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Bear is now source-available

herman.bearblog.dev

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Re: Bear is now source-available

#71

Post by ezekg »

jraph wrote: post #62
ezekg wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Well, too bad for them, because I can still fork this AGPL software and compete. So what's the issue? No legal department will ever allow it due to the FUD. That's the whole fucking point.

Sorry, but I won't cry for corps big enough to have legal departments because they elected not to benefit from my software. They have too much power for me to worry about looking to accommodate them and their fantasy. I don't mind them not using my code. They are doing themselves here. They have the human power to rebuild it anyway and I actually believe it should cost them. it's actually them who are spreading the F…

My point is less about the AGPL license itself and more about the people who choose it.

If the OSI came out and made a statement on the ambiguities in the AGPL, and cleared the FUD in such a way that all companies agreed and could reference it, I'd wager that the AGPL would over time become much, much less popular for commercial open source. But I'd wager that they won't do that, because they win when COSS wins.

But if they did, we'd likely even see a move towards non-OSS licenses, ones that are clear as to their intent and rules -- rather than relying on ambiguity -- because there would no longer be an OSI-approved license that businesses could use to have their cake and eat it too.

Very few COSS business/startup/w/e right now are choosing AGPL for altruistic reasons. This thread and every other COSS licensing thread here are evidence of that.

Few of them care about software freedoms, or know why they chose the AGPL. They have a playbook that says AGPL lets them take advantage of the open source distribution flywheel, while largely protecting them from the risks associated with commercial open source, i.e. competition. They choose AGPL for this, not because it's the best license for users.

I honestly don't get how people don't see the deception under the AGPL right now.

Re: Bear is now source-available

#72

Post by jraph »

gpm wrote: post #67
rs186 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will be as useless in terms of enforcement as "shall be used for good, not evil." https://www.json.org/license.html

I think they're suggesting a license that says "except Apple, Amazon, Google, Huawei, ..." not a license that literally says "no jerks". The problem of attempting to enumerate the jerks does seem pretty... insurmountable... to me though.

Yeah, and even if you like the idea, this is not dependable. How do you know, as a user, that you'll not end up in the jerk list tomorrow?

Re: Bear is now source-available

#73

Post by gpm »

barnabee wrote: post #37
cinericius wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a lawyer, but my understanding is there is a strong feeling that AGPL can be roughly ignored if a service provider provides some level of indirection (e.g. a proxy) between the user and the software. Then, the software is somehow not being accessed over a network and thus they are not required to release the source.

I have a strong feeling that speaking to a lawyer might reveal that to be untrue

I have a strong feeling you would be told "we don't know, it's never been tested in court, there's a chance you would win and a chance you would lose on that argument".

Re: Bear is now source-available

#74

Post by DaSHacka »

supriyo-biswas wrote: post #22
cinericius wrote: post #3

As far as I understand it, the stance of the 'Open Source' crowd is that if Amazon can't make it one of their AWS offerings then it isn't true open source, and they'll get very upset at you if you claim it is. I'd like to see some recognition from this crowd of the "free-ride competition" problem as this author puts it. What Herman is doing is a service to us all, and we should find a term (better than 'source-availa…

The weird part is that these companies/individuals will use proprietary software with no qualms of the sort they express for these "source available" licenses.

Because the proprietary software never claimed to be anything but.

Re: Bear is now source-available

#75

Post by Spivak »

cinericius wrote: post #44
Spivak wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why the scare quotes, the first freedom of both Open Source and Free Software is the right to run the software for any purpose . It's not some little unimportant detail. It's arguably the most important property of Open Source.

I argue that the natural winner-take-all dynamics of the marketplace are not beneficial to the the mission of free and open source software. In fact, having no safeguard against large organisations making money this way is actually hugely detrimental to the mission by enabling these companies to ensnare unsuspecting users in a web of both their own proprietary software as well as all that free and open source softwar…

I mean in this specific case we're not talking about AWS or any other large company. We're talking about someone wanting to offer Bear.app hosting in the vein of managed Wordpress. This is good for Open Source. Having multiple commercial entities working off of and invested in the same codebase is exactly what Open Source envisions.

It does take some mental discipline to actually believe in the movement and not view someone using your software to start a business as them "stealing your work." Such a thing doesn't make sense in OSS, you gave it away freely. It's a good thing, the competition is healthy. You don't have to believe, closed-source proprietary software is much easier to run a business off of as evidenced by most businesses operating that way. There's no shame in it. The FOSS folks are the free love "we don't believe in intellectual property mann" hippies of the software world.

Re: Bear is now source-available

#76

Post by cxr »

ahartmetz wrote: post #19
omnicognate wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As far as I understand it, the stance of the 'Open Source' crowd is that if Amazon can't make it one of their AWS offerings then it isn't true open source Isn't this what the AGPL is for? That's an OSI approved "open source" license that places restrictions on people making the software accessible as a network service.

I thought so, too, at first. But there's a crucial difference: With the AGPL, Bear's competition can offer the software as as service if they publish the source code they are deploying. With the Bear license, Bear's competition just cannot offer the software as a service. It feels mostly in the spirit of FOSS to me, but Stallman would disagree. He has made it clear that there should be no restrictions on use.

> It feels mostly in the spirit of FOSS to me

From the license at https://github.com/HermanMartinus/bearblog/blob/998e87263248...>:

"You may not provide the Software as a hosted or managed service that offers users access to substantial features or functionality"

Given that the exclusive purpose of the Software in question is to implement a managed service for its users' hosting needs, I'm having trouble understanding how anyone could take the position that this is "mostly in the spirit of FOSS".

The license might as well say, "You just can't use this."

Re: Bear is now source-available

#77

Post by phkahler »

Naive. Guy picks a license that allow anyone to do anything they want with his code. Later realizes that was not appropriate when he's trying make money. Changes to an obscure license that on the surface seems to fix the problem.

Your options are: MIT / BSD, GPL, LGPL, AGPL. All others are unnecessary and create needless incompatibility.

Re: Bear is now source-available

#78

Post by jorams »

redwood wrote: post #15

It's great to see the open source crowd particularly in Europe is finally turning corner here. You know something's broken when Microsoft gets to claim to be the biggest backer of open source. Meanwhile they'll break your back and steal all your trust and credibility if they can

> You know something's broken when Microsoft gets to claim to be the biggest backer of open source.

They can say whatever they want. They're just lying. If you spend even a little bit of time looking into it you'll find it's just a marketing strategy.

Re: Bear is now source-available

#79

Post by gpm »

jraph wrote: post #72
gpm wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they're suggesting a license that says "except Apple, Amazon, Google, Huawei, ..." not a license that literally says "no jerks". The problem of attempting to enumerate the jerks does seem pretty... insurmountable... to me though.

Yeah, and even if you like the idea, this is not dependable. How do you know, as a user, that you'll not end up in the jerk list tomorrow?

Presumably the license would, like practically all open source licenses, be irrevocable. You aren't guaranteed new versions will be issued under the same license (short of a contract saying otherwise, just like every other piece of open source software) but the existing license that did not list you as a jerk can't be revoked...

Re: Bear is now source-available

#80

Post by thayne »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #36
wahnfrieden wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

edit: I thought this HN thread was about the Bear app never mind

Bear has no VC investors: https://herman.bearblog.dev/manifesto/

Are there any other maintainers? What happens when Herman Martinez is no longer able or willing to keep it going?
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