15 ms·

Facebook React.js License

461 points by maxsavin 10y ago

romanovcode 10y ago
React.js is basically licensed so that you cannot make anything that can compete with facebook corporation. Example: 1. You create something similar to Instagram using React. 2. It gets popular 3. Facebook sues you and takes all your reacts and reducers
- Oletros 10y ago
  Can you point which part of the license says what you claim? Thanks
  - augustt 10y ago
    In their PATENTS file: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS#L14-L26 https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS#L14-L2... If you read it, it doesn't seem like GP's claim is completely true.
    - Oletros 10y ago
      Are you talking about this part? > if Facebook or any of its subsidiaries or corporate affiliates files a lawsuit alleging patent infringement against you in the first instance, and you respond by filing a patent infringement counterclaim in that lawsuit against that party that is unrelated to the Software, the license granted hereunder will not terminate under section (i) of this paragraph due to such counterclaim And, please, point in which part of the file you linked where is said that your license is terminated if Facebook sues you
      - arcticbull 10y ago
        [edit] ugh, meant to put this elsewhere, rough morning.
        Oletros 10y ago
        > 3. Facebook sues you and takes all your reacts and reducers Perhaps I highlighted that part because the original OP talked about Facebook suing you first. Dude.
- Kwastie 10y ago
  I am not a lawyer, but "not bringing a patent infringement lawsuit against Facebook or its affiliates" suggest that anyone using React can't file a lawsuit against Facebook over patents and NOT vice versa as you suggest.
- ojr 10y ago
  Actually I see it as 3. You can't sue Facebook because your app is similar to Instagram
  - amelius 10y ago
    Is such a clause actually enforceable? Has this been tested in a court of law? Just curious.
    - icebraining 10y ago
      Well, the clause isn't "you can't sue", it's "you have to stop using React if you sue".
      - amelius 10y ago
        But what if you don't stop using it?
        leonatan 10y ago
        You can be sued by Facebook for infringing their license.
        amelius 10y ago
        Which brings us back to my original question ;)
  - Mc_Big_G 10y ago
    Ok, so expanding on that, the problem becomes this: 1) You create a successful app using React 2) Facebook blatantly copies your app. 3) You can't sue Facebook
- capkutay 10y ago
  Yes it would totally make sense for facebook to effectively kill react (wasting millions of their paid engineering hours) and forever taint their developer community by using that clause to sue another company just because they compete. </sarcasm> Hypothetically if you ever grow so big and frighten facebook to that degree, migrating off react would be an easy problem to solve.
  - bad_user 10y ago
    Hypothetically, when you're found to infringe a patent for a product that was already deployed, then the damage was already done and migrating at that point won't save you ;-)
    - capkutay 10y ago
      Right but this clause assumes you are the one suing facebook for patent infringement and unless your patent is along the lines of "we use react.js to do x", then you probably have the flexibility to port it to a different framework.
  - ergo14 10y ago
    BILLIONS, TRILLIONS of hours went into react /s Or maybe whole eternity... Why restrict yourself to just millions.
- danabramov 10y ago
  No, this is a complete misunderstanding of the license. Please read Facebook's official FAQ on this matter:: https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 >Does the additional patent grant in the Facebook BSD+Patents license terminate if I create a competing product? >No.
JoshTriplett 10y ago
Other Open Source licenses have patent termination provisions. Apache 2.0 (which React used to use) says "If You institute patent litigation against any entity (including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that the Work or a Contribution incorporated within the Work constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement, then any patent licenses granted to You under this License for that Work shall terminate as of the date such litigation is filed.". There are other licenses as well that include more extensive patent termination provisions, such as the APSL.
- SloopJon 10y ago
  The author covered this: "Facebook is not saying only that a licensee’s rights to use React will terminate if the licensee claims patent infringement by the React library itself. ... Facebook is using its publication of React source code as leverage to win some protection against patent lawsuits generally."
- bad_user 10y ago
  For Apache 2.0, read again the part that says "alleging that the Work or a Contribution incorporated within the Work constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement". This in other words means that the license termination happens when you sue for patents that are related to the Work or to derivative works. And it applies to all contributors and isn't related to a specific company. Which is quite reasonable. Now go read: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS - you'll notice that this is a license related only to Facebook's patents and that Facebook will terminate your license if you sue them for any patents, even patents that are unrelated to the Work. And even more problematic, I'm not a lawyer, but it doesn't seem to me that this license applies to derivative works. Big difference.
- omouse 10y ago
  Then Facebook should have stuck with the Apache 2.0 license.
- brianm 10y ago
  The AL2 (and MPL2 and GPL3) language is designed to protect the users from the software authors. The Facebook PATENTS language is designed to protect Facebook from the users.
bad_user 10y ago
Facebook's license is even weaker than a BSD/MIT license without any PATENTS license attached at all. Because in that case the patents grant can be considered implicit, depending on jurisdiction. By including a PATENTS license in that repository, Facebook nullifies the possibility of such a defense.
- arcticbull 10y ago
  [edit] I'm bad at read. Sorry!
  - bad_user 10y ago
    I'm not sure what you disagree with.
    - dleslie 10y ago
      I am equally confused; I think they may have misread your comment.
- bluejekyll 10y ago
  I wish he went into more detail on the difference between this and the Apache2 patent grants. I've been favoring Apache2, and am considering adopting the GPLv2 compatibility clause that is being added to Swift.
  - bad_user 10y ago
    Apache 2 is definitely much better. IANAL, but I've written about the difference in another comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692852
zelon88 10y ago
Does this mean that react could be considered "available source" instead of "open source?"
- mi100hael 10y ago
  I think it's a great illustration of the difference between "open source" and "free software." In this case the source is still openly published, but under certain circumstances you're no longer free to redistribute.
  - bad_user 10y ago
    Personally I think it's a great illustration that even software developers lack reading skills. Open Source means this, no more, no less: https://opensource.org/osd-annotated https://opensource.org/osd-annotated
    - eatbitseveryday 10y ago
      > even software developers lack reading skills A little condescending, no? Do you read (or expect everyone to) the EULA in full when you install Windows, and understand the implications of _all_ clauses? Or for that matter, the Privacy and User Agreements of any website you visit, e.g. Spotify, Facebook, HN (this very website), Netflix, Hulu, Google, etc., or software you might install, e.g. WhatsApp, Signal, iTunes, macOS, all the licenses visible and distributed with Android? What about your banks, and the actions they sneak in that give them the most freedom to do with your money/data under the law? The text written in these agreements is foremost written for other lawyers, not you. Many companies have made them easier to parse, slowly prioritizing the user's ability to understand them. Most people have fine reading skills. What you are misconstruing is an ability to understand and derive implications of legal agreements.
    - mi100hael 10y ago
      A license (such as Facebook's) that prevents me from redistributing a modified version could still qualify as "open source" so long as simple mirroring wasn't restricted. > In practice, open source stands for criteria a little looser than those of free software. As far as we know, all existing released free software source code would qualify as open source. Nearly all open source software is free software, but there are exceptions. First, some open source licenses are too restrictive, so they do not qualify as free licenses. For example, “Open Watcom” is nonfree because its license does not allow making a modified version and using it privately. Fortunately, few programs use such licenses. > Second, and more important in practice, many products containing computers check signatures on their executable programs to block users from installing different executables; only one privileged company can make executables that can run in the device or can access its full capabilities. We call these devices “tyrants”, and the practice is called “tivoization” after the product (Tivo) where we first saw it. Even if the executable is made from free source code, the users cannot run modified versions of it, so the executable is nonfree. > The criteria for open source do not recognize this issue; they are concerned solely with the licensing of the source code. Thus, these unmodifiable executables, when made from source code such as Linux that is open source and free, are open source but not free. Many Android products contain nonfree tivoized executables of Linux. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.h... (Pasted the most relevant portion in case you lack reading skills.)
pitaj 10y ago
I feel like if React doesn't "count" as open source software, then neither should anything licensed as GPLv3.
- mordocai 10y ago
  How are those things related at all in the context?
omouse 10y ago
I wonder what the OSI and Software Freedom Law Center say about this.
microcolonel 10y ago
Similar approach to the patchwork of various patent grants on Opus implementations; it's still open source, it just might not be free for 100% of the purposes you could think of. I think Robert doesn't understand that open source refers to the source code being open to use, derivation, and study. The BSD license also includes a warranty disclaimer, which is the exact same kind of protective language as the patent grant. The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license when you enter patent litigation against Facebook for a counterclaim the granted patents or primary litigation for unrelated patents. I don't consider countersuing Facebook for patents applying to React, while USING REACT, to be a serious fundamental software freedom.
- RodericDay 10y ago
  > The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license when you enter patent litigation against Facebook for the granted patents. I don't consider suing Facebook for patents applying to React, while USING REACT, to be a serious fundamental software freedom. Where does it say that the stipulation refers only to patents applying to React?
  - microcolonel 10y ago
    >Apparently in response to criticism, in April 2015 Facebook issued a second version of the Additional Grant of Patent Rights that softened the termination provision to say that the React software licensee would not lose its right to use the software under Facebook patents in the special case in which the licensee brings a patent lawsuit that is a counterclaim against Facebook or its affiliates that is unrelated to React.js. The second version of the Additional Grant of Patent Rights, in addition to the BSD license, is what governs use of React.js today. Sorry, seems it only applies to counterclaims.
mjg59 10y ago
Version 2 of the Apple Public Source License includes the following termination clause: 12.1 Termination. This License and the rights granted hereunder will terminate: … (c) automatically without notice from Apple if You, at any time during the term of this License, commence an action for patent infringement against Apple; provided that Apple did not first commence an action for patent infringement against You in that instance. Like the React patent grant, this applies to any patent suit, not just ones that allege that the covered software infringes. The Open Source Initiative considers APSLv2 an Open Source license, and the Free Software Foundation considers it a Free Software license. Note that this clause terminates your copyright license, not merely your patent license - it's significantly stronger than the React rider. So I think the claim that it's not open source is a bit strong, even though I find this sort of language pretty repugnant.
- TAForObvReasons 10y ago
  Microsoft is not necessarily a paragon of open source, but many of their open source projects use unadulterated OS licenses. Typescript is Apache 2: https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/blob/master/LICENSE.... Visual Studio Code is MIT: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt
  - webwalker 10y ago
    You will notice that most new projects all use MIT. Apache 2 hasn't been used for anything new in the last year+.
    - the_duke 10y ago
      Have some examples? The MIT license is problematic with software patents. I see some projects moving to Apache2 for that reason (one prominent example here is Rust. They moved to an MIT/Apache2 dual licensing model).
      - 10y ago
falcolas 10y ago
I worked with a development manager headhunted from Microsoft, who was quite worried about simple "Taint" from open source software (i.e. ideas gained from viewing open source code making their way into closed source software). I also worked with a company which wouldn't accept code contributions to their OS project; they would do clean room implementations to avoid the legal hassle of incorporating code which wasn't written for hire. So I can certainly see large companies being leery of utilizing software with licenses which don't include patent grants. Perhaps it's less of an issue with the BSD style licenses, as explicitly called out in the article.
deleted 10y ago
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falsestprophet 10y ago
After Alice v. CLS, what patents about React could be enforced? edit: After Alice there has been a software patent massacre: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_United_States_patent_law#Post-Alice_period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_United_...
- joatmon-snoo 10y ago
  IANAL but OTOH I would argue that Alice isn't very relevant here. The chief rationale behind that case was the triviality of the core algorithm being described: if there isn't enough money in an account, you don't withdraw money from the account.
woah 10y ago
If it becomes a problem, you could drop in a react-compatible library pretty quickly. React native might be tougher but still would probably appear if there was a case with a lot of publicity.
- morenoh149 10y ago
  So happy https://preactjs.com/ https://preactjs.com/ and others are around
  - brlewis 10y ago
    Other frameworks could infringe the hypothetical React-related patent. There is no safety from infringement as long as software patents exist.
    - tracker1 10y ago
      Personally, I'm opposed to software patents... that said, there's no safety from any third party wrt patents either.
      - brlewis 10y ago
        I think there exist fields of invention where it's reasonable for inventors to know what's in the patent database and thus avoid unintentional infringement. Obviously software isn't one of those fields.
        tracker1 10y ago
        When it's a case where it's not possible to utilize patent research in order to help make something, and in fact ill-advised to do so, then in that space the entire purported purpose of patents in that space invalidates their use.
shadowmint 10y ago
If companies fear that if they try to enforce their patents they will lose access to significant commercial opportunities as a result of not being able to use projects such as react... ...basically, I welcome it. Patents are harmful. The FSF has, to my knowledge, made no meaningful progress in significant patent reform. If this helps, then bring it on.
- gcp 10y ago
  Facebook's patent license doesn't grant you any patents outside the ones used by React. It does grant them freedom to use any patent you may have (if you use their software). See the problem? Even if you don't like patents, it makes the playing field totally uneven.
  - matt4077 10y ago
    It still lowers the value of IP patents, since that value has most often manifest itself in suing Facebook/Apple etc. With their value being even marginally reduced, maybe some patents will never be filed, or the value proposition of setting up patent-litigation entities is reduced enough to discourage it. Basically this is net-positive for anyone who doesn't own or plan to own patents, even if it is even better for Facebook.
    - gcp 10y ago
      Patent litigation against such companies is often carried out by specialized entities, so those have nothing to lose by having their "React" patents revoked.
- brlewis 10y ago
  I would agree with you if it was only software patents. I still think hardware patents have a place, and that it is possible for the patent office to judge novelty and non-obviousness of hardware inventions.
andrewvijay 10y ago
Frankly multiple developers don't really care about the licenses or clauses. Software veterans and corporations care about it more than anyone else. Even the article is kinda hard to grasp in one go that I had to read a couple of times. To find the nuances in an OSS license and to think and act on it is not easy for a lot non native English speakers. And more posts like these are needed to make many people read and know about these serious issues.
iplaw 10y ago
So this attorney's problem is that rather than ambiguously granting a license to the patent claims necessary to implement this software, they decided to explicitly grant such rights? I see no problems.
- gcp 10y ago
  No, his problem is with the breadth of the patent assertion Facebook makes. He's not the first to point out it's unusually in favor of Facebook, even compared to patent grants from Microsoft and Google.
cjbprime 10y ago
The argument that "This is Not Open Source Software" feels unsupported and very sloppy. > Thus, the licensee pays a price to use the library. It is not a price paid with money. [..] I could be missing something, but I have never seen any other software license use such a condition and also claim to be an open source license. This just isn't thinking creatively. The GPL also requires a "price to be paid, but not with money" -- you give up your right to keep changes you make secret (if you distribute them). Yet no-one seriously argues that the GPL isn't an open source license. If there is something about giving up the right to file patent lawsuits that is totally different to giving up the right to keep your changes secret, the article doesn't say what that difference is. Giving up the right to keep your changes secret is surely more stringent than giving up your right to file patent infringement lawsuits against one company. Why, then, should the latter be a dealbreaker for an open source license?
- gcp 10y ago
  I think the argument is that the grant is asymmetric. GPL is "I open up, you open up". The retaliation clause Facebook uses is "you don't get to sue us, but we may sue you".
  - cjbprime 10y ago
    That's an interesting argument! (But the article didn't make it..) Couldn't you argue that the GPL says "you don't get to keep your changes private, but I do", and so is asymmetric too? It seems normal to me for the rightsholder to retain more rights than the grantee.
    - gcp 10y ago
      You can keep GPL changes private if you don't publish it, and the same applies to the original author. If you feed back changes, you're mutually bound. But the problem with Facebook's license is not the copyright, it's the patent grant.
- ComodoHacker 10y ago
  Mush simpler. Open source != free as in free beer. That's enough to bust this argument.
Noseshine 10y ago
So I checked StackExchange's law site and found this question - thus far unanswered, but those would be my questions exactly: http://law.stackexchange.com/questions/14337/q-about-consequences-of-a-software-license-amendment-regarding-patents-facebook http://law.stackexchange.com/questions/14337/q-about-consequ... It comes down to two questions (quoted from the linked question) - note that those are questions, not assertions: 1) > ... if we use any of Facebook's open source projects Facebook can violate *our patents* (of any > kind) pretty much with impunity: If we try to sue them we lose the right to patents covering their > open source projects(?) 2) > I have read opinions that other open source projects that don't have such a clause, for example > those from Microsoft or Google, nevertheless have the exact same problem, only that it isn't > explicitly stated. Is that true? Is my situation not any better when I only use open source > projects without such a clause? I think that is a good point. The many opinions I see are almost all from people who don't have their own patents to think about, but what happens if you are a company and you do? Would you basically allow Facebook to use any of your patents, because for all practical purposes you can't defend them if you rely on their open source projects?
- gcp 10y ago
  1) Yes, and that's exactly the problem raised here. 2) The patent grants from Microsoft and Google grant a license on software (or a standard), and only give them a (reciprocal) license on the software or standard that is under consideration. If Microsoft had published React, you could still sue them for violating patents that are unrelated to React without losing your license to use it. The Facebook grant doesn't have this, so if you rely on React you can't sue Facebook at all. But they can still sue you.
  - madeofpalk 10y ago
    2) If Microsoft published React without a patent rider, and Microsoft had patents on the tech in React, then you would be in violation in the first place, right? Microsoft can still you sue for violating their React patents, especially if you sue them first.
    - 10y ago
Egidius 10y ago
I agree. I was working at a somewhat large IT company (~30k employees) this year. I made a plea for React and while our development section agreed, it got bounced by legal because of these points. If Facebook is really serious about Open Source, they also have to make their licence so that every organisation is free to use it.
- matt4077 10y ago
  Being "serious about Open Source" doesn't mean a commitment to do anything to support people using your software. It's the opposite, actually: the original copyleft licenses such as the GPL were explicitly designed to promote Open Source by hindering adoption in some cases, namely those where companies want to distribute derivative works commercially. Then the BSD/MIT-style licenses weakened this restriction. So you're free to use React in a commercial product. But Facebook, Apple etc. care a lot about patents these days. Not offensively, as far as we can tell, but they have now been burned repeatedly by often trivial patents being used to extract hundreds of million from them. So they added these 'patentleft' clauses to their licenses to essentially undermine the patent system in regards to software. As it gets more difficult to build anything without some library that includes this clause, fewer and fewer actors will have the freedom to sue without consequences. Being opposed to patents on intellectual property in the first case, I can only applaud these efforts. In fact, they should probably go further and extend the protection to everyone: If you use IP patents against Jane Doe, you may no longer use React. The only problem is the rise of entities focused entirely on patent-litigation.
  - Flimm 10y ago
    See my other comment on why this is not analogous to copyleft, and therfore the term 'patentleft' isn't very useful here.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - eitland 10y ago
    > It's the opposite, actually: the original copyleft licenses such as the GPL were explicitly designed to promote Open Source by hindering adoption in some cases, namely those where companies want to distribute derivative works commercially. I'm usually not the one to defend GPL but I want to point out that AFAIK distributing derivative works commercially is totally fine for GPL - you just have to follow the rules in the license (provide source code under the same licence).
topbagsvk 10y ago
The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license - http://www.handbagsgb.com http://www.handbagsgb.com
lucb1e 10y ago
The way I read it, it's not evil. It's a known and deliberate shortcoming of many licenses (e.g. BSD) not to include patent stuff because it makes everything unnecessarily complex. There was recently an article about why BSD and MIT are so popular, and it's because they're concise and understandable. There is a reason WTFPL exists and some developers resort to it as a way to avoid legalese. Facebook clearly was aware of this "shortcoming" and being a big player, they might have wanted to be nice and say "we won't sue you for patent infringement if it turns out we have a patent on something React does". Then the managers went "but what if they sue us? Patents are not only for offense but also our defense, we would weaken our defense." And so the clause of "except if you sue us first" came into being. And now this fuss about the patent part making it not an open source license? Oh come on. I really don't like Facebook as a company, but this bickering is silly.
- Alex3917 10y ago
  Also, let's say hypothetically that Facebook does sue you for the patents covered by React. When to comes time to establish damages, the fact that Facebook is currently giving away the licenses for free can be used to argue in court that their monetary value is zero. So even if you get hit with treble damages for willful infringement, the actual impact might not be as severe as one might otherwise suspect. (IANAL, don't try this at home, etc.)
- ronjouch 10y ago
  > It's a known and deliberate shortcoming of many licenses (e.g. BSD) not to include patent stuff because it makes everything unnecessarily complex. There was recently an article about why BSD and MIT are so popular, and it's because they're concise and understandable. Could you (or anyone confident in their legalese) elaborate on: * Does the Apache2 license indeed solve this? (I'm asking because I read about it in the LLVM/Clang license change proposal [1]) * Why isn't the less-popular-but-still-well-established Apache2 license more widely used, then? To counter what you are saying about simplicity, don't you think patents are a common concern that should be covered by default in a license, even at some complexity cost? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12531887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12531887 EDIT: precisions, wording.
the_duke 10y ago
While we are on the subject: I constantly find the need to read up on licensing. Usually with various blog posts or online information, which never gives me the feeling that I fully understood the legal implications or the context. Can anyone recommend a book covering software licenses in depth? (ideally not only US centric)
- bdcravens 10y ago
  With a new package manager every year, a new framework every six months, and a new build system every month, who has time for that? Just trust the masses: whatever frameworks and libraries have the most stickers on Macbooks has proven its veracity. /s
deleted 10y ago
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briankwest 10y ago
How is this any different than the MPL 1.1 license? Section 8 of the MPL 1.1 has similar language. /b
- gcp 10y ago
  It's completely different. MPL 1.1 talks about "such Participant's Contributor Version directly or indirectly infringes any patent" Which refers to the software itself. Which means it's a patent retaliation clause similar to the one Microsoft and Google use. If you claim patents on someone for using specific software, you lose any patent licenses for said software that were granted to you. But in Facebook's case, the retaliation extends when you make any patent claim on anything Facebook does, even if it's completely unrelated to the software in question. Meanwhile, the patent license that Facebook gives you does not extend beyond the software in question. So you're effectively licensing all your patents to Facebook, and Facebook only gives you the ones you need to use the software.
coding123 10y ago
Email I just sent the OSI: Please see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692552 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692552 It turns out companies are now "bastardizing" the license terms. I would love for the OSI to re-evaluate if these licences are truly open source. Open source covers freedom, and I should think that these clauses abridge that freedom since it is very well possible for a company to be required to sue Apple or Facebook over patents. If that unrelated lawsuit "strips" your legal right to use software, that is NOT freedom. Thanks
- matt4077 10y ago
  The OSI are opposed to software patents anyway, so I doubt that they have a problem with them becoming worthless. "Freedom" is an empty slogan in this regard. Copyleft licenses have long restricted your freedom, the idea being that there are colliding "freedoms" under some circumstances and it's for the greater good of society to restrict some peoples "freedom" (those creating derivative works) for the benefit of of the end-user.
- tracker1 10y ago
  It's not significantly different than the Apache or MSPL licenses in this regard.
zpao 10y ago
Hi, Paul from the React team here. There have been lots of questions about the license+patents combo we use. Recently our legal team answered some of those questions. https://code.facebook.com/license-faq https://code.facebook.com/license-faq
- bwhitty 10y ago
  Is there any talk within Facebook on amending this clause or moving React to a standard license? I believe it's stopping a lot of large companies (whom the patent clause could actually affect) from using React, and all other like-licensed Facebook software.
  - ergo14 10y ago
    Just use Polymer, vue or something else without that problem :-)
    - timup 10y ago
      Polymer has nearly the same provision. They're sneaky about it as it doesn't appear in the main license. http://polymer.github.io/PATENTS.txt http://polymer.github.io/PATENTS.txt
      - ergo14 10y ago
        Not at all: "If you or your agent or exclusive licensee institute or order or agree to the institution of patent litigation against any entity (including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that this implementation of Polymer or any code incorporated within this implementation of Polymer constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement, or inducement of patent infringement, then any patent rights granted to you under this License for this implementation of Polymer shall terminate as of the date such litigation is filed." I dont see how is that similar to react. It makes way more sense and is closer in spirit to apache I think.
        10y ago
Twirrim 10y ago
Unrelated to the actual content of the page.. but why does this site require 1.25Mb of javascript to load? It makes up nearly 70% of the entire page, and is responsible for almost 60% of the requests needed to render the page. Do you really need to use that much javascript just to render a blog post. Why? Those webfonts also took multiple seconds to retrieve leaving the page essentially completely blank to visitors until their browsers finally pulled them down. It paused long enough I was wondering if HN had sent sufficient traffic to bring the site down. Here's an output to a quick stab at loading the page using pingdom: https://tools.pingdom.com/#!/cpZuGy/http://www.elcaminolegal.com/single-post/2016/10/04/Facebook-Reactjs-License https://tools.pingdom.com/#!/cpZuGy/http://www.elcaminolegal...
- talmand 10y ago
  Because it's a basic site with a handful of pages with a blog that is built as a single page app. All the HTML of the page is generated by Javascript and dumped into the lone div inside the body. So, you take the big hit at first load but then it's snappy after that. Although, I would think the load size and speed for such a basic site would be better with standard HTML for everything but the blog. Also, the main JS file is 1690 lines long and even though it says it is min in the file name, it doesn't seem to be minified. The CSS file has some nice stuff going on in there. Some of the selectors are a bit long for my tastes though.
appleflaxen 10y ago
if a person offers two licenses, and you only need to accept one of them to be licensed, then you should be all set. If I sue facebook and they countersue, then my defense is simply "i am licensed under BSD". The fact that you offered an additional license (they even call it "additional") does not mean that I am required to accept it when the first license stands alone. Right?
- Flimm 10y ago
  Yes, but Facebook didn't dual-license this, they licensed it under a modified version of the BSD license. So it's that license or nothing. Edit: good point, gcp.
  - gcp 10y ago
    You misunderstood. He says "I'll take this": https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/LICENSE https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/LICENSE which by admission of the blog post this is about, already includes an implicit patent grant on React. And he'll pass on this: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS Which is marked as "additional".
    - DannyBee 10y ago
      This is a reasonable argument, given the headers says " * This source code is licensed under the BSD-style license found in the * LICENSE file in the root directory of this source tree. An additional grant * of patent rights can be found in the PATENTS file in the same directory. *" However, the problem you have here is there literally can be no implied license when an explicit one is offered. You can't say "i take the bsd and implied patent license". So if you want to take it without the additional rights grant, you can. But you won't get patent rights, because they have offered them to you explicitly under a different license.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
guelo 10y ago
To me it's the GPL of patents; it's a viral anti-patent license. Once you use React you must disarm in the destructive patent wars. I wish more popular software were released with it.
- appleflaxen 10y ago
  it's not really viral... the viral aspect of GPL is that any derived work you distribute would automatically have to be open. in the case of the patents, they're not really used to create a derived work. As a result, there is no "infection".
  - tracker1 10y ago
    I liken it to a mutually assured destruction aka nuclear deterrent. Which is a pretty close fit. As someone who is opposed to software patents in general, I'm okay with this.
- gcp 10y ago
  The problem is that Facebook doesn't need to disarm, and it's removing your options to fight them if they do not [1]. It's like being forced to abide by the GPL but having the other party use your code under BSD. [1] I originally said "defend against", but the countersuing clause does cover that.
draw_down 10y ago
I'm not a lawyer so I can't say with certainty, but I'm sure Facebook could make React's license a bit nicer in some ways. But I can't buy it as a reason for not using React, that sounds bogus to me. Facebook isn't gonna come sue your beer-ranking app company over a patent beef.
- gcp 10y ago
  The Facebook competitor that is considering buying out your beer-ranking app making company might reconsider, though.
morgante 10y ago
These conspiracy theories are really getting old. Do people really think Facebook developed and released React for the sole, or even primary purpose of gaining patent rights? It's preposterous that so many top engineers would be working on such a goal. It seems obvious that Facebook just has some overly cautious lawyers. I highly doubt that means Facebook is going to use your usage of React as an excuse to steal your patents.
- ryanswapp 10y ago
  Amen.
- stealthefocus 10y ago
  Perhaps. But what if Oracle buys facebook or Zuckerberg steps down and a litigious CEO takes over. This is a major concern for lawyers in large companies.
  - morgante 10y ago
    I'm happy to recommend that everyone stop using React if Facebook ever sues someone for using React. But it remains a very unlikely possibility, especially since we don't even know if Facebook has React patents.
    - ramenmeal 10y ago
      If what I gather is correct, the patents in question don't need to be related to React.
      - morgante 10y ago
        Yes they do, because that's the only patent rights this license is granting to you. All that happens if you sue Facebook for patent infringement is that you lose the patent license included with React—since unrelated patents were never included in that in the first place, it makes no difference if it's terminated.
    - 10y ago
ryanswapp 10y ago
So, assuming you actually have a patent, and Facebook actually decides to infringe on that patent, the worst case scenario is that you lose your license to use React. There are principles of fairness and equity in the law that would allow you to stop using React in a reasonable amount of time. So write your frontend in Elm. It probably needed a rewrite anyways.
- Lazare 10y ago
  > the worst case scenario is that you lose your license to use React. Not even that; you lose your license to use the patents Facebook has which cover React... ...if they exist. Nobodies ever found one, and a core React dev is on record saying he doesn't know of any either. :) But you don't ever your license to use React. Bonus: Many people think the BSD license contains an implicit patent grant, which might well cover you even if the explicit patent grant is revoked. Again, if there are any patents to license.
nmblackburn 10y ago
This has been a major issue for me from the get go, it goes against open source culture but that's no surprise because that is what Facebook loves to do (which it has consistently proved). They pick something upcoming, recreate it injecting their ideals while knocking the original. They then release it to a sea of "pseudo developers" that latch onto it with the "well it's good because Facebook" mentality which aggressively defend it giving them more leverage. Then they rinse and repeat until they have replaced everything the community has created with their equivalent instead of contributing back to those projects like a true supporter of open source would. Open source is much more than having code on a repo, it's a culture that Facebook is hell bent on "changing".
DannyBee 10y ago
"A. The Additional Grant of Patent Rights in Unnecessary." This is legally incorrect. ". But I’ve never heard any lawyer postulate that that document does not grant a license to fully exploit the licensed software under all of the licensor’s intellectual property. Anyone who pushes that view is thinking too hard." Nobody has pushed this view. However, the author seems to miss that such rights are likely not sublicensable, because they are implied, and implied rights are pretty much never sublicensable. That is, i may have gotten the rights. That does not mean i can give someone else the same rights. Now, there are other possible principles, such as exhaustion, that may take care of this (it's a grey area) But it's definitely not the case that implied patent rights are somehow going to be better than an explicit grant. They are for people using software. They are not for people distributing software.
giancarlostoro 10y ago
I'm not sure why they didn't just use the MS-PL it sounds like the same thing? I don't understand why use BSD if the MS-PL achieves what they want, and is backed by Microsoft (surely it would be in their best interest to defend their own license). https://opensource.org/licenses/MS-PL https://opensource.org/licenses/MS-PL
bedros 10y ago
interesting article about why startups should never use Reactjs because if it's license https://medium.com/bits-and-pixels/a-compelling-reason-not-to-use-reactjs-beac24402f7b#.i625jul0b https://medium.com/bits-and-pixels/a-compelling-reason-not-t...
yladiz 10y ago
One interesting thing to note is that the actual license makes no specific references to the patents rider, and in fact the patents grant rider is a separate file completely. Does that mean that I have to follow it, if it's not directly in the license? If we look at the license as a contract, shouldn't it be in the license directly, even if it's referencing something outside?
brooklyndude 10y ago
For some reason, I have NO idea why, just like Angular. Just something kind of cool about it. React I'm sure is awesome, but Angular just seems to have something special. Just that extra "something."
nutate 10y ago
"It is unknown to me why Facebook issued an Additional Grant of Patent Rights in the first place." STOP RIGHT THERE If you can't be bothered to do the research necessary to see why then your JD didn't teach ya much in the ways of learning about things. Which ideally should be a large portion, those big books of case law, now oft replaced with speculation and internet comments, do at least tell the story of "why". And if you jump the gun on researching the imminently googleable first sentence of your argument, how can I trust, nay, why should I trust, a single sentence thereafter. Long and short APL has patent clauses, BSD doesn't, their PATENTS file kinda added that back to BSD without some of the apparent downsides of the APL in terms of forcing you to never ever sue about patents. Small but not hard, I know, I just have a PhD not some fancy JD, but at least I can do the research that would've muted I imagine the entire post. I still can't seem to write non-confusing sentences though. Oh well. Parse the above at your own peril.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
javascript_fn 10y ago
I think the change in licence has something to do with mobile phone licence issues, React Native had its first official release on a date that correlates to the licence addendum changes, this is the first official tagged release : https://github.com/facebook/react-native/releases/tag/v0.14.2 https://github.com/facebook/react-native/releases/tag/v0.14.... As you can see it is dated: "10 Nov 2015" shortly after the licence was changed.
DeAndre222 10y ago
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tofupup 10y ago
neat

461 points by maxsavin 10y ago

React.js is basically licensed so that you cannot make anything that can compete with facebook corporation. Example: 1. You create something similar to Instagram using React. 2. It gets popular 3. Facebook sues you and takes all your reacts and reducers

Oletros 10y ago
Can you point which part of the license says what you claim? Thanks
- augustt 10y ago
  In their PATENTS file: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS#L14-L26 https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS#L14-L2... If you read it, it doesn't seem like GP's claim is completely true.
  - Oletros 10y ago
    Are you talking about this part? > if Facebook or any of its subsidiaries or corporate affiliates files a lawsuit alleging patent infringement against you in the first instance, and you respond by filing a patent infringement counterclaim in that lawsuit against that party that is unrelated to the Software, the license granted hereunder will not terminate under section (i) of this paragraph due to such counterclaim And, please, point in which part of the file you linked where is said that your license is terminated if Facebook sues you
    - arcticbull 10y ago
      [edit] ugh, meant to put this elsewhere, rough morning.
      - Oletros 10y ago
        > 3. Facebook sues you and takes all your reacts and reducers Perhaps I highlighted that part because the original OP talked about Facebook suing you first. Dude.
Kwastie 10y ago
I am not a lawyer, but "not bringing a patent infringement lawsuit against Facebook or its affiliates" suggest that anyone using React can't file a lawsuit against Facebook over patents and NOT vice versa as you suggest.
ojr 10y ago
Actually I see it as 3. You can't sue Facebook because your app is similar to Instagram
- amelius 10y ago
  Is such a clause actually enforceable? Has this been tested in a court of law? Just curious.
  - icebraining 10y ago
    Well, the clause isn't "you can't sue", it's "you have to stop using React if you sue".
    - amelius 10y ago
      But what if you don't stop using it?
      - leonatan 10y ago
        You can be sued by Facebook for infringing their license.
        amelius 10y ago
        Which brings us back to my original question ;)
- Mc_Big_G 10y ago
  Ok, so expanding on that, the problem becomes this: 1) You create a successful app using React 2) Facebook blatantly copies your app. 3) You can't sue Facebook
capkutay 10y ago
Yes it would totally make sense for facebook to effectively kill react (wasting millions of their paid engineering hours) and forever taint their developer community by using that clause to sue another company just because they compete. </sarcasm> Hypothetically if you ever grow so big and frighten facebook to that degree, migrating off react would be an easy problem to solve.
- bad_user 10y ago
  Hypothetically, when you're found to infringe a patent for a product that was already deployed, then the damage was already done and migrating at that point won't save you ;-)
  - capkutay 10y ago
    Right but this clause assumes you are the one suing facebook for patent infringement and unless your patent is along the lines of "we use react.js to do x", then you probably have the flexibility to port it to a different framework.
- ergo14 10y ago
  BILLIONS, TRILLIONS of hours went into react /s Or maybe whole eternity... Why restrict yourself to just millions.
danabramov 10y ago
No, this is a complete misunderstanding of the license. Please read Facebook's official FAQ on this matter:: https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 >Does the additional patent grant in the Facebook BSD+Patents license terminate if I create a competing product? >No.

JoshTriplett 10y ago

Other Open Source licenses have patent termination provisions. Apache 2.0 (which React used to use) says "If You institute patent litigation against any entity (including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that the Work or a Contribution incorporated within the Work constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement, then any patent licenses granted to You under this License for that Work shall terminate as of the date such litigation is filed.". There are other licenses as well that include more extensive patent termination provisions, such as the APSL.

SloopJon 10y ago
The author covered this: "Facebook is not saying only that a licensee’s rights to use React will terminate if the licensee claims patent infringement by the React library itself. ... Facebook is using its publication of React source code as leverage to win some protection against patent lawsuits generally."
bad_user 10y ago
For Apache 2.0, read again the part that says "alleging that the Work or a Contribution incorporated within the Work constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement". This in other words means that the license termination happens when you sue for patents that are related to the Work or to derivative works. And it applies to all contributors and isn't related to a specific company. Which is quite reasonable. Now go read: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS - you'll notice that this is a license related only to Facebook's patents and that Facebook will terminate your license if you sue them for any patents, even patents that are unrelated to the Work. And even more problematic, I'm not a lawyer, but it doesn't seem to me that this license applies to derivative works. Big difference.
omouse 10y ago
Then Facebook should have stuck with the Apache 2.0 license.
brianm 10y ago
The AL2 (and MPL2 and GPL3) language is designed to protect the users from the software authors. The Facebook PATENTS language is designed to protect Facebook from the users.

bad_user 10y ago

Facebook's license is even weaker than a BSD/MIT license without any PATENTS license attached at all. Because in that case the patents grant can be considered implicit, depending on jurisdiction. By including a PATENTS license in that repository, Facebook nullifies the possibility of such a defense.

arcticbull 10y ago
[edit] I'm bad at read. Sorry!
- bad_user 10y ago
  I'm not sure what you disagree with.
  - dleslie 10y ago
    I am equally confused; I think they may have misread your comment.
bluejekyll 10y ago
I wish he went into more detail on the difference between this and the Apache2 patent grants. I've been favoring Apache2, and am considering adopting the GPLv2 compatibility clause that is being added to Swift.
- bad_user 10y ago
  Apache 2 is definitely much better. IANAL, but I've written about the difference in another comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692852

zelon88 10y ago

Does this mean that react could be considered "available source" instead of "open source?"

mi100hael 10y ago
I think it's a great illustration of the difference between "open source" and "free software." In this case the source is still openly published, but under certain circumstances you're no longer free to redistribute.
- bad_user 10y ago
  Personally I think it's a great illustration that even software developers lack reading skills. Open Source means this, no more, no less: https://opensource.org/osd-annotated https://opensource.org/osd-annotated
  - eatbitseveryday 10y ago
    > even software developers lack reading skills A little condescending, no? Do you read (or expect everyone to) the EULA in full when you install Windows, and understand the implications of _all_ clauses? Or for that matter, the Privacy and User Agreements of any website you visit, e.g. Spotify, Facebook, HN (this very website), Netflix, Hulu, Google, etc., or software you might install, e.g. WhatsApp, Signal, iTunes, macOS, all the licenses visible and distributed with Android? What about your banks, and the actions they sneak in that give them the most freedom to do with your money/data under the law? The text written in these agreements is foremost written for other lawyers, not you. Many companies have made them easier to parse, slowly prioritizing the user's ability to understand them. Most people have fine reading skills. What you are misconstruing is an ability to understand and derive implications of legal agreements.
  - mi100hael 10y ago
    A license (such as Facebook's) that prevents me from redistributing a modified version could still qualify as "open source" so long as simple mirroring wasn't restricted. > In practice, open source stands for criteria a little looser than those of free software. As far as we know, all existing released free software source code would qualify as open source. Nearly all open source software is free software, but there are exceptions. First, some open source licenses are too restrictive, so they do not qualify as free licenses. For example, “Open Watcom” is nonfree because its license does not allow making a modified version and using it privately. Fortunately, few programs use such licenses. > Second, and more important in practice, many products containing computers check signatures on their executable programs to block users from installing different executables; only one privileged company can make executables that can run in the device or can access its full capabilities. We call these devices “tyrants”, and the practice is called “tivoization” after the product (Tivo) where we first saw it. Even if the executable is made from free source code, the users cannot run modified versions of it, so the executable is nonfree. > The criteria for open source do not recognize this issue; they are concerned solely with the licensing of the source code. Thus, these unmodifiable executables, when made from source code such as Linux that is open source and free, are open source but not free. Many Android products contain nonfree tivoized executables of Linux. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.h... (Pasted the most relevant portion in case you lack reading skills.)

pitaj 10y ago

I feel like if React doesn't "count" as open source software, then neither should anything licensed as GPLv3.

mordocai 10y ago
How are those things related at all in the context?

omouse 10y ago

I wonder what the OSI and Software Freedom Law Center say about this.

microcolonel 10y ago

Similar approach to the patchwork of various patent grants on Opus implementations; it's still open source, it just might not be free for 100% of the purposes you could think of. I think Robert doesn't understand that open source refers to the source code being open to use, derivation, and study. The BSD license also includes a warranty disclaimer, which is the exact same kind of protective language as the patent grant. The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license when you enter patent litigation against Facebook for a counterclaim the granted patents or primary litigation for unrelated patents. I don't consider countersuing Facebook for patents applying to React, while USING REACT, to be a serious fundamental software freedom.

RodericDay 10y ago
> The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license when you enter patent litigation against Facebook for the granted patents. I don't consider suing Facebook for patents applying to React, while USING REACT, to be a serious fundamental software freedom. Where does it say that the stipulation refers only to patents applying to React?
- microcolonel 10y ago
  >Apparently in response to criticism, in April 2015 Facebook issued a second version of the Additional Grant of Patent Rights that softened the termination provision to say that the React software licensee would not lose its right to use the software under Facebook patents in the special case in which the licensee brings a patent lawsuit that is a counterclaim against Facebook or its affiliates that is unrelated to React.js. The second version of the Additional Grant of Patent Rights, in addition to the BSD license, is what governs use of React.js today. Sorry, seems it only applies to counterclaims.

mjg59 10y ago

Version 2 of the Apple Public Source License includes the following termination clause: 12.1 Termination. This License and the rights granted hereunder will terminate: … (c) automatically without notice from Apple if You, at any time during the term of this License, commence an action for patent infringement against Apple; provided that Apple did not first commence an action for patent infringement against You in that instance. Like the React patent grant, this applies to any patent suit, not just ones that allege that the covered software infringes. The Open Source Initiative considers APSLv2 an Open Source license, and the Free Software Foundation considers it a Free Software license. Note that this clause terminates your copyright license, not merely your patent license - it's significantly stronger than the React rider. So I think the claim that it's not open source is a bit strong, even though I find this sort of language pretty repugnant.

TAForObvReasons 10y ago
Microsoft is not necessarily a paragon of open source, but many of their open source projects use unadulterated OS licenses. Typescript is Apache 2: https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/blob/master/LICENSE.... Visual Studio Code is MIT: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/LICENSE.txt
- webwalker 10y ago
  You will notice that most new projects all use MIT. Apache 2 hasn't been used for anything new in the last year+.
  - the_duke 10y ago
    Have some examples? The MIT license is problematic with software patents. I see some projects moving to Apache2 for that reason (one prominent example here is Rust. They moved to an MIT/Apache2 dual licensing model).
    - 10y ago

falcolas 10y ago

I worked with a development manager headhunted from Microsoft, who was quite worried about simple "Taint" from open source software (i.e. ideas gained from viewing open source code making their way into closed source software). I also worked with a company which wouldn't accept code contributions to their OS project; they would do clean room implementations to avoid the legal hassle of incorporating code which wasn't written for hire. So I can certainly see large companies being leery of utilizing software with licenses which don't include patent grants. Perhaps it's less of an issue with the BSD style licenses, as explicitly called out in the article.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

falsestprophet 10y ago

After Alice v. CLS, what patents about React could be enforced? edit: After Alice there has been a software patent massacre: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_United_States_patent_law#Post-Alice_period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_United_...

joatmon-snoo 10y ago
IANAL but OTOH I would argue that Alice isn't very relevant here. The chief rationale behind that case was the triviality of the core algorithm being described: if there isn't enough money in an account, you don't withdraw money from the account.

woah 10y ago

If it becomes a problem, you could drop in a react-compatible library pretty quickly. React native might be tougher but still would probably appear if there was a case with a lot of publicity.

morenoh149 10y ago
So happy https://preactjs.com/ https://preactjs.com/ and others are around
- brlewis 10y ago
  Other frameworks could infringe the hypothetical React-related patent. There is no safety from infringement as long as software patents exist.
  - tracker1 10y ago
    Personally, I'm opposed to software patents... that said, there's no safety from any third party wrt patents either.
    - brlewis 10y ago
      I think there exist fields of invention where it's reasonable for inventors to know what's in the patent database and thus avoid unintentional infringement. Obviously software isn't one of those fields.
      - tracker1 10y ago
        When it's a case where it's not possible to utilize patent research in order to help make something, and in fact ill-advised to do so, then in that space the entire purported purpose of patents in that space invalidates their use.

shadowmint 10y ago

If companies fear that if they try to enforce their patents they will lose access to significant commercial opportunities as a result of not being able to use projects such as react... ...basically, I welcome it. Patents are harmful. The FSF has, to my knowledge, made no meaningful progress in significant patent reform. If this helps, then bring it on.

gcp 10y ago
Facebook's patent license doesn't grant you any patents outside the ones used by React. It does grant them freedom to use any patent you may have (if you use their software). See the problem? Even if you don't like patents, it makes the playing field totally uneven.
- matt4077 10y ago
  It still lowers the value of IP patents, since that value has most often manifest itself in suing Facebook/Apple etc. With their value being even marginally reduced, maybe some patents will never be filed, or the value proposition of setting up patent-litigation entities is reduced enough to discourage it. Basically this is net-positive for anyone who doesn't own or plan to own patents, even if it is even better for Facebook.
  - gcp 10y ago
    Patent litigation against such companies is often carried out by specialized entities, so those have nothing to lose by having their "React" patents revoked.
brlewis 10y ago
I would agree with you if it was only software patents. I still think hardware patents have a place, and that it is possible for the patent office to judge novelty and non-obviousness of hardware inventions.

andrewvijay 10y ago

Frankly multiple developers don't really care about the licenses or clauses. Software veterans and corporations care about it more than anyone else. Even the article is kinda hard to grasp in one go that I had to read a couple of times. To find the nuances in an OSS license and to think and act on it is not easy for a lot non native English speakers. And more posts like these are needed to make many people read and know about these serious issues.

iplaw 10y ago

So this attorney's problem is that rather than ambiguously granting a license to the patent claims necessary to implement this software, they decided to explicitly grant such rights? I see no problems.

gcp 10y ago
No, his problem is with the breadth of the patent assertion Facebook makes. He's not the first to point out it's unusually in favor of Facebook, even compared to patent grants from Microsoft and Google.

cjbprime 10y ago

The argument that "This is Not Open Source Software" feels unsupported and very sloppy. > Thus, the licensee pays a price to use the library. It is not a price paid with money. [..] I could be missing something, but I have never seen any other software license use such a condition and also claim to be an open source license. This just isn't thinking creatively. The GPL also requires a "price to be paid, but not with money" -- you give up your right to keep changes you make secret (if you distribute them). Yet no-one seriously argues that the GPL isn't an open source license. If there is something about giving up the right to file patent lawsuits that is totally different to giving up the right to keep your changes secret, the article doesn't say what that difference is. Giving up the right to keep your changes secret is surely more stringent than giving up your right to file patent infringement lawsuits against one company. Why, then, should the latter be a dealbreaker for an open source license?

gcp 10y ago
I think the argument is that the grant is asymmetric. GPL is "I open up, you open up". The retaliation clause Facebook uses is "you don't get to sue us, but we may sue you".
- cjbprime 10y ago
  That's an interesting argument! (But the article didn't make it..) Couldn't you argue that the GPL says "you don't get to keep your changes private, but I do", and so is asymmetric too? It seems normal to me for the rightsholder to retain more rights than the grantee.
  - gcp 10y ago
    You can keep GPL changes private if you don't publish it, and the same applies to the original author. If you feed back changes, you're mutually bound. But the problem with Facebook's license is not the copyright, it's the patent grant.
ComodoHacker 10y ago
Mush simpler. Open source != free as in free beer. That's enough to bust this argument.

Noseshine 10y ago

So I checked StackExchange's law site and found this question - thus far unanswered, but those would be my questions exactly: http://law.stackexchange.com/questions/14337/q-about-consequences-of-a-software-license-amendment-regarding-patents-facebook http://law.stackexchange.com/questions/14337/q-about-consequ... It comes down to two questions (quoted from the linked question) - note that those are questions, not assertions: 1) > ... if we use any of Facebook's open source projects Facebook can violate *our patents* (of any > kind) pretty much with impunity: If we try to sue them we lose the right to patents covering their > open source projects(?) 2) > I have read opinions that other open source projects that don't have such a clause, for example > those from Microsoft or Google, nevertheless have the exact same problem, only that it isn't > explicitly stated. Is that true? Is my situation not any better when I only use open source > projects without such a clause? I think that is a good point. The many opinions I see are almost all from people who don't have their own patents to think about, but what happens if you are a company and you do? Would you basically allow Facebook to use any of your patents, because for all practical purposes you can't defend them if you rely on their open source projects?

gcp 10y ago
1) Yes, and that's exactly the problem raised here. 2) The patent grants from Microsoft and Google grant a license on software (or a standard), and only give them a (reciprocal) license on the software or standard that is under consideration. If Microsoft had published React, you could still sue them for violating patents that are unrelated to React without losing your license to use it. The Facebook grant doesn't have this, so if you rely on React you can't sue Facebook at all. But they can still sue you.
- madeofpalk 10y ago
  2) If Microsoft published React without a patent rider, and Microsoft had patents on the tech in React, then you would be in violation in the first place, right? Microsoft can still you sue for violating their React patents, especially if you sue them first.
  - 10y ago

Egidius 10y ago

I agree. I was working at a somewhat large IT company (~30k employees) this year. I made a plea for React and while our development section agreed, it got bounced by legal because of these points. If Facebook is really serious about Open Source, they also have to make their licence so that every organisation is free to use it.

matt4077 10y ago
Being "serious about Open Source" doesn't mean a commitment to do anything to support people using your software. It's the opposite, actually: the original copyleft licenses such as the GPL were explicitly designed to promote Open Source by hindering adoption in some cases, namely those where companies want to distribute derivative works commercially. Then the BSD/MIT-style licenses weakened this restriction. So you're free to use React in a commercial product. But Facebook, Apple etc. care a lot about patents these days. Not offensively, as far as we can tell, but they have now been burned repeatedly by often trivial patents being used to extract hundreds of million from them. So they added these 'patentleft' clauses to their licenses to essentially undermine the patent system in regards to software. As it gets more difficult to build anything without some library that includes this clause, fewer and fewer actors will have the freedom to sue without consequences. Being opposed to patents on intellectual property in the first case, I can only applaud these efforts. In fact, they should probably go further and extend the protection to everyone: If you use IP patents against Jane Doe, you may no longer use React. The only problem is the rise of entities focused entirely on patent-litigation.
- Flimm 10y ago
  See my other comment on why this is not analogous to copyleft, and therfore the term 'patentleft' isn't very useful here.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- eitland 10y ago
  > It's the opposite, actually: the original copyleft licenses such as the GPL were explicitly designed to promote Open Source by hindering adoption in some cases, namely those where companies want to distribute derivative works commercially. I'm usually not the one to defend GPL but I want to point out that AFAIK distributing derivative works commercially is totally fine for GPL - you just have to follow the rules in the license (provide source code under the same licence).

topbagsvk 10y ago

The Facebook arrangement meets all of those requirements with the one stipulation that you forfeit the license - http://www.handbagsgb.com http://www.handbagsgb.com

lucb1e 10y ago

The way I read it, it's not evil. It's a known and deliberate shortcoming of many licenses (e.g. BSD) not to include patent stuff because it makes everything unnecessarily complex. There was recently an article about why BSD and MIT are so popular, and it's because they're concise and understandable. There is a reason WTFPL exists and some developers resort to it as a way to avoid legalese. Facebook clearly was aware of this "shortcoming" and being a big player, they might have wanted to be nice and say "we won't sue you for patent infringement if it turns out we have a patent on something React does". Then the managers went "but what if they sue us? Patents are not only for offense but also our defense, we would weaken our defense." And so the clause of "except if you sue us first" came into being. And now this fuss about the patent part making it not an open source license? Oh come on. I really don't like Facebook as a company, but this bickering is silly.

Alex3917 10y ago
Also, let's say hypothetically that Facebook does sue you for the patents covered by React. When to comes time to establish damages, the fact that Facebook is currently giving away the licenses for free can be used to argue in court that their monetary value is zero. So even if you get hit with treble damages for willful infringement, the actual impact might not be as severe as one might otherwise suspect. (IANAL, don't try this at home, etc.)
ronjouch 10y ago
> It's a known and deliberate shortcoming of many licenses (e.g. BSD) not to include patent stuff because it makes everything unnecessarily complex. There was recently an article about why BSD and MIT are so popular, and it's because they're concise and understandable. Could you (or anyone confident in their legalese) elaborate on: * Does the Apache2 license indeed solve this? (I'm asking because I read about it in the LLVM/Clang license change proposal [1]) * Why isn't the less-popular-but-still-well-established Apache2 license more widely used, then? To counter what you are saying about simplicity, don't you think patents are a common concern that should be covered by default in a license, even at some complexity cost? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12531887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12531887 EDIT: precisions, wording.

the_duke 10y ago

While we are on the subject: I constantly find the need to read up on licensing. Usually with various blog posts or online information, which never gives me the feeling that I fully understood the legal implications or the context. Can anyone recommend a book covering software licenses in depth? (ideally not only US centric)

bdcravens 10y ago
With a new package manager every year, a new framework every six months, and a new build system every month, who has time for that? Just trust the masses: whatever frameworks and libraries have the most stickers on Macbooks has proven its veracity. /s

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

briankwest 10y ago

How is this any different than the MPL 1.1 license? Section 8 of the MPL 1.1 has similar language. /b

gcp 10y ago
It's completely different. MPL 1.1 talks about "such Participant's Contributor Version directly or indirectly infringes any patent" Which refers to the software itself. Which means it's a patent retaliation clause similar to the one Microsoft and Google use. If you claim patents on someone for using specific software, you lose any patent licenses for said software that were granted to you. But in Facebook's case, the retaliation extends when you make any patent claim on anything Facebook does, even if it's completely unrelated to the software in question. Meanwhile, the patent license that Facebook gives you does not extend beyond the software in question. So you're effectively licensing all your patents to Facebook, and Facebook only gives you the ones you need to use the software.

coding123 10y ago

Email I just sent the OSI: Please see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692552 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12692552 It turns out companies are now "bastardizing" the license terms. I would love for the OSI to re-evaluate if these licences are truly open source. Open source covers freedom, and I should think that these clauses abridge that freedom since it is very well possible for a company to be required to sue Apple or Facebook over patents. If that unrelated lawsuit "strips" your legal right to use software, that is NOT freedom. Thanks

matt4077 10y ago
The OSI are opposed to software patents anyway, so I doubt that they have a problem with them becoming worthless. "Freedom" is an empty slogan in this regard. Copyleft licenses have long restricted your freedom, the idea being that there are colliding "freedoms" under some circumstances and it's for the greater good of society to restrict some peoples "freedom" (those creating derivative works) for the benefit of of the end-user.
tracker1 10y ago
It's not significantly different than the Apache or MSPL licenses in this regard.

zpao 10y ago

Hi, Paul from the React team here. There have been lots of questions about the license+patents combo we use. Recently our legal team answered some of those questions. https://code.facebook.com/license-faq https://code.facebook.com/license-faq

bwhitty 10y ago
Is there any talk within Facebook on amending this clause or moving React to a standard license? I believe it's stopping a lot of large companies (whom the patent clause could actually affect) from using React, and all other like-licensed Facebook software.
- ergo14 10y ago
  Just use Polymer, vue or something else without that problem :-)
  - timup 10y ago
    Polymer has nearly the same provision. They're sneaky about it as it doesn't appear in the main license. http://polymer.github.io/PATENTS.txt http://polymer.github.io/PATENTS.txt
    - ergo14 10y ago
      Not at all: "If you or your agent or exclusive licensee institute or order or agree to the institution of patent litigation against any entity (including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that this implementation of Polymer or any code incorporated within this implementation of Polymer constitutes direct or contributory patent infringement, or inducement of patent infringement, then any patent rights granted to you under this License for this implementation of Polymer shall terminate as of the date such litigation is filed." I dont see how is that similar to react. It makes way more sense and is closer in spirit to apache I think.
      - 10y ago

Twirrim 10y ago

Unrelated to the actual content of the page.. but why does this site require 1.25Mb of javascript to load? It makes up nearly 70% of the entire page, and is responsible for almost 60% of the requests needed to render the page. Do you really need to use that much javascript just to render a blog post. Why? Those webfonts also took multiple seconds to retrieve leaving the page essentially completely blank to visitors until their browsers finally pulled them down. It paused long enough I was wondering if HN had sent sufficient traffic to bring the site down. Here's an output to a quick stab at loading the page using pingdom: https://tools.pingdom.com/#!/cpZuGy/http://www.elcaminolegal.com/single-post/2016/10/04/Facebook-Reactjs-License https://tools.pingdom.com/#!/cpZuGy/http://www.elcaminolegal...

talmand 10y ago
Because it's a basic site with a handful of pages with a blog that is built as a single page app. All the HTML of the page is generated by Javascript and dumped into the lone div inside the body. So, you take the big hit at first load but then it's snappy after that. Although, I would think the load size and speed for such a basic site would be better with standard HTML for everything but the blog. Also, the main JS file is 1690 lines long and even though it says it is min in the file name, it doesn't seem to be minified. The CSS file has some nice stuff going on in there. Some of the selectors are a bit long for my tastes though.

appleflaxen 10y ago

if a person offers two licenses, and you only need to accept one of them to be licensed, then you should be all set. If I sue facebook and they countersue, then my defense is simply "i am licensed under BSD". The fact that you offered an additional license (they even call it "additional") does not mean that I am required to accept it when the first license stands alone. Right?

Flimm 10y ago
Yes, but Facebook didn't dual-license this, they licensed it under a modified version of the BSD license. So it's that license or nothing. Edit: good point, gcp.
- gcp 10y ago
  You misunderstood. He says "I'll take this": https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/LICENSE https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/LICENSE which by admission of the blog post this is about, already includes an implicit patent grant on React. And he'll pass on this: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS Which is marked as "additional".
  - DannyBee 10y ago
    This is a reasonable argument, given the headers says " * This source code is licensed under the BSD-style license found in the * LICENSE file in the root directory of this source tree. An additional grant * of patent rights can be found in the PATENTS file in the same directory. *" However, the problem you have here is there literally can be no implied license when an explicit one is offered. You can't say "i take the bsd and implied patent license". So if you want to take it without the additional rights grant, you can. But you won't get patent rights, because they have offered them to you explicitly under a different license.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

guelo 10y ago

To me it's the GPL of patents; it's a viral anti-patent license. Once you use React you must disarm in the destructive patent wars. I wish more popular software were released with it.

appleflaxen 10y ago
it's not really viral... the viral aspect of GPL is that any derived work you distribute would automatically have to be open. in the case of the patents, they're not really used to create a derived work. As a result, there is no "infection".
- tracker1 10y ago
  I liken it to a mutually assured destruction aka nuclear deterrent. Which is a pretty close fit. As someone who is opposed to software patents in general, I'm okay with this.
gcp 10y ago
The problem is that Facebook doesn't need to disarm, and it's removing your options to fight them if they do not [1]. It's like being forced to abide by the GPL but having the other party use your code under BSD. [1] I originally said "defend against", but the countersuing clause does cover that.

draw_down 10y ago

I'm not a lawyer so I can't say with certainty, but I'm sure Facebook could make React's license a bit nicer in some ways. But I can't buy it as a reason for not using React, that sounds bogus to me. Facebook isn't gonna come sue your beer-ranking app company over a patent beef.

gcp 10y ago
The Facebook competitor that is considering buying out your beer-ranking app making company might reconsider, though.

morgante 10y ago

These conspiracy theories are really getting old. Do people really think Facebook developed and released React for the sole, or even primary purpose of gaining patent rights? It's preposterous that so many top engineers would be working on such a goal. It seems obvious that Facebook just has some overly cautious lawyers. I highly doubt that means Facebook is going to use your usage of React as an excuse to steal your patents.

ryanswapp 10y ago
Amen.
stealthefocus 10y ago
Perhaps. But what if Oracle buys facebook or Zuckerberg steps down and a litigious CEO takes over. This is a major concern for lawyers in large companies.
- morgante 10y ago
  I'm happy to recommend that everyone stop using React if Facebook ever sues someone for using React. But it remains a very unlikely possibility, especially since we don't even know if Facebook has React patents.
  - ramenmeal 10y ago
    If what I gather is correct, the patents in question don't need to be related to React.
    - morgante 10y ago
      Yes they do, because that's the only patent rights this license is granting to you. All that happens if you sue Facebook for patent infringement is that you lose the patent license included with React—since unrelated patents were never included in that in the first place, it makes no difference if it's terminated.
  - 10y ago

ryanswapp 10y ago

So, assuming you actually have a patent, and Facebook actually decides to infringe on that patent, the worst case scenario is that you lose your license to use React. There are principles of fairness and equity in the law that would allow you to stop using React in a reasonable amount of time. So write your frontend in Elm. It probably needed a rewrite anyways.

Lazare 10y ago
> the worst case scenario is that you lose your license to use React. Not even that; you lose your license to use the patents Facebook has which cover React... ...if they exist. Nobodies ever found one, and a core React dev is on record saying he doesn't know of any either. :) But you don't ever your license to use React. Bonus: Many people think the BSD license contains an implicit patent grant, which might well cover you even if the explicit patent grant is revoked. Again, if there are any patents to license.

nmblackburn 10y ago

This has been a major issue for me from the get go, it goes against open source culture but that's no surprise because that is what Facebook loves to do (which it has consistently proved). They pick something upcoming, recreate it injecting their ideals while knocking the original. They then release it to a sea of "pseudo developers" that latch onto it with the "well it's good because Facebook" mentality which aggressively defend it giving them more leverage. Then they rinse and repeat until they have replaced everything the community has created with their equivalent instead of contributing back to those projects like a true supporter of open source would. Open source is much more than having code on a repo, it's a culture that Facebook is hell bent on "changing".

DannyBee 10y ago

"A. The Additional Grant of Patent Rights in Unnecessary." This is legally incorrect. ". But I’ve never heard any lawyer postulate that that document does not grant a license to fully exploit the licensed software under all of the licensor’s intellectual property. Anyone who pushes that view is thinking too hard." Nobody has pushed this view. However, the author seems to miss that such rights are likely not sublicensable, because they are implied, and implied rights are pretty much never sublicensable. That is, i may have gotten the rights. That does not mean i can give someone else the same rights. Now, there are other possible principles, such as exhaustion, that may take care of this (it's a grey area) But it's definitely not the case that implied patent rights are somehow going to be better than an explicit grant. They are for people using software. They are not for people distributing software.

giancarlostoro 10y ago

I'm not sure why they didn't just use the MS-PL it sounds like the same thing? I don't understand why use BSD if the MS-PL achieves what they want, and is backed by Microsoft (surely it would be in their best interest to defend their own license). https://opensource.org/licenses/MS-PL https://opensource.org/licenses/MS-PL

bedros 10y ago

interesting article about why startups should never use Reactjs because if it's license https://medium.com/bits-and-pixels/a-compelling-reason-not-to-use-reactjs-beac24402f7b#.i625jul0b https://medium.com/bits-and-pixels/a-compelling-reason-not-t...

yladiz 10y ago

One interesting thing to note is that the actual license makes no specific references to the patents rider, and in fact the patents grant rider is a separate file completely. Does that mean that I have to follow it, if it's not directly in the license? If we look at the license as a contract, shouldn't it be in the license directly, even if it's referencing something outside?

brooklyndude 10y ago

For some reason, I have NO idea why, just like Angular. Just something kind of cool about it. React I'm sure is awesome, but Angular just seems to have something special. Just that extra "something."

nutate 10y ago

"It is unknown to me why Facebook issued an Additional Grant of Patent Rights in the first place." STOP RIGHT THERE If you can't be bothered to do the research necessary to see why then your JD didn't teach ya much in the ways of learning about things. Which ideally should be a large portion, those big books of case law, now oft replaced with speculation and internet comments, do at least tell the story of "why". And if you jump the gun on researching the imminently googleable first sentence of your argument, how can I trust, nay, why should I trust, a single sentence thereafter. Long and short APL has patent clauses, BSD doesn't, their PATENTS file kinda added that back to BSD without some of the apparent downsides of the APL in terms of forcing you to never ever sue about patents. Small but not hard, I know, I just have a PhD not some fancy JD, but at least I can do the research that would've muted I imagine the entire post. I still can't seem to write non-confusing sentences though. Oh well. Parse the above at your own peril.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

javascript_fn 10y ago

I think the change in licence has something to do with mobile phone licence issues, React Native had its first official release on a date that correlates to the licence addendum changes, this is the first official tagged release : https://github.com/facebook/react-native/releases/tag/v0.14.2 https://github.com/facebook/react-native/releases/tag/v0.14.... As you can see it is dated: "10 Nov 2015" shortly after the licence was changed.

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tofupup 10y ago

neat