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Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

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Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#201

Post by tbrownaw »

WalterBright wrote: post #21

If you prevent licensing software to large corporations, small corporations won't use it, either, because small corporations may get acquired by large ones. Such a license would be a "poison pill". I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. We picked the Boost license for the D Language Foundation because it is the closest to public domain we could find. Besides, why would "bad guys" be deterred by a license, an…

> If you prevent licensing software to large corporations, small corporations won't use it, either, because small corporations may get acquired by large ones. Such a license would be a "poison pill".

Acquisitions already come with a giant laundry list of IT work to bring things into compliance with internal policies and maybe contractual requirements and such.

Would one more thing that has to be done sooner rather than later really make that much difference?

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#202

Post by nine_k »

type0 wrote: post #187
nine_k wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is impossible to write a real "use for good, not evil" [1] license, because there's no formal, universally accepted notions of good and evil. While there are things that are universally considered good, or considered evil, the areas around them are large, nebulous, and are anything but clearly outlined. Hence legally avoiding the "anti-evil" license terms will always be a relatively easy option for a willing party…

> "the Software shall be used for Good, not Evil." For JSLint, Crockford gave an exemption though: "I give permission to IBM, its customers, partners, and minions, to use JSLint for evil." https://gist.github.com/kemitchell/fdc179d60dc88f0c9b76e5d38...

The very fact that this instantly feels like ironic jest illustrates how impossible it is to seriously limit licenses with broad moral clauses.

One could come up with clauses that could be admissible at court, e.g. "this software is expressly not licensed to be used for anything intended to kill humans". It would not be licensed for military planning software, but would likely be still licensed for a military transport system, or even an anti-drone weapon.

The best actionable clause I could come up with is like so: "your license to use this software for any purpose terminates as soon as a court of [insert jurisdiction] finds that it has been used for [something you are opposed to, but also sufficiently clearly defined, like genocide, or incarceration of peaceful political dissidents], which has resulted from the use of your products and services, and with your prior knowledge of such use". I think I've even saw similar clauses in many commercial licenses, just with not morals-related provisions.

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#203

Post by awesome_dude »

mejutoco wrote: post #155
sokoloff wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you make good or bad resolvable? Is a piece of code being used by Tyson Foods okay? A vegetarian software engineer who contributed to the package might say “no, that use contributes to the killing of animals for food, which is bad.” If you need to evaluate all the context to know whether a license is usable, it makes it extremely hard for “good guys” to use code under that license. (It’s generally very easy fo…

> How do you make good or bad resolvable? It is not a computer program, but a an ethics problem. We can solve it by thinking of the context and the ethics of it. I realize it is the topic of this thread, but OP did not mention anything in relation to licenses, and was just talking about good and bad not existing objectively (without context). I think, if we came with a specific situation, most people with similar val…

> I think, if we came with a specific situation, most people with similar values might reach the same good/bad verdict, and a small minority might reach a different one.

All you doing is agreeing how the context of the situation is determining if the action is "good" or "bad" (which was my point)

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#204

Post by asalahli »

paulbjensen wrote: post #135

In theory you can change the licence and hope that those that use the software respect the licence terms, but that depends on trusting others. I think of the case of the Russian programmer who was arrested and jailed for stealing proprietary code from Goldman Sachs. During the trial it was revealed that Goldman Sachs would use open source software and replace the software licence with their own: "Open source was an i…

https://archive.is/J3n3q

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#205

Post by lenkite »

tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #139

"Bad guys can't use it" is per definition incompatible with free software. For this author's definition of "bad guys" (megacorps), AGPL is probably the easiest poison pill. As with all poison pills, this will also make many (most?) "good" users unable to use it. This project is no curl or database engine, it seems to be a slightly easier way to set HTTP response headers. I bet most of the uses are transitive (someone…

Yeah, the big problem is defining who are the "bad guys". He will probably need to make a "bad-guys_do-not-use.txt" with 10k lines - a file that will the leading star in repo commits, depending on the politics of the week/month/year.

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#206

Post by navane »

generalizations wrote: post #124
navane wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, what is deemed evil by this blog, is what exploites open source. For open source software, that's very relevant. Just like anti democratic values are relevant for democracies. Don't straw man this.

No, I did not. From the article. This is, unfortunately, a straightforward case of poorly-considered moralizing with extremely bad consequences. > Overall, these ideas lead me to believe that the open source movement needs to see itself as in a larger social context. Can we shift the balance of power away from massive companies and their massive harms? Can we prevent Nazis from using our software? Should we even try?…

Whoops you're right. I read it twice and completely overlooked that part. Also one of the seven bullet points points in that direction.

I read it as a more "big corps exploiting open source devs" take (as were six out of seven bullet points), but they did indeed slip that in, and concluded with it even.

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#207

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

bloudermilk wrote: post #96
poopsmithe wrote: post #92

If you're having thoughts about who can and cannot use your free software, I think you're no longer interested in free software.

You’re not wrong, but arguments like this ignore the point. For many authors and maintainers, ‘free software’ and ‘open source’ as traditionally defined result in unsustainable outcomes. The original article cites articles explaining several such issues. Many people in the software industry are looking for new licensing models that take these systemic issues into account. It’s the ecosystem evolving to address curren…

Those "many people" can go ahead and come up with their own brand name for their "new licensing models" instead of hijacking existing ones. The only reason they so insistently want to re-define "free software" and "open source" to include their licenses is to ride on the goodwill associated with them for personal profit; they criticize free riders while themselves attempting to hitch a free ride on the FOSS label.

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#208

Post by oxag3n »

This question bothers me very much. I wanted to open source result of my thesis, which is quite interesting for theoretical CS, but my supervisor strongly recommends to avoid publishing the source code because it is a complex system solving non-trivial problems and his opinion it would be a great start up basis.

I'm not in a position to get full time job and definitely not an entrepreneur, I'd like to collaborate on my ideas, see it grow and may be become useful. The counter-argument from my peers is that it will be just ai-copyed with slight change in variable naming.

Re: Stopping bad guys from using my open source project (feedback wanted)

#210

Post by DANmode »

mamcx wrote: post #80
rsingel wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree and it's happening. I co-founded Outpost Publishers Cooperative as a member services co-op to provide enterprise-level subscription services to publishers on Ghost (which is a non-profit). I'm biased but I think the model of member-service co-ops (like Ace Hardware) providing tailored software services to particular industries is fertile ground. Free of VC incentives, reasonably profitable, aligned incentives…

> how to get to decent product without upfront investment Yeah, this is the hard part. I work in the small “ERP-like” business market and I’ve come up with some good ideas (based on the reaction of the people I talk to). But the problem is that even a small team of about five genuinely solid developers can cost around US $300,000–500,000 per year — and that’s even factoring in that I’m in LATAM!. That’s a lot. To mak…

Bite the bullet, and find something smaller to use for funding the big thing.

(This is the stage I’m at currently.)

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