it to some users, this users will have no freedom to know what the code they run does, no freedom to change it and distribute it. The fact that a user does not code is irrelevant because they ca always pay for others to modify things.

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#144

Post by kemitchell » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:08 PM UTC

dllthomas wrote: post #137

kemitchell wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a lawyer, and I really appreciated your "free" versus "fair" line. One tidbit on the GPLs: They require you to share alike if you share the software with others, but do not require you to share the software with others. You can make changes and larger programs entirely for your own or your company's internal use, and not share anything. The GPLs mention this explicitly, and implement it using concepts like "dist…

> That led eventually to AGPL, a kind of fork of GPL Yes. > but outside FSF Initially. The current version was published by the FSF in 2007.

I wasn't clear. The reciprocal licenses that require sharing alike, with or without distribution, came from outside FSF.

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#145

Post by klyrs » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:09 PM UTC

kerkeslager wrote: post #129

flamtap wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But at a certain point you just have to realize that there are differing points of view, that is just the way things go, and "progress" includes all of them. This is really insightful, to me. Worth keeping in mind in today’s world.

Eh, is it really insightful? It just seems straightforwardly wrong to me. Nazism is a viewpoint. Does progress include that? I know I'm triggering Godwin's law here, but if you're literally saying that progress includes ALL viewpoints, you're really opening yourself up to including some really ridiculously outlandish ideals.

There's an addendum, regarding speaking out against actual nazism

https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2018/06/19/27874178/godwins...

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#146

Post by simion314 » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:10 PM UTC

godshatter wrote: post #102

simion314 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>First, I'm not a lawyer, but I've always seen the MIT license as being more "free", If you are a lawyer can you maybe be more clear about "more free" , more free relative to what? AFAIK GPL protects the user freedom and I think you are referring at the programmers freedom, GPL is a license that respects the users/society as a group, most people here are developers sothey will say that this is less free for them as a…

I was looking at it from the programmer's perspective. Specifically, from the perspective of someone who built something themselves and distributed it. From what I can tell, the user's freedoms (assuming no changes) are pretty much the same. They can use the software without worry.

Yes, the direct users of teh MIT program have the freedoms, the issue is the project can be hijacked and made proprietary and then sold to the users. As an example the fact Webkit is opensource is because it was impossible to close source the KHTML fork.

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#147

Post by lioeters » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:11 PM UTC

kickopotomus wrote: post #97

kemitchell wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a lawyer, and I really appreciated your "free" versus "fair" line. One tidbit on the GPLs: They require you to share alike if you share the software with others, but do not require you to share the software with others. You can make changes and larger programs entirely for your own or your company's internal use, and not share anything. The GPLs mention this explicitly, and implement it using concepts like "dist…

That is fascinating. Do you happen to know of any good resources for pitfalls/downsides of other popular licenses (bonus if layman friendly)?

This one is a good resource:

Software Licenses in Plain English https://tldrlegal.com/

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#148

Post by megous » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:13 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #93

It's a very natural human reaction to push back against the idea that someone else might profit from your work--whether or not you have any real opportunity to profit yourself. That was really one of the geniuses of open source licensing (including the GPL) as it developed. By contrast, in the PC world for example, there were a lot of licenses along the lines of "free for educational use only" or "you can't use this…

> It's a very natural human reaction to push back against the idea that someone else might profit from your work--whether or not you have any real opportunity to profit yourself.

Purpose of GPL is not to avoid profiting from other people's work. It's to give user's freedom to inspect, modify and re-use the software.

I now have a mental blacklist of GPL violators, that I bought or were given the HW of, that is useless, bugged, or otherwise crippled, and can't be updated and fixed, or used for new innovative things, because they failed to meet their obligations under the GPL.

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#149

Post by progval » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:13 PM UTC

kemitchell wrote: post #61

godshatter wrote: post #24

First, I'm not a lawyer, but I've always seen the MIT license as being more "free", whereas the GPL is more "fair". Both licenses are pretty much the same for users of the code. Where they differ is that the MIT license gives you the freedom to make an awesome change to the free code you were given, and add it to your closed source application with no obligation to give those enhancements you made to the code to anyo…

I am a lawyer, and I really appreciated your "free" versus "fair" line. One tidbit on the GPLs: They require you to share alike if you share the software with others, but do not require you to share the software with others. You can make changes and larger programs entirely for your own or your company's internal use, and not share anything. The GPLs mention this explicitly, and implement it using concepts like "dist…

> when it turned out folks often ran software for others to use over networks

aka the SaaS/cloud loophole

Re: My Personal Journey from MIT to GPL

#150

Post by microtherion » Fri, Jun 14, 2019, 5:14 PM UTC

kerkeslager wrote: post #126

threwawasy1228 wrote: post #65

I can't relate to this at all, I feel like I went the opposite way. I started out putting all of my work out under GPL but slowly realized how restrictive and demanding such a license actually is, I think public domain is the license that provides the most good to the world as a whole. It enriches everyone, even those who I don't necessarily agree with. It is a much more powerful statement in my view to provide work…

> If that means a professor wants to put the work into their course and help to instruct a class with it, that is great too. Just to be very clear, neither the MIT nor GPL licenses prevent this.

Under a strict interpretation of the GPL, a student who copied code out of a textbook to use in a commercial project would be infringing the license.

I've never come across this with GPL code, but I've been a bit uncomfortable about reading Numerical Recipes too closely because their code is restrictively licensed.