5 ms·

Yeah, in the FAQ of the article it becomes pretty clear how dead this code is: ------------ Do I have to sign a contributor agreement to modify the code? N

by pquerna 11y ago

Yeah, in the FAQ of the article it becomes pretty clear how dead this code is: ------------ Do I have to sign a contributor agreement to modify the code? No. This is no longer an active project, we are providing the code for public to read and use on their own. Will you take patches? In general, no. We won’t have anybody assigned to reviewing and accepting code. We’d encourage interested maintainers to fork the code and build out a community around it. ------------ So, I mean, er, thanks for open sourcing a dead project. But still under an AGPLv3 license.... meh.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
So, I mean, er, thanks for open sourcing a dead project. But still under an AGPLv3 license.... meh. A project gets released as free software, and not only do you make a sarcastic thanks, but you moan about how it's using a license that ensures you pass on the same freedom to other users. Talk about entitlement.
- teacup50 11y ago
  It's using a license that ensures that it'll probably stay dead; this is a reasonable criticism. Anyone using the code is forced to "pass on the same freedom" to original code that's infected by the AGPL license. Talk about entitlement.
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    Works for Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud and some others. Freedom ain't free. There is a price you have to pay. That price is to pass on the same freedoms to others, the freedoms which you explicitly benefited from in your use of the software. To me that sounds like an exceptionally reasonable requirement, but evidently the one not being a grubby freeloader is somehow entitled in your worldview. Interesting how that works. This reflects the fundamental schism between free software and open source, at least philosophically rather than in terms of what licenses fall under their definitions. Free software implies an ethical responsibility to give back to the community, open source is a way to conveniently reappropriate other people's labor with no obligation to contribute, while hiding behind the cloak of "technical superiority" and "code quality" (which is bullshit).
    - pquerna 11y ago
      > Works for Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud and some others. None of these are abandonware. All three are VC-backed companies. An AGPLv3 license is extremely restrictive for what amounts to a code dump.
      - leni536 11y ago
        Maybe they borrowed code from other AGPLv3 projects?
    - teacup50 11y ago
      Well, we agree that there's a philosophical difference. In my world view, there's nothing ethical about laying claim to all future work output of my own in exchange for incorporating any amount of copyleft code. This situation favors the original author in the extreme, which is why it's not surprising to see that this works for maintained projects owned by a single author/organization, such as Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud, "and some others". However, the answer for people other than the original author is, unsurprisingly, to generally avoid copyleft code. The proof is in the pudding; the majority of usable successful projects are licensed in a way that grant the author(s) the ability to benefit from their work outside the straightjacket confines of copyleft.
      - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
        Well, no, that's a mischaracterization. The provisions are only triggered when redistributing it, and further many GPL projects have linking exceptions, assuming the LGPL isn't used outright. AGPL is stricter because the semantics of networked services are different from local software. It actually doesn't favor the original author that much. Permissive licensing is more adapt at massive propagation, hence why it's preferred for some low-level or utility libraries like zlib where you would rather not have those be poorly reinvented. The proof is in the pudding; the majority of usable successful projects are licensed in a way that grant the author(s) the ability to benefit from their work outside the straightjacket confines of copyleft. Ignoring the stupidity of defining copyleft as a "straitjacket" when it's clearly beneficial for continuing free terms, most of the popular free software is in fact copyleft, be it GPL, LGPL or MPL. FileZilla, GIMP, Notepad++, Blender, VLC, Wordpress, etc. Then for development, the GNU system is all copyleft and ubiquitous, just to list the most obvious example.
- geofft 11y ago
  This is Canonical, a company that would not have existed on the work of the free software community. For them to even consider writing closed-source software is entitlement.
  - ssalazar 11y ago
    90% if not more of web startups from the last 10 years would not exist without free software. Is it entitlement that Facebook has closed-source software? Dropbox? GitHub?
    - geofft 11y ago
      Canonical's primary product is Ubuntu, which is, to first order, a repackaging of Debian. Facebook and Dropbox just use free software. GitHub is sort of in between; certainly they have invested a lot into the stuff besides raw git hosting, which is why they have such a dominant position, but certainly git itself is a core part of their product.
      - slgeorge 11y ago
        Canonical has put a lot of energy into open source for a decade - contributing code and putting free software into the hands of millions around the world. It should be entitled (your word, different usage) to write proprietary code if it thinks that's the right approach. If you constantly burn the companies and people who actually work on open source for not meeting the purity standard then you make it a hard environment. Honestly, there are way more fully proprietary software companies out there, or companies using but not contributing anything to open source to have a go at.

by pquerna 11y ago

vezzy-fnord 11y ago

So, I mean, er, thanks for open sourcing a dead project. But still under an AGPLv3 license.... meh. A project gets released as free software, and not only do you make a sarcastic thanks, but you moan about how it's using a license that ensures you pass on the same freedom to other users. Talk about entitlement.

teacup50 11y ago
It's using a license that ensures that it'll probably stay dead; this is a reasonable criticism. Anyone using the code is forced to "pass on the same freedom" to original code that's infected by the AGPL license. Talk about entitlement.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  Works for Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud and some others. Freedom ain't free. There is a price you have to pay. That price is to pass on the same freedoms to others, the freedoms which you explicitly benefited from in your use of the software. To me that sounds like an exceptionally reasonable requirement, but evidently the one not being a grubby freeloader is somehow entitled in your worldview. Interesting how that works. This reflects the fundamental schism between free software and open source, at least philosophically rather than in terms of what licenses fall under their definitions. Free software implies an ethical responsibility to give back to the community, open source is a way to conveniently reappropriate other people's labor with no obligation to contribute, while hiding behind the cloak of "technical superiority" and "code quality" (which is bullshit).
  - pquerna 11y ago
    > Works for Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud and some others. None of these are abandonware. All three are VC-backed companies. An AGPLv3 license is extremely restrictive for what amounts to a code dump.
    - leni536 11y ago
      Maybe they borrowed code from other AGPLv3 projects?
  - teacup50 11y ago
    Well, we agree that there's a philosophical difference. In my world view, there's nothing ethical about laying claim to all future work output of my own in exchange for incorporating any amount of copyleft code. This situation favors the original author in the extreme, which is why it's not surprising to see that this works for maintained projects owned by a single author/organization, such as Neo4j, MongoDB, ownCloud, "and some others". However, the answer for people other than the original author is, unsurprisingly, to generally avoid copyleft code. The proof is in the pudding; the majority of usable successful projects are licensed in a way that grant the author(s) the ability to benefit from their work outside the straightjacket confines of copyleft.
    - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
      Well, no, that's a mischaracterization. The provisions are only triggered when redistributing it, and further many GPL projects have linking exceptions, assuming the LGPL isn't used outright. AGPL is stricter because the semantics of networked services are different from local software. It actually doesn't favor the original author that much. Permissive licensing is more adapt at massive propagation, hence why it's preferred for some low-level or utility libraries like zlib where you would rather not have those be poorly reinvented. The proof is in the pudding; the majority of usable successful projects are licensed in a way that grant the author(s) the ability to benefit from their work outside the straightjacket confines of copyleft. Ignoring the stupidity of defining copyleft as a "straitjacket" when it's clearly beneficial for continuing free terms, most of the popular free software is in fact copyleft, be it GPL, LGPL or MPL. FileZilla, GIMP, Notepad++, Blender, VLC, Wordpress, etc. Then for development, the GNU system is all copyleft and ubiquitous, just to list the most obvious example.
geofft 11y ago
This is Canonical, a company that would not have existed on the work of the free software community. For them to even consider writing closed-source software is entitlement.
- ssalazar 11y ago
  90% if not more of web startups from the last 10 years would not exist without free software. Is it entitlement that Facebook has closed-source software? Dropbox? GitHub?
  - geofft 11y ago
    Canonical's primary product is Ubuntu, which is, to first order, a repackaging of Debian. Facebook and Dropbox just use free software. GitHub is sort of in between; certainly they have invested a lot into the stuff besides raw git hosting, which is why they have such a dominant position, but certainly git itself is a core part of their product.
    - slgeorge 11y ago
      Canonical has put a lot of energy into open source for a decade - contributing code and putting free software into the hands of millions around the world. It should be entitled (your word, different usage) to write proprietary code if it thinks that's the right approach. If you constantly burn the companies and people who actually work on open source for not meeting the purity standard then you make it a hard environment. Honestly, there are way more fully proprietary software companies out there, or companies using but not contributing anything to open source to have a go at.