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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

#61

Post by emersion »

npr11 wrote: post #39

This post seemed aggressive and vague to me. I'm not even sure what problem the author has with these licenses. I _think_ the issue is confusing naming - which seems pretty solvable - and not a fundamental problem with "dual licensing" / "source available" / "commons clause" software? People can develop software out in the open and say "use it as it is, for free!", "use it as part of a new product, for free!", but al…

There are two issues. First, naming is confusing, as you said, and wording implies " + something more" instead of " but with more restrictions". Second, some open-source projects choosing the Commons Clause still say they are FOSS. Choosing Commons Clause is your choice, lying to your users is different.

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

#62

Post by thrower123 »

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.

Open-source doesn't necessarily imply everything that the FOSS and GPL folks think it does outside of their semantic bubble. It's one of those bastardized terms that has become so mangled and situationally-dependent as to be almost meaningless.

For a significant number of people "open-source" just means, "I found this on GitHub"

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

#63

Post by emersion »

rocqua wrote: post #54
emersion wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

"Open" doesn't mean "read", it means "freedom". If I look up the definition of "open-source" for instance on Wiktionary [1], it says "permit modifications and redistribution" (and refers to the OSI definition).

[1]: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/open%2Dsource

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

#64

Post by pron »

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…

> it's an extremely well known license

Extremely well known? It was created only 6 months ago, and practically no one had heard of until a couple months ago when Redis Labs adopted it, to much controversy.

> If I want to restrict others from selling my product I will do so.

Of course, and the article says so. The question is whether it OK for you to use a non open-source license (by most common interpretations), and yet call yourself open-source source, enjoying the PR benefits.

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

#65

Post by boomboomsubban »

api wrote: post #27
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…

The Commons Clause might be clunky, but its an attempt to address the changes that have happened in the world since the late 1990s. For those who don't know, the FOSS revolution came about in the late 1990s and as a popular movement was largely fueled by concern over the extent to which Microsoft was dominating the PC and (then) PC-based server industries. MS was moving to embrace-extend-extinguish the web at the tim…

This version of events is so incredibly wrong.

Free software started in the eighties over concerns about how proprietary software was being used. Embrace-extend-exstinquish was Microsoft's attack on a growing free software market, it had nothing to do with the web.

The "free" in "free software" never referred to the price, and is not business strategy. It's used like in "free speech," and it refers to the free modification and redistribution of the code.

Free software has a huge presence across computing. Honeypots use free software because everyone uses free software, free software enables bad actors like building roads enables drunk drivers.

Looking at your profile, either this is an elaborate troll or I am genuinely amazed in how long you've managed to misunderstand "free software." You use the GPL for your business.

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

#66

Post by hoaw »

Flimm wrote: post #55
staticassertion wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The whole point of the license is presumably that they disagree with that definition. As far as I know a license can be OSI approved without containing patent grants, effectively making the code unusable for commercial purposes. There is also, again as far as I know, nothing stopping companies from using contracts to restrict the use of code in at least some OSI approved licenses.

That said, I do think they should state that it is "non-commercial open source".

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

#67

Post by zekevermillion »

People are talking past each other here b/c we can't decide if we're concerned primarily with the ethics of software freedom, or just with confusion of Open Source (TM) labeling.

This discussion says to me that maybe RMS was right to insist on using the term "free software", and to refuse to promote "open source". When we debate the merits of an "open source" (or more confusingly, a "FOSS") license, people end up talking past each other. Are we talking about what is an effective licensing / development strategy, or are we talking about software ethics? People who do not agree with the free software ethos are understandably confused to find themselves criticized on moral grounds for choosing a license that makes source available but does not permit full exercise of user freedom. Hey, I thought we called it open source b/c we didn't want to focus on user freedom as ideology? Right? Maybe that was a mistake.

My personal view is that there is no logical problem in an author talking about open source as the basis for a restrictive, source-available license -- as long as there is no implication that the license is endorsed by a particular standards body. And conversely if you are a proponent of software freedom, maybe you have to recognize that there is some merit in referring to this as "free software" instead of something else, to avoid confusion.

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

#68

Post by JasonFruit »

kabes wrote: post #30
Semaphor wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We also won't forget about how you've harassed so many people throughout the years Mr. Drew. Care for a background link for those out of the loop?

Drew is known to be a bit of an asshole. E.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18156980

Read through all of that, came back. So he is prickly but skilled, and some people get their feelings hurt. I can't see anywhere he did worse than smack down someone he saw as annoying and not useful. I'd work with him, but I don't know that he'd find me useful!

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

#69

Post by BeetleB »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #53
staticassertion wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

>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.

Given how every Reddit/HN thread I come across has an argument on whether it is appropriate to use open source in this context, I strongly disagree with the phrase "most people". In my experience, most people call it open source, and it only misleads the minority that insists on owning the definition of the phrase.

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

#70

Post by sytse »

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…

You can license your project however you want. People are upset because the contributed to these modules assuming they would stay open source, accepted a CLA, and how they are relicensed as closed source. By the way, this is the situation that a DCO addresses https://about.gitlab.com/2017/11/01/gitlab-switches-to-dco-l...

Apache 2.0 with restrictions would have already been much clearer than + Common Clause since it prevents confusion with Creative Commons and Apache Commons.

It would have been better still to just call it the Redis license since the restrictions fundamentally alter the license. Many projects using Apache 2.0 software like Debian can't accept the new license.

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