Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses • Hacker News Board

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#151

Post by tsimionescu » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:28 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #67

infinity0 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SSPL "debate" was indeed a shit-show hijacked by people either abusing permissive-license ideologies with a corporate interest in mind, or so blinded by that ideology that they are unable to grasp the idea that freedom is an inherently contradictory concept, and that to maximise overall freedom across space and time it is necessary to restrict freedoms that result in a restriction of more freedoms. Good on these…

Why did they create SSPL when AGPL already existed? IMHO all use cases can probably be covered by MIT/BSD, GPL, LGPL, and AGPL. Everything else is license proliferation and adds confusion and problems sharing code between projects.

MongoDB was already AGPL, but that didn't suffice. Amazon simply took the free version of MongoDB, as is, deployed it on its systems in a scalable way, and sold that to customers. They gave the code for MongoDB away, per the terms of the AGPL.

Hence, the need for a new license.

However, they seem to have kept the deployment infrastructure as a trade secret, and since that didn't interact directly with MongoDB's interfaces, it șes that it really didn't come under the scope of the AGPL.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#152

Post by xeeeeeeeeeeenu » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:33 PM UTC

infinity0 wrote: post #55

momokoko wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you might want to look into, if you have not already, a topic referred to as "gift culture"[1] The hard reality, that someone like myself believes, is that open source works because most actors try to be considerate of others. It falls apart when everyone acts selfishly. I personally believe the world is better off because we have open source software(as generally defined by the OSI and other groups). So my c…

The SSPL "debate" was indeed a shit-show hijacked by people either abusing permissive-license ideologies with a corporate interest in mind, or so blinded by that ideology that they are unable to grasp the idea that freedom is an inherently contradictory concept, and that to maximise overall freedom across space and time it is necessary to restrict freedoms that result in a restriction of more freedoms. Good on these…

>I still consider SSPL to be "free software" very much within the ideals that movement, regardless of what the OSI says.

SSPL is less free than most of propertiary EULAs. It is literally impossible to comply with the section 13 of the license.

SSPL requires the user to release the source code of everything they are using to host their service and license it under the terms of SSPL. Everything, that even includes operating system and firmware of the server used to host the user's service. No one is able to do that.

I don't understand how can anyone defend that awful license.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#153

Post by Nursie » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:34 PM UTC

xeeeeeeeeeeenu wrote: post #54

jchw wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's certainly an interesting point of view. Take something that's commercial, for example, like Microsoft's docx format. If Open Office/Libre Office implements support for docx, is it hijacking proprietary formats, and siphoning customers off of proprietary projects? (edit: as it has been pointed out, .docx is a bad example, because it was standardized, but the point stands, I believe.) I hate that this stuff hits H…

.docx (Office Open XML) isn't propertiary, it's an open standard.

It's a bad open standard though - microsoft basically stacked ISO to push it through.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#154

Post by quickthrower2 » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:52 PM UTC

jeena wrote: post #123

mwfunk wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone gets into writing open source with the goal of making money off of it and gets pissed when others “extract value” from their work, that person never should have gotten into open source to begin with. In fact, for their own sake, they should probably get right the fuck out of open source pronto, because they are seriously missing all the points in spectacular fashion.

I don't agree. Open Source has always been about making money. What you might mean is Free Software, which is quite different from a philosophical point of view.

Open source isn’t particularly about making money. The making money is orthogonal and potentially harder if the source is available with a permissive license. Free software is about freedom of the user to make copies and distribute the source code and again money is orthogonal.

But I think in practice both open source and free software are hard to monitise. Often the open source software is a marketing platform for a managed service ala “we made it were the experts let us host it for you”

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#155

Post by msbarnett » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:57 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #67

infinity0 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SSPL "debate" was indeed a shit-show hijacked by people either abusing permissive-license ideologies with a corporate interest in mind, or so blinded by that ideology that they are unable to grasp the idea that freedom is an inherently contradictory concept, and that to maximise overall freedom across space and time it is necessary to restrict freedoms that result in a restriction of more freedoms. Good on these…

Why did they create SSPL when AGPL already existed? IMHO all use cases can probably be covered by MIT/BSD, GPL, LGPL, and AGPL. Everything else is license proliferation and adds confusion and problems sharing code between projects.

> Why did they create SSPL when AGPL already existed?

Because they were already using the AGPL, and it did precisely Nothing to stop Amazon from turning into a massive free-rider who undermined the very ability of the project to fund continued development of the project Amazon was free-riding on.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#156

Post by detaro » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 11:01 PM UTC

Reelin wrote: post #150

AnaniasAnanas wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind elaborating on that? I am interested in a super-copyleft license for my next project and thought that AGPL was the "best" option out there. In what ways can it be bypassed?

Check mongoDB's SSPL FAQ ( https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license... ). As far as I'm concerned, SSPL is superior to AGPL in that it catches all the bits that make your software actually work , forcing you to include them as part of the offering. I honestly don't understand the apparent objection to referring to a license with such a clause as open source - all it does is close a (major imo) loo…

> “Service Source Code” means the Corresponding Source for the Program or the modified version, and the Corresponding Source for all programs that you use to make the Program or modified version available as a service, including, without limitation, management software, user interfaces, application program interfaces, automation software, monitoring software, backup software, storage software and hosting software, all such that a user could run an instance of the service using the Service Source Code you make available.”

So I can't run a service for it on VPS at a hosting provider, because I can not share the source to the backup system, hypervisor and load-balancer they use? Are firmware-blobs in my kernel-drivers ok? That seems extremely open and far-reaching, to the point that one could argue that it clearly is intended to forbid offerings as a service, even if it pretends not to.

EDIT: after looking up details about the "comical debate" (quote article), that indeed appears to have been one of the arguments. Not surprising the article badmouths the OSI, but doesn't actually engage with or even dare mention their arguments.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#157

Post by ryukafalz » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 11:02 PM UTC

Reelin wrote: post #150

AnaniasAnanas wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind elaborating on that? I am interested in a super-copyleft license for my next project and thought that AGPL was the "best" option out there. In what ways can it be bypassed?

Check mongoDB's SSPL FAQ ( https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license... ). As far as I'm concerned, SSPL is superior to AGPL in that it catches all the bits that make your software actually work , forcing you to include them as part of the offering. I honestly don't understand the apparent objection to referring to a license with such a clause as open source - all it does is close a (major imo) loo…

From my reading of SSPL v1, it would seem extremely difficult to use in concert with other free software; it requires you to distribute all software[0] you're using to run your service under the SSPL. The trouble is, you can't do that if you're using any other software in your environment that's licensed under another copyleft license such as the GPL. Does this apply all the way down to the Linux kernel? Who knows!

SSPL v2 appears to be an attempt to correct this[1], by explicitly excluding system components and allowing other FSF/OSI approved licenses if you're unable to release something under the SSPL yourself. But note that not even MongoDB, the project that the SSPL came from, is using v2 at the moment.

The GPL and AGPL have been around longer and have much more of a community behind them, and both versions of the SSPL are incompatible with them. At least for the time being, I'm inclined to stick with the AGPL for network services, because I like having access to all the GPL/AGPL code out there. Maybe someday I'll take a look at SSPL v2; I wouldn't touch SSPL v1 with a 10-foot pole.

[0] "all programs that you use to make the Program or modified version available as a service, including, without limitation, management software, user interfaces, application program interfaces, automation software, monitoring software, backup software, storage software and hosting software" [1] http://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review_lists.o...

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#158

Post by wolco » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 11:03 PM UTC

jeena wrote: post #123

mwfunk wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone gets into writing open source with the goal of making money off of it and gets pissed when others “extract value” from their work, that person never should have gotten into open source to begin with. In fact, for their own sake, they should probably get right the fuck out of open source pronto, because they are seriously missing all the points in spectacular fashion.

I don't agree. Open Source has always been about making money. What you might mean is Free Software, which is quite different from a philosophical point of view.

Open source has been about protecting open software going forward.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#159

Post by jimktrains2 » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 11:14 PM UTC

msbarnett wrote: post #155

phkahler wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did they create SSPL when AGPL already existed? IMHO all use cases can probably be covered by MIT/BSD, GPL, LGPL, and AGPL. Everything else is license proliferation and adds confusion and problems sharing code between projects.

> Why did they create SSPL when AGPL already existed? Because they were already using the AGPL, and it did precisely Nothing to stop Amazon from turning into a massive free-rider who undermined the very ability of the project to fund continued development of the project Amazon was free-riding on.

But why should Amazon be prevented from running said software? "Because I don't like it" isn't a good reason.

Re: Lack of leadership in open source results in source-available licenses

#160

Post by jimktrains2 » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 11:19 PM UTC

mavelikara wrote: post #64

danShumway wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> some competing project elsewhere - student projects, in your example - will eat your market. If a student somewhere is willing to do the same thing as your company for free and release their work under MIT, why is that a problem? This smacks to me of Microsoft complaining that projects like Linux shouldn't be allowed to exist, because its unreasonable to expect them to compete with free. If eventually we get into a…

> If a student somewhere is willing to do the same thing as your company for free and release their work under MIT, why is that a problem? There isn't a problem with that. The problem is when such projects aspire to commercialize their work, find it hard, and then complain when other commercial entities exploit their work. The hypocrisy I am pointing out is that to get a software adopted initially projects choose ove…

"exploit", you need the quotes because nothing was exploited. Someone else was able to execute better than you were, that isn't a crime.