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It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

drewdevault.com

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Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#51

Post by Fuxy »

I don't understand why everyone is so against his point as far as I'm aware even wikipedia says under "Open source license"[1] that "Licenses which only permit non-commercial redistribution or modification of the source code for personal use only are generally not considered as open-source licenses."

So his point is valid you can't advertise your product as open source if it's not and you shouldn't be allowed to trick the community into thinking it is.

Companies can use whatever license they like it's their right but advertising it as open source when it isn't just to take advantage of the now large community of open source contributors is not acceptable.

Using “Apache+Commons Clause” is just one way used to trick people into believing it's open source when it's not; you may not be using it like that but do you honestly think a company with a team of lawyers didn't do this intentionally so they can take advantage of the open source community?

[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license)

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#52

Post by staticassertion »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #36
staticassertion wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I won't address your analogy since I think it's obviously quite different. Ultimately, people want to keep their code open, develop in the open, bring in contributors, make it easy to adopt and audit their code, etc. They also want to eat and have a home. The extreme hostility I've seen over the years to every OSS project that tries some new way of monetizing is just absurd and damaging to the concept. > "Hey, you ca…

>every OSS project that tries some new way of monetizing These are not OSS projects. >You're just talking about taking an open source license and adding a restriction around monetizing the code - this is not open source, as it violates one of the 10 or so requirements to be Truly Open Source (by some organization's standards). 4 requirements, upheld by two highly respected organizations. You can read them here: https…

I'm aware of the OSD. I'm referring to open source in the sense of the source code being made available.

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#53

Post by Sir_Cmpwn »

staticassertion wrote: post #52
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>every OSS project that tries some new way of monetizing These are not OSS projects. >You're just talking about taking an open source license and adding a restriction around monetizing the code - this is not open source, as it violates one of the 10 or so requirements to be Truly Open Source (by some organization's standards). 4 requirements, upheld by two highly respected organizations. You can read them here: https…

I'm aware of the OSD. I'm referring to open source in the sense of the source code being made available.

The term most people use for this is "source available". Calling it "open source" is misleading, and continuing to call it that after it's been pointed out to you is flatly dishonest.

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#54

Post by rocqua »

emersion wrote: post #22
hendzen wrote: post #7

At the end of the day, open source projects need developers... and developers need to eat. These license changes have been forced by the business reality of larger cloud companies capturing all the value created by open source communities and leaving OSS developers to starve. Who deserves the value created by Redis? Antirez and the Redis Labs developers? Or Jeff Bezos?

This is not the point. The point is: stop calling open-source stuff that isn't. You shouldn't lie to your users.

So this is just a very harsh discussion of semantics? Moreover, one where the argument is based on common understanding of a term, rather than a literal interpretation of the term.

Because a literal interpretation of open-source is a system where the 'source'(code) is open (to read). Indeed many people understand it to mean more, but that doesn't make that understanding indisputably correct.

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#55

Post by Flimm »

staticassertion wrote: post #52
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>every OSS project that tries some new way of monetizing These are not OSS projects. >You're just talking about taking an open source license and adding a restriction around monetizing the code - this is not open source, as it violates one of the 10 or so requirements to be Truly Open Source (by some organization's standards). 4 requirements, upheld by two highly respected organizations. You can read them here: https…

I'm aware of the OSD. I'm referring to open source in the sense of the source code being made available.

There is only one commonly accepted definition of open source. Just making the source code available is not enough, you also have to grant the right to be able to use the software for commercial purposes, etc. See: https://opensource.org/osd-annotated

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#56

Post by calgoo »

yebyen wrote: post #35
vorpalhex wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! You can't make a substantive change to a license and pretend it's a small deal. You can't hijack core tenants of a license, and then just put a little disclaimer at the bottom. "Buy one get one half off! *The one half off is actually just a plastic model and d…

> Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product Is that an actual license? Because that's not what I've seen most often recently, at all. An honest FOSS license + dual licensed for commercial would say "it's fine if you make money, and we don't need a cut... unless you've integrated our software AND you don't want your final product to be similarly…

Reminds me a bit of the QT licenses which are dual: "Qt for Application Development is dual-licensed under commercial and open source licenses. The commercial Qt license gives you the full rights to create and distribute software on your own terms without any open source license obligations. With the commercial license you also have access to the official Qt Support and close strategic relationship with The Qt Company to make sure your development goals are met.

Qt for Application Development is also available under GPL and LGPLv3 open source licenses. Qt tools and some libraries are only available under GPL. See the comparison chart for details. The Qt open source licensing is ideal for use cases such as open source projects with open source distribution, student/academic purposes, hobby projects, internal research projects without external distribution, or other projects where all (L)GPL obligations can be met."

https://www1.qt.io/licensing/

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#57

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

cameronhowe wrote: post #10
_wmd wrote: post #4

If you don't like software with these new style licenses, then don't use software with these new style licenses. Explain what it is that apparently so deeply violates your right to exist, but puritanical screaming and finger-pointing black & white contrasts never really convinces people of anything. All these rants are lame. The best comment I've heard so far w.r.t. CC is how it complicates acquisition of software by…

His problem with them is in the title of the post. If you want to do something that is non-free, don't call it open source or free software, both words have accepted definitions, by osi and fsf/gnu respectively. Your reply is entirely off-topic.

> If you want to do something that is non-free, don't call it open source or free software, both words have accepted definitions

If you want to do something that is non-free, don't call it Free Software. As free software advocates keep telling us, Open Source is not the same thing despite the two being historically linked.

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#58

Post by detaro »

Klathmon wrote: post #45
detaro wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the term "Open Source", there is a list of criteria which from all I can tell goes back to pretty close to the creators of the term, and which is quite widely accepted: https://opensource.org/osd

I get that, but I'm asking why we adhere to that? I'd be more than happy to change the definition of "Open Source" if it means that more companies will participate, as doing so won't entirely rob them of most of their income from that product. In fact, I'd consider it a significant improvement over the concept of "open core" that has been becoming more and more popular, where the core 80% of a product is open source,…

I'd personally prefer if the various proposals for these things picked their own term and filled that positively (e.g. one recent example used a label along the lines of "fair licensing").

Many projects have build on the foundation of these principles (E.g. Debian, where they originated, accepts only compliant software in the core distro) Many people feel quite strongly about things that can be perceived as corporate interests infringing on the ideals, and I think it would muddle the waters even further, and changing the term should have really widespread support to not feel icky. It's a departure from old ideas, it's not wrong to clearly acknowledge that, and unwillingness to do that looks somewhat questionable IMHO.

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#59

Post by KajMagnus »

dedsm wrote: post #12
staticassertion wrote: post #5

I believe I'm in the minority when I say this. Ultimately, if I choose to, I will license my project however I want. If I want to restrict others from selling my product I will do so. Calling it Apache 2.0 + Common Clause makes sense, it's an extremely well known license and it's easier to start there and then say "but with some restrictions". That said, I do see the issue that people may use this software and not un…

I think the main issue is that you state something that's not true, https://github.com/antirez/redis-doc/pull/984 shows that, Redis Labs is claiming license is OSI-approved, when it's not.

And maybe also that Redis Search etc were AGPL licensed, but then re-licensed under Apache + Commons Clause, that is, became no-longer-open-source.

... and apparently this mattered a lot to some people / organizations — they forked those Redis modules: https://goodformcode.com

Re: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

#60

Post by skykooler »

yebyen wrote: post #35
vorpalhex wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! You can't make a substantive change to a license and pretend it's a small deal. You can't hijack core tenants of a license, and then just put a little disclaimer at the bottom. "Buy one get one half off! *The one half off is actually just a plastic model and d…

> Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product Is that an actual license? Because that's not what I've seen most often recently, at all. An honest FOSS license + dual licensed for commercial would say "it's fine if you make money, and we don't need a cut... unless you've integrated our software AND you don't want your final product to be similarly…

Fusion 360 has a license like that - free for personal use, but you have to pay if you use it to make anything you sell.
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