Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software • Hacker News Board

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#91

Post by polyfractal » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:10 PM UTC

chris_wot wrote: post #66

rmc wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Listen, the clause is so ridiculously vague as to be unenforcable. You hope. If you consider evil to be contrary to the good functioning of a civil society, then you could say that any act of evil is against the laws if this society. In which case the clause is legally enforceable, but completely unnecessary as no contract can stipulate a party undertake an illegal act. Which countries laws are we dealing with here?…

You hope Actually, I don't really care either way. If it becomes legally enforcable not to commit evil, I win. If it isn't legally enforcable, then I still win, only to a much lesser degree. By which I mean I lose through winning. Which countries laws are we dealing with here? :P e.g. I believe lots of US employee laws would be very illegal in EU. You merely illustrate my point. Too vague to be enforcable.

I believe the general consensus is that "evil" is subjective. See the abortion argument above. "Evil" can be spun many different ways.

It's "evil" to use automation software because it eliminates jobs of hard working Americans. etc etc

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#92

Post by scott_w » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:11 PM UTC

jasim wrote: post #44

runningdogx wrote: post #28

There is no place for humor or overly subjective terms like "evil" in a software license or other legal document, and the problem with Douglas Crockford's license is that he fails to understand that. That is, unless his intent is to keep every entity with sane lawyers from using his software. I don't think that's his intent. He said he wants to keep people without a sense of humor from using his software, but sane la…

I don't disagree to this premise. Yes, it could be an issue - but Douglas Crockford is not morally obligated to worry about it. His code, his license. When you use it, you accept the risks that come with it. The post could have made a sane argument that the license is ambiguous and should be avoided in Free Software. But it focused on the author and made unjustifiable personal remarks. Not cool. The author also seem…

""" The author also seem to forget that there are advocates of the MIT license who would never use GPL software because of its viral nature. Does that mean Richard Stallman is 'harmful to software'? Criticize the license, but don't name-call the author who has made major positive contributions to the field. """

There is a large difference here:

* The GPL is pushing an agenda in their licence, and attempts to clearly state your legal obligations.

* Crockford, on the other hand, is trying to crack a joke in a legal document. As the author states, this is dangerous to people who don't understand the legal ramifications of using this. From what I can see, the author is venting their frustration that Crockford appears to be treating the whole affair like a big joke, and I can totally understand that.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#93

Post by ygra » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:13 PM UTC

apgwoz wrote: post #59

jasim wrote: post #14

The article is in bad taste. The title even more. If you don't like Crockford's license you are at liberty to write that code yourself. Please don't call people who contribute a great deal to advancing computing (Free Software or not) names like 'harmful to Free Software'. Even if there is genuine concern in the license and its usage in Free Software, it should be raised by pointing to the code and the license, not b…

I think you're missing the larger picture here. If someone like IBM or Apple, or Google were to accidentally use a license like this (which is otherwise free ) they could waste millions defending it in court due to some lawsuit. How would that look for Free Software? Probably even worse! "Google sued for using Free Software" -- Headline on the NY Times.

That's why large corporations have hordes of lawyers to help with such things. There is no such thing as accidentally using code under a certain license and there are procedures in place to handle that.

It's no different with using commercial code that was licensed to you, anyway. You still have to adhere to the licensing terms and if you don't they can sue you.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#94

Post by theorique » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:17 PM UTC

jahewson wrote: post #20

andrewguenther wrote: post #8

Here is the quote the post refers to from "The JSON Saga": When I put the reference implementation onto the website, I needed to put a software license on it. I looked up all the licenses that are available, and there were a lot of them. I decided the one I liked the best was the MIT license, which was a notice that you would put on your source, and it would say: "you're allowed to use this for any purpose you want,…

It's sad that Crockford thinks that causing this kind of hassle to diligent users of his software is funny. Ha ha, stupid user, you took the legally binding joke which I inserted into a legally binding license seriously, hahah you sooo funny. Yeah, a real barrel of laughs. Never mind that licensing law is a lot less flexible than contract law, in which unreasonable terms are readily removed.

Seems like a real, major user requested a clarification / amendment to their software license in order to use the software. Crockford granted such a clarification / amendment. I don't see the problem here.

Software is written and licensed by people, and is susceptible to their quirks and foibles.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#95

Post by theorique » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:21 PM UTC

bad_user wrote: post #43

jasim wrote: post #14

The article is in bad taste. The title even more. If you don't like Crockford's license you are at liberty to write that code yourself. Please don't call people who contribute a great deal to advancing computing (Free Software or not) names like 'harmful to Free Software'. Even if there is genuine concern in the license and its usage in Free Software, it should be raised by pointing to the code and the license, not b…

People need to be aware that using childish clauses in licenses can have legal repercussions. This is not about "Free Software" or "Open Source" either, because that same clause can get you in trouble even if it comes in the EULA of a proprietary product. The article was itself childish, but then again, it's a personal blog, not some kind of official statement. > it discourages people from contributing True, but my p…

The contributions from ego-driven testosterone-filled spoiled brats are significant.

Indeed, I would go further and say that the fruits of Open Source are in significant part the result of young men trying to impress and outdo each other in mental contests and show each other who's smarter (aka whose organ is bigger). This kind of competition is driven by testosterone.

And we all benefit as a result.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#96

Post by aw3c2 » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:23 PM UTC

pooriaazimi wrote: post #69

Don't say "Free Software", please. Because you actually mean "FSF-compliant" license. Some people don't give the slightest damn what FSF or any other crazy institution has determined to be a "free" (as in thought/speech) software license. In my humble opinion, a true "free" software license is the kind of license that lets you do "whatever the fuck you want to do" with it - in other words, "public domain". GPL (whate…

GPL/BSD are "restrictive" to protect the freedom of the software. You cannot have freedom without having a rule for freedom. Free software is not anarchy software.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#97

Post by dasil003 » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:29 PM UTC

pooriaazimi wrote: post #69

Don't say "Free Software", please. Because you actually mean "FSF-compliant" license. Some people don't give the slightest damn what FSF or any other crazy institution has determined to be a "free" (as in thought/speech) software license. In my humble opinion, a true "free" software license is the kind of license that lets you do "whatever the fuck you want to do" with it - in other words, "public domain". GPL (whate…

I think the FSF has done enough to deserve a defacto trademark on the term Free Software. Certainly I see no reason why your particular definition deserves to supercede the established convention.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#98

Post by ams6110 » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:34 PM UTC

opminion wrote: post #27

Crockford triggered an argument at least as old as the Lutheran reform. The irony is that Crockford's licence is an unintended success in line with Eich's JavaScript itself. JavaScript, as a Lisp in disguise which survived early standardisation, browser wars, Microsoft's JScript, European bureaucracy (the E in ECMA?), Adobe and Crockford's own jslint, is a success at being something very, very useful. Crockford's "Go…

One of the main issues of Luther's reform is that good and evil are a personal choice

I wouldn't say it like that. Luther's main position was that salvation or forgiveness of sin was a personal matter between God and the sinner; that salvation comes directly from God and cannot not be conferred by a priest or church, in exchange for money, etc. and that the Bible itself was the source of divine knowledge, not the church.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#99

Post by ams6110 » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:35 PM UTC

So quit whining and write your own json parser.

Re: Evil, or why Douglas Crockford is harmful to Free Software

#100

Post by markokocic » Fri, Nov 09, 2012, 1:41 PM UTC

skreech wrote: post #76

jballanc wrote: post #53

Sometimes I find the cognitive dissonance in the software community to be as entertaining to watch as that in various religious sects... Software types are famously inclined toward libertarian views. An oft repeated mantra on HN is "let the market decide". Yet, here we have myriad complaints about a decision the market has made. What I particularly love about the Open Source/Free Software world is that it is a market…

If you see it as a market, this is a typical market failure (externality and / or information assymmetry). Since the author has chosen a non-standard license, I doubt government regulation would help (unless that regulation outlawed non-standard FLOSS licenses). Probably would be better to reduce the information assymmetry. Maybe Github could have warning notifications for custom licenses, for example?

Do I understand correctly that you think that outlawing creation of custom licenses besides the chosen and already existing few will solve the perceived problem?

What's the next step, outlawing forks, since there are already enough projects?

And why do you see the very existence of the library with "no evil" clause as a market failure? Is that some people think that it's basic human right to be allowed to do evil? Doing evil, if we define evil as illegal, is already outlawed, so this one phrase is clearly redundant.

I said you, but it's not addressed to you, but to people that got so offended and turned up by this small "do no evil" purpose.

The market already decided, and that clause is there for a purpose. The author clearly didn't want people unsure if this piece of software will be used for good or evil to use it.

It's funny that people are ready to sign all kind of nonsense in commercial licenses, and this small clause makes so much pain to some "open source" developers.