24 ms·

Startups should not use React

332 points by nbmh 9y ago

halfnibble 9y ago
I've been saying this for months. Don't use React!
BukhariH 9y ago
Can someone please share what patents cover react? Because if they're revoking patents that don't cover react then there should be no problem to continue using react right?
- theduro 9y ago
  Exactly! And if the day came where this because an issue, for 1/10th the cost of actually retaining a lawyer and reasonably going after Facebook for a patent, you could rewrite your app in something else.
- binaryapparatus 9y ago
  If I understand that license correctly, it is not 'patents that cover react', it is 'any facebook patent, present or future'. Also as explained in the article, it is also about my patents if I have any, in case facebook tries violating them. Far wider than 'react patents'.
  - BukhariH 9y ago
    I understand that but here's the scenario I'm talking about: - I use React for my startup's dashboard - I sue facebook for violating my startup's patent without removing my react dashboard first Now, what patents can facebook use to counter sue me that they couldn't sue me with anyway had I not used react?
    - yozel 9y ago
      Facebook won't counter sue you. They don't have to. You just lose your right to use React, due to its license.
      - kybernetikos 9y ago
        I believe you still have a right to use it under copyright law since the license isn't terminated, it's just that potentially you may be infringing some patents, but so far nobody has actually pointed out what those patents would be, so I think it's a valid question.
      - ec109685 9y ago
        That's not true: https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 Facebook can't take away your rights to use React under the BSD license, no matter what you do.
      - CodesInChaos 9y ago
        You only lose the patent license, not the copyright license. So it is important to know if facebook actually owns patents covering react and if those patents cover other frameworks as well (e.g. because they cover all virtual DOMs).
    - Lazare 9y ago
      As far as is known: None. There don't seem to be any patents.
- anilgulecha 9y ago
  The problem is if you ever found facebook infringing on one of your patents, you could not sue them -- your react patent grant would be rescinded. This is not a behavior of free software.
  - littlecranky67 9y ago
    This is the same BS repeated on HN almost every day now. You can sue FB anytime, whether you use React or not. You do not give them any kind of permission to use YOUR patents just by using React. The only thing that happens when you sue FB over patents is that your patent grant covering React is gone, reducing your license to a regular BSD license. If you use Angular, vue or whatnot open source products covered by licenses without patents grants, there is NO guarantee whatsoever that this piece of software is free from patents of Google, FB, Oracle your favorite patent troll from around the corner. Yet people seem more fine with using software which comes without any patent grants whatsoever, and declare that hell would come over us if the FB patent grant on the software would be revoked. Btw, clauses that revoke patent grants when you sue a party are pretty regular and present in the Apache License v2 and the (L)GPLv3, no one is crying about it and says that those licenses are not open source anymore. The GPLv3 goes even further and invalidates your right to use the software at all if you start sueing people who created that software. Gosh, I am so happy to live in the EU where we do not have to deal with this kind of BS and can just use the best technology that solves the problem.
    - BukhariH 9y ago
      Wait... I live in the EU aswell (UK). What do you mean by: "Gosh, I am so happy to live in the EU where we do not have to deal with this kind of BS and can just use the best technology that solves the problem."
      - fstephany 9y ago
        Software Patenting theoretically does not exist in the EU[1]. But in practice I guess it's up to the interpretation of the law by national courts. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_the_European_Patent_Convention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_the_Eur...
thomyorkie 9y ago
> If all giants agreed to open source under the “BSD + patents” scheme, cross-adoption would grind to a halt. Why? If Google released Project X under “BSD + Patents”, and Amazon really liked it, rather than adopting it and losing their right to ever sue Google for patents, they would go off and build it on their own. This seems like a reasonable argument, but it doesn't seem to have deterred several big name companies from using React. Airbnb, netflix, and dropbox for example.
- chaostheory 9y ago
  Developers are not lawyers, and developers and lawyers don't talk to each other all the time. I wonder how many of those companies even bothered to check the license, given how fast they have to move? I've been guilty of that as well in the past.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - traek 9y ago
    > I wonder how many of those companies even bothered to check the license, given how fast they have to move? Airbnb, Netflix, and Dropbox? I guarantee you all of those companies have lawyers that reviewed the license.
    - chaostheory 9y ago
      Sure they have lawyers, but I highly doubt they reviewed it and I don't blame them since open source licenses have been pretty vanilla for over a decade now. The only companies that actually even really reviewed open source in terms of legal implications were extremely risk averse ones like the telecoms... in the 90s and early 2000s. Of course I could be wrong especially if any of those companies use a tool that checks licenses (I have my doubts).
- danmaz74 9y ago
  Amazon is the poster child of idiotic software patents, see 1-click buying. If this makes their software development more expensive, I'll be really glad.
notaboutdave 9y ago
Easy workaround: Install Preact. No code changes required, at least not for me last year.
- k__ 9y ago
  even the creator of preact said he doesn't know if he infringed FB patents with the creation of preact, because nobody knows what React covering patents FB holds.
  - kybernetikos 9y ago
    And in this, the situation is exactly the same as with any front end library, or even not using one at all. It's almost impossible to know if you're infringing any patents.
- ec109685 9y ago
  Wouldn't Preact run into the same hypothetical patents as React?
cbhl 9y ago
It's worth noting this "you can't sue us for violating your patents if you use our non-free open source software" is working as designed. Facebook claims that if every company adopted a React-like license, that software patents as we know it would basically die. It's worth noting that both Google and Facebook's patent lawyers are generally of the opinion that software patents are net bad, but differ in their opinions of how to express that intent without exposing their companies to additional risk from patent trolls. If you want to be acquired, then this is the opposite of what you want. You file patents for every part of the product you can; you audit your dependencies to avoid copyleft (AGPL and GPL) and React-like licenses, so your software can be folded into a 100% closed source product or shut down or whatever your acquirer wants. If you run a start-up, and you're worried about the React license, you should be speaking to your own legal counsel about the best way forward.
- oh_sigh 9y ago
  This would have no effect on NPEs, which are the most pernicious types of patent trolls as I see it today.
  - cbhl 9y ago
    Right. The way of dealing with NPEs in the short term is to have patents (encourage employees to file for patents, and acquire companies with patents before NPEs do). My understanding is that Facebook's long term vision is that no productive entity can assert its software patent rights, which should then make it politically viable to lobby for laws to be changed to invalidate all software patents altogether.
- danmaz74 9y ago
  This seems to be the case: the wording is pretty obscure and IANAL, but the risk if you use React and sue Facebook for patent infringement should only be that they can counter-sue you for any patents they may hold that apply to React. And be careful: if Facebook has any patents related to React, they could very well cover also the React alternatives: I seriously doubt that eg the author of Vue.js researched if they were violating and FB React-related patents. Edit: here the link to the patent grant https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS > A "Necessary Claim" is a claim of a patent owned by Facebook that is necessarily infringed by the Software standing alone. This should mean that the patent grant only covers you from being sued for any patents covering React technology, and that is the only protection you lose if you sue Facebook.
danielrhodes 9y ago
Are companies getting asked about React in M&A due diligence or has any lawyer recommended this, because otherwise this post is pure clickbait.
- rtpg 9y ago
  code licenses come up in even simple funding rounds. IP happens in due diligence to avoid "oh actually this one freelancer owns all the code"-style situations.
jasonkester 9y ago
I really like the idea behind this license. They want to see a world where software patents no longer exist. So they write a term into their licensing that makes it really difficult for people who do like software patents to use their stuff. I think I will move my projects over to a similar license. The only thing I would change would be to broaden it to invalidate if your company sued anybody over any patent. If everybody did that, maybe software patents would finally go away.
- pavanky 9y ago
  This would only encourage fragmentation. Large companies have to resources to not use your software and create a competing product.
  - AstralStorm 9y ago
    I think you meant encouraging centralization. And yes, big players will often find it cheaper to undercut you via reimplement than a sale. (Or force you to capitulate then get your employees.)
- imtringued 9y ago
  >Facebook claims that if every company adopted a React-like license, that software patents as we know it would basically die. If you think patents shouldn't exist then why is the purpose of the license to protect a single company from patent lawsuits. Why isn't the license covering any patent lawsuits of any kind to any party like the ASL does? Why does the license only protect facebook? What if there are patents that apply to react that facebook doesn't own? Patent trolls can't sue facebook but they can still sue users of react and continue to use react. >If everybody did that, maybe software patents would finally go away. No because facebook can still sue you for other software patents for internal software they didn't release. Facebook's patent grant is a halfassed solution. They are either outright malicious and merely acting in self interest or blatantly incompetent. But since they are unwilling to change the license and patent grant I'm betting on the former.
  - 9y ago
chrisco255 9y ago
Do most software startups even have patentable technology? I'm rather curious about this. Most consumer and SaaS apps I know of are built on non-patented software so I generally question this advice. The fridge example was a case in point of how ridiculously low the odds of any company getting into patent litigation with Facebook are. To go to battle with FB you're gonna need millions and it's going to take years. That's not a light decision.
- snarfy 9y ago
  It's purely anecdata but I've worked for a dozen different companies in my career. The only companies that are still around today are the companies that had patents.
  - chrisco255 9y ago
    I worked for a $5 billion 25 year old company that had no patents to its name (until this year). What matters is execution and distribution, above and beyond patents, especially in software.
sheetjs 9y ago
There was a time when React was Apache v2! https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/3bbed150ab58a07b0c4faf64126b4c9349eecfea/LICENSE https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/3bbed150ab58a07b0c4fa... shows that license. Has anyone seriously explored forking React from the last Apache v2 version?
- mattnewton 9y ago
  AFAICT that version still had patents.txt no?
  - chrisco255 9y ago
    I checked on the repo and I didn't see it.
- chrisco255 9y ago
  If they published React under Apache v2 at one point in time, how can they later re-release under a new license and claim patent rights on it then? Since, assuming whatever patents they own covered this version of React as well...wouldn't that be considered prior art?
  - sirclueless 9y ago
    I don't understand this argument. They are the owners of the patents in question. That gives them a limited monopoly on the rights to use those patents, and can create any number of products using the patents, and offer them to you under any number of licenses. Facebook re-licensing React doesn't create prior art, any more than an inventor manufacturing a new product using a patent they own would create prior art.
    - ktta 9y ago
      IANAL, and might be (likely) totally wrong. Here's my take on GP's comment. Apache v2 has an patent clause which explicitly waives the rights of the licensor over the patents they might have on the licensed code. So, presumably, it doesn't matter if the current project has a patent because it was once licensed under Apache v2, and the so those patents can't really be exercised. Unless, any new additions since changing the license are patented. Since you can say the only code you've used with the current license is the diff from since it was Apache licensed. But all of this is moot since you can't even take the risk of getting sued over a case which cannot be thrown out, because you might be bankrupt by the time the case is over. Also the current discussion isn't just about the current codebase. It is about using any of FB's projects using this license and problems over suing FB (and its affiliates) for any patent infringement. (Oculus comes to mind because it presumably has tons of important patents)
hoodoof 9y ago
"Look, we were going to buy you for $500million but our thorough due diligence has turned over a rather nasty stone that you probably wished we didn't look under. You know what I mean don't you? YES - we found out your dirty little secret that you're using ReactJS. Due to this, we have decided to pull the deal in favor of your competitor who uses AngularJS. What you need to understand is that although you've cornered the market with your superb software and business model, we are dead serious about never buying companies that have built on ReactJS. We have a deep, and we think entirely valid, concern that Facebook will, at a point in time, suddenly pull the carpet from under you and Mark Zuckerberg will be laughing at us saying 'suckers... we sure got you with the whole ReactJS ruse didn't we!'" "We're also not very enthused about you building on Amazon - surprised you'd take a risk like that, it doesn't indicate much business sense." "Sorry to say, but your business, due to the ReactJS decision, is worth $0."
- kybernetikos 9y ago
  If you're using angular, you're almost certainly using Typescript which contains this less extreme version of the same sort of patent clause: 3. Grant of Patent License. Subject to the terms and conditions of this License, each Contributor hereby grants to You a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable (except as stated in this section) patent license to make, have made, use, offer to sell, sell, import, and otherwise transfer the Work, where such license applies only to those patent claims licensable by such Contributor that are necessarily infringed by their Contribution(s) alone or by combination of their Contribution(s) with the Work to which such Contribution(s) was submitted. 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. As I understand it, Angular in general doesn't contain a patent grant at all. Believing that that is superior to a grant that is removed in certain circumstances requires some contentious legal argument that as far as I know has not been demonstrated to stand up in court.
  - zilian 9y ago
guelo 9y ago
This doesn't convince me. As a consumer patents and patent lawsuits are almost always bad. Patents reduce options in the market, lawsuits between companies waste resources, startups being acquired reduce market options. The only real argument is that it will prevent communities from forming. But I don't buy it. Open source needs competition too, monolythic ecosystems are bad. As an example, Apple didn't want to contribute to gcc so they created LLVM which is a boon to everybody.
- h8liu 9y ago
  apple did not create llvm. llvm started as an academic project, and apple took advantage from its ecosystem -- same as many other companies did.
k__ 9y ago
What is the safe alternative here? I mean probably FB got patents. and Probably they have at least one that covers things React can do. Almost every framework moved to components and virtual DOM. So there is a big chance that any framework out there could infringe some of these React patents. So their either can revoke your React license when you sue them or Sue you over patent infringement if you don't use React
- kybernetikos 9y ago
  It almost makes you wonder if startups should make a point of using react somewhere, even if it's just peripheral so as to be sure that they have a patent license for whatever frontend framework they are using.
- Lazare 9y ago
  You're mostly right, except: > revoke your React license when you sue them Incorrect; all they can do is revoke your patent grant and then sue you for patent infringement. They can't "revoke your React license". So the difference is, if you use React they can only sue you for patent infringement if you sue them first; if you use something else they can sue you no matter what... ...if they have a patent on React. Despite your breezy assertion, patents are public, people have looked, and none have been found.
  - k__ 9y ago
    So other libraries can't be sued because there are no patents to be infringed? And it doesn't matter that FB terminates the patent grant if you sue them, because there were no patents to start with?
- pluma 9y ago
  Have you watched Wargames? The only winning move is not to play. If you have code, you're at risk of being sued over software patents. In the end if you do get sued it likely won't be Google or Facebook, it will be some patent troll you've never heard of that randomly extorts companies into bankruptcy and can't be countersued because they're a non-practicing entity (i.e. they don't have code). Maybe Facebook has patents for React. Maybe Facebook has patents for other libraries. Maybe other companies have patents for React. You won't find out until it's too late, so stop worrying.
hoodoof 9y ago
"So you've sewn up the market eh? Here's your check for $500million." "But don't you want to know what technology we built it with?" "No."
skrebbel 9y ago
This is a badly written article full of FUD. It's written by an angry backend engineer, not a lawyer, and it shows. He goes from this: > The instant you sue Facebook, your patent rights for React — and any other Facebook ‘open source’ technology you happen to use) — are automatically revoked. To this: > If you use React, you cannot go against Facebook for any patent they hold. Full period. "Full period", really? Because the first does not imply the second. This is now how patent law works. Now, I'm not a lawyer either, but broad assertions like these should tell you that there's emotion at work here, not reason. In his fourth update, he made a list of companies that add something about patents to their open source licenses, implying that somehow that that proves something. So the thing that people confuse here is patents and copyrights. The BSD license grants you the right to use works copyrighted by Facebook people and contributors. The patents clause, further, promises that should Facebook hold any patents that cover the OSS, they won't use them against you, unless you sue them first. There is the whole idea floating around the internet that a BSD license somehow ensures that nobody will sue you for patent infringement. I really don't understand where this comes from. Hell, Android is Apache Licensed (which includes a patent grant) and still anyone who makes an Android phone has to pay license fees to all kinds of patent trolls (Microsoft most notably). These things are totally separate. So first, if you sue Facebook for patents, you lose their patent grant (so they can sue you back, which everybody always does anyway - it's the only defense companies have in patent wars). But you don't lose the BSD license or anything. That's not how it works. All you lose is Facebook's promise not to sue you because you use React. Secondly, and this is the core point, patents don't cover code, they cover ideas. Any patents that Facebook might have that, right or wrong, cover React, will surely be written broad enough that they also cover Preact, Inferno, Vue.js probably, and I bet also Angular. Not using React but one of these other libraries therefore makes no difference - in both cases, Facebook can use their React-ish patents to sue you. To my understanding, patent lawsuits rarely get to the nitty gritty details of actual patents in reality. It does not matter whether a Facebook patent written broadly actually covers Vue.js or not - in practice, more often than not, companies will compare the height of the patent stacks they have, and agree on a settlement based on that. All this patent grant says is that Facebook gets to use their patents that cover OSS to make their stack of paper a bit higher. Like they would if they hadn't made a patent grant at all. So, repeat after me: using open source does not shield you from patent infringment lawsuits.
vim_wannabe 9y ago
Does this mean I should primarily use services from startups that use React, so that they won't get acquired and the service shut down?
- chippy 9y ago
  Also keep monitoring them for when they unviel their latest UI change for usability improvements which sublty removes React for some other framework. This change would be the canary in the mine and would probably be accompanied by changes in terms of use / privacy policy with some subtle word changes. One could almost imagine this monitoring being automated... if it could be backed up with data!
dimillian 9y ago
Yeah because small startups will totally go after Facebook. Make sense. Wow.
- askmike 9y ago
  Google looking to acquire small startup X? Not anymore because they use React. Wow.
npad 9y ago
What happened to the "software patents are ridiculous and should never be granted" argument? Now it seems that the same sort of people advancing the anti-patent argument are angry about FB's licence. This seems like pretty muddled thinking.
- matt4077 9y ago
  It seems like the times have changed in that regard. If you hung around on slashdot in the 2000s, it was commonly accepted that software patents are bad, and that the GPL was more good than bad. Now, it appears there are many people thinking they will at some point get filthy rich with their patents. And I've frequently seen the GPL being derided as some sort of communist plot. It's good to see that at least the large companies are still on the side of openness, although I fear what will happen when today's commentators become tomorrow's CEOs. Imagine something like the nodejs ecosystem, except now you'll have to buy a $1000/year subscription to the "node modules starter edition".
amelius 9y ago
I'm not using React for another reason. I don't agree with the way they treat their users (i.e., as a product).
jlebrech 9y ago
my reason is that your app doesn't need the whiz bang reactiveness of react of any other frontend framework just yet. it's just extra overhead.
vladimir-y 9y ago
Can the title be generalized? Like don't use anything from FB?
- CityWanderer 9y ago
  This is true, all of Facebook's projects have the same PATENTS file. The title is the most clickbaity though, which is the intention of the piece.
  - u320 9y ago
    Yarn, RocksDB and ZStandard does not.
matthewmacleod 9y ago
FUD, FUD, FUD. Pure FUD. There are, AFAIK, no known patents on React. This means you can go ahead and sue Facebook for patent violations to your heart's content. The license they granted to you to use any of their patents applied to React (of which there are none) is terminated, and you can merrily continue using React. If this is incorrect, and Facebook actually do hold patents on React, then all of the popular alternatives almost certainly infringe on them as well. So, the worst-case scenario is no different.
- raulk 9y ago
  > There are, AFAIK, no known patents on React. Really? That's your argument? If there are no public patents today, does it mean there's none in the works? What tells you there won't be a patent tomorrow? Let me ask differently. Assuming you're a software engineer, do you pick your stack based on the status quo? Or do you pick a future-proof stack, based not only in its position today, but its projection tomorrow? What CAN happen today is not as important as what COULD happen tomorrow, based on the legal provisions you're agreeing to by adopting React. > If this is incorrect, and Facebook actually do hold patents on React, then all of the popular alternatives almost certainly infringe on them as well. So, the worst-case scenario is no different. This is absolutely incorrect. It depends on the content of the patent. For example, if FB filed a patent for React Mobile, it would not affect Preact and Inferno, as these frameworks do not deal with mobile rendering.
  - matthewmacleod 9y ago
    What tells you there won't be a patent tomorrow? Nothing. But that applies regardless of whether I use React, or I use any other piece of software that Facebook may or may not take a patent out on in the future. Except, in the former case, I at least had a license to begin with. This is absolutely incorrect. It depends on the content of the patent. For example, if FB filed a patent for React Mobile, it would not affect Preact and Inferno, as these frameworks do not deal with mobile rendering. There is a small outside chance that Facebook might patent a particular thing that React does that no other view framework does. It's unlikely to be the case, since most frameworks accomplish the same things in the same way.
bitL 9y ago
It truly seems non-mature businesses should stop relying on open-source with "baggage" and utilize only free software (AGPL3+) that has dual-licensing for commercial use with support as e.g. in Qt, unless you are 100% sure for your product lifecycle you won't get into direct business collision with the "baggage" author.
- DonbunEf7 9y ago
  AGPL is too toxic to use. Fortunately, there's not much compelling software using it, so it's easy to avoid. Businesses should shun AGPL, period.
  - bitL 9y ago
    Why is AGPL toxic? I'd advise all developers to do dual AGPL/commercial license for all their open source projects. AGPL would guarantee that their work is not used by others without giving back anything; commercial one to keep them afloat and allow proper business.
CityWanderer 9y ago
What makes the PATENTS file legally binding? If I install React via NPM/Yarn, or even as a dependency of another project, I will not see this file. LICENSE is a pretty common convention and you could argue I should seek out this file in every one of my dependencies' dependencies - but how would I know to look for PATENTS? Are all statements in the code base legally binding? Could they be hidden in a source file somewhere?
- Vinnl 9y ago
  Not a lawyer, but I can imagine it can be expected that you do some due diligence before installing it through npm - like checking the website whether their license allows you to use it, and on what terms.
  - donkeyd 9y ago
    Exactly. The "they didn't force me to comply" defence hardly ever holds. In the Netherlands, somebody was recently fined for using an image she got from a "free photo's" website. It was a picture that was illegally published on that website, and the judge said she should've checked whether it was actually royalty free. The fine was even higher than expected because she also cropped the picture, which was another breach of copyright, apparently.
    - Confiks 9y ago
      If you refer to the case in De rijdende rechter ("The traveling judge"): she didn't have to pay a fine, but pay damages to the opposing party (which applies to civil rather than criminal law). In addition to that, both parties have agreed to submit to a binding arbitration decision, with the 'judge' actually being the arbitrator, despite what the program's name would suggest. That means that the decision doesn't actually have to follow the law. I personally find it unhelpful that the program never clarifies that it is a display of binding arbitration instead of a decision by a judge. I've seen the layman confuse the two quite a few times.
      - 9y ago
scandox 9y ago
Trust. Trust. Trust and Trust again. My brain becomes exhausted within seconds of reading a licence. Not just because I'm lazy, but because I know that however closely I think I'm reading it, I probably won't be reading it closely enough to be 100% sure of my conclusions (viz. the differences of opinion here from people that actually have read this thing). So what do I do? I trust certain organisations and I don't trust others. No-one in their right mind can trust Facebook. You might as well trust the Ocean.
- pluma 9y ago
  Here's an idea: if you intend to lock people into a technology so you can sue them later, would you a) build a small library that encourages modular code, has tons of escape hatches to use other libraries and has so few concepts it actually encourages learning the language and solving problems outside the library instead? Or b) build a large monolith that comes with dozens of idiosyncratic concepts and its own way to solve every problem so you build your entire application inside of it? If I was a patent troll, I would create Angular, not React. I don't trust Google, I don't trust Facebook, I don't trust Tilde, I don't trust Evan You. But at least with React I'm not deeply invested in non-transferable knowledge and have easy migration paths if I ever need to move away from it.
  - scandox 9y ago
    Probably why I'm still using Backbone - and actively pondering other options!
    - pluma 9y ago
      You think there aren't patents covering Backbone? Or any other part of your applications?
      - scandox 9y ago
        My concern isn't with Patents per se. It's mainly with the good faith of the originator of a particular piece of code. I mean yes there could be Patents covering everything and anything I ever do, but how would I assess such a thing. I haven't got much control over that side of things. However, I can exercise judgement on the source. And my judgement on Facebook is that I never saw them do anything I liked.
pluma 9y ago
Nerds shouldn't write opinion pieces about subject domains they don't understand. Seriously, stop this. Sometimes you just need to admit you have no idea what you're talking about and shut up. The author honestly thinks using Preact or Inferno could protect them from patent lawsuits. Oh, wait, maybe "Facebook holds any software patents on the Virtual DOM or the React APIs" so better use Vue and Cycle. Unless you actually know 1) which patents Facebook holds and 2) which patents are relevant to each framework/library (i.e. React and various its alternatives) stop giving people legal advice about which library they should be using. The cosmic irony would be if Facebook didn't hold any patents covering React to begin with but DID hold patents covering parts of Angular, Ember, Vue and Preact, over which they can sue who they like because Facebook never gave them a patent grant for those. Sounds far-fetched? It isn't because we don't know which actual patents these could be and who holds them. Or for all you know Google might sue you. Or Apple. This isn't a discussion, this is literally just a bunch of nerds ranting on the Internet about problems they don't sufficiently understand, playing Three Blind Men with the elephant that is Software Patents.
- emilfihlman 9y ago
  _You_ should stop, immediately. Attempting to silence an issue because people are not experts on the issue is beyond immoral. Please reflect on how you are hurting everyone, not helping.
  - pluma 9y ago
    There isn't an issue. The issue is software patents. What's hurting people is self-proclaimed experts writing authoritative blog posts about what technologies people should chose and presenting it as if it were legal advice. This entire drama is a 100% repeat of what pops up on almost a monthly basis because some random developer finds out about Facebook's open source patent grant and decides he has an opinion without even understanding the basic underlying concepts. There are legitimate issues worth discussing, especially around the notion of open source purism (i.e. whether React should migrate to the Apache license to make it more compatible). But instead of having these discussions we get ridiculous unfounded opinion pieces by yet another "dude with an opinion" who didn't even bother validating his basic premises.
tchaffee 9y ago
I wonder if Facebook's claims that they are doing this in order to make patents useless would have legal standing. In other words, if they become "evil" about this patent clause at some point in the future and try to enforce this in the bad ways that people are imagining might happen, then doesn't Facebook's clearly and publicly stated intentions hurt any claim they would make which goes against those intentions?
pluma 9y ago
Aside from the validity of the article's claims about patents (see my other tirades about that) I'm not sure the point even makes sense. React, the library, is at its core a glorified templating system. It provides plenty of escape hatches that make migration as well as inclusion of foreign UI components and libraries a breeze. It's stupidly simple to migrate away from. If you are a high valuation startup looking to get acquired for your technology (rather than acquihired) I find it extremely unlikely your valuation hinges on your frontend code. And even if it does I find it extremely unlikely your frontend is tied so closely to React you won't be able to spend, say, 1MM replacing React with Vue or what have you (maybe at the cost of a little pizzazz). If your frontend is animation-heavy, that likely doesn't live in React land. If your frontend is mostly static, it should be trivial to replace React as well. If your startup is valuable, being sued over some frontend library is probably the least of your concerns. If the company looking to acquire you has enough cash in the bank to sue Facebook, they have far more than enough cash in the bank to replace React.
- thepompano 9y ago
  Just throwing this out there - replacing an entire front-end monolith framework in large part depends on the size/scale of the application, and how well it was implemented to begin with.
  - pluma 9y ago
    Okay, so maybe the recommendation should be "build your app around the assumption you may have to swap individual dependencies out in the future". Amazingly enough, this recommendation is also beneficial if it turns out there are patents covering Angular, Vue or Ember.
codingdave 9y ago
Even if everything in this article were 100% correct, which is clearly arguable, think about how this would truly play out. Company X would sue Facebook. Facebook would sue them back for using React... and then... lawsuits would ensue. Attorneys would do their things. Cases would be argued out of court. Lots of legal stuff would be going on, and plenty of time would be had for the engineers to select and move to a new framework. Yes, I think there are problems with the license, and I'm not using React. But do I really think those problems will result in some scenario where you have an overnight show-stopper of your business because of it? Extremely unlikely. Startups need to stop fearing the law and start understanding it.
franciscop 9y ago
The author is making assumptions about what Open Source is and what should or shouldn't be. While many developers would like Open Source to be about "creating communities to build better software together" (myself included), open source just means that everyone can read the code. Different developers and companies might use Open Source for different reason, included but not limited to: reduce Q&A, brand relevance, increase hiring power, strategic positioning, ideals that code should be _libre_, etc. Some companies and devs might even want several of those! In this line, Facebook is a private corporation who I think we all agree their main reason for releasing React.js or any code at all doesn't seem to be purely idealistic. I would say strategic position (the best tool in the dev world, notably against Angular) and increasing their hiring power are really high within their reasons to release Open Source. It is patently absurd to tell companies what to do and patronizing to tell developers what to do. Also, something that I don't see anyone arguing for/against is why so many big companies, even ones competing with Facebook, can use React.js freely and without worries? It's a point that anyone arguing against React is conveniently ignoring but I'd love to hear about.
- mhw 9y ago
  I don't disagree with your general point, but I don't think we can ascribe a singular objective to Facebook as an entire organisation. It was quite clear from the discussion around the recent github issue asking them to consider relicensing that there are many parties internal to Facebook with a say in the decision, and it's unlikely they all agree on everything. The React developer's motives for releasing React as open source are probably more along the lines of "creating communities to build better software together", and there are obviously others within Facebook who are motivated by protecting Facebook from lawsuits. What we see on the outside is the resulting compromise. See Dan Abramov's comments in the issue, particularly [1] & [2] 1: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316223034 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-... 2: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316739812 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-...
  - franciscop 9y ago
    Sure, I totally agree. What I tried to express is that there is probably a hiring and brand push as well for keeping React Open Source, not that it is the only one.
blackoil 9y ago
Someone with knowledge should bring clarity to all this noise! My understanding is, if I sue FB for some patents, they can sue me back with any patents they may hold on React. We do not know of any such patents they own. So practically I am no safer if I use preact/vue or even Angular, since they may own some patents that cover those tech. tldr; Do not sue FB unless you have muscles.
afro88 9y ago
There were a lot of people in the older thread about the patents stuff saying things like "well, are you ever going to sue Facebook?? You don't need to worry about the patents stuff". But consider this: Facebook do something disastrous, like leak a bunch of private or financial data and it affects you really badly. There's a class action against Facebook. Now you can't join it, because you don't wanna rewrite your app without React to ensure Facebook can't counter sue over a patent that may or may not exist on React.
- rnijveld 9y ago
  Except that the patent grant states that the grant only voids if you sue (or are contributing money to such a cause) because of patents. The grant is still valid if you sue Facebook for non-patent related issues.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
williamle8300 9y ago
Facebook is like the Disney in the tech world. They want to be that trove of intellectual property. They take free-to-use stuff (Disney is cheap ripoff of Hans Christian Anderson's fables), and create "magical" stuff that they protect with their arsenal of lawyers. If Facebook is able to pull the wool over our eyes this time... OSS is gonna be in a bad place in the next century just like how Disney single-handedly lobbied to change public domain laws in America.
epicide 9y ago
> If there is no chance of igniting a community, there is no reason to open source. I see most of this article as a dangerous way of thinking, but especially the above. The mentality I get from this quote (especially combined with its context) is basically: I should only open source something I'm working on if I can build a community around it (that I control/influence/benefit from). Open sourcing your software should be the default. If I make a tool or small library/function, I would more look for a reason NOT to open source it. When I can't think of one, I will open it up, regardless of whether or not there is a "chance of igniting a community".
brawny 9y ago
I have one question that I am interested in knowing. Can someone fork React, change its name, remove patents + bsd, and publish it?

332 points by nbmh 9y ago

I've been saying this for months. Don't use React!

Can someone please share what patents cover react? Because if they're revoking patents that don't cover react then there should be no problem to continue using react right?

theduro 9y ago
Exactly! And if the day came where this because an issue, for 1/10th the cost of actually retaining a lawyer and reasonably going after Facebook for a patent, you could rewrite your app in something else.
binaryapparatus 9y ago
If I understand that license correctly, it is not 'patents that cover react', it is 'any facebook patent, present or future'. Also as explained in the article, it is also about my patents if I have any, in case facebook tries violating them. Far wider than 'react patents'.
- BukhariH 9y ago
  I understand that but here's the scenario I'm talking about: - I use React for my startup's dashboard - I sue facebook for violating my startup's patent without removing my react dashboard first Now, what patents can facebook use to counter sue me that they couldn't sue me with anyway had I not used react?
  - yozel 9y ago
    Facebook won't counter sue you. They don't have to. You just lose your right to use React, due to its license.
    - kybernetikos 9y ago
      I believe you still have a right to use it under copyright law since the license isn't terminated, it's just that potentially you may be infringing some patents, but so far nobody has actually pointed out what those patents would be, so I think it's a valid question.
    - ec109685 9y ago
      That's not true: https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 https://code.facebook.com/pages/850928938376556 Facebook can't take away your rights to use React under the BSD license, no matter what you do.
    - CodesInChaos 9y ago
      You only lose the patent license, not the copyright license. So it is important to know if facebook actually owns patents covering react and if those patents cover other frameworks as well (e.g. because they cover all virtual DOMs).
  - Lazare 9y ago
    As far as is known: None. There don't seem to be any patents.
anilgulecha 9y ago
The problem is if you ever found facebook infringing on one of your patents, you could not sue them -- your react patent grant would be rescinded. This is not a behavior of free software.
- littlecranky67 9y ago
  This is the same BS repeated on HN almost every day now. You can sue FB anytime, whether you use React or not. You do not give them any kind of permission to use YOUR patents just by using React. The only thing that happens when you sue FB over patents is that your patent grant covering React is gone, reducing your license to a regular BSD license. If you use Angular, vue or whatnot open source products covered by licenses without patents grants, there is NO guarantee whatsoever that this piece of software is free from patents of Google, FB, Oracle your favorite patent troll from around the corner. Yet people seem more fine with using software which comes without any patent grants whatsoever, and declare that hell would come over us if the FB patent grant on the software would be revoked. Btw, clauses that revoke patent grants when you sue a party are pretty regular and present in the Apache License v2 and the (L)GPLv3, no one is crying about it and says that those licenses are not open source anymore. The GPLv3 goes even further and invalidates your right to use the software at all if you start sueing people who created that software. Gosh, I am so happy to live in the EU where we do not have to deal with this kind of BS and can just use the best technology that solves the problem.
  - BukhariH 9y ago
    Wait... I live in the EU aswell (UK). What do you mean by: "Gosh, I am so happy to live in the EU where we do not have to deal with this kind of BS and can just use the best technology that solves the problem."
    - fstephany 9y ago
      Software Patenting theoretically does not exist in the EU[1]. But in practice I guess it's up to the interpretation of the law by national courts. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_the_European_Patent_Convention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_the_Eur...

thomyorkie 9y ago

> If all giants agreed to open source under the “BSD + patents” scheme, cross-adoption would grind to a halt. Why? If Google released Project X under “BSD + Patents”, and Amazon really liked it, rather than adopting it and losing their right to ever sue Google for patents, they would go off and build it on their own. This seems like a reasonable argument, but it doesn't seem to have deterred several big name companies from using React. Airbnb, netflix, and dropbox for example.

chaostheory 9y ago
Developers are not lawyers, and developers and lawyers don't talk to each other all the time. I wonder how many of those companies even bothered to check the license, given how fast they have to move? I've been guilty of that as well in the past.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- traek 9y ago
  > I wonder how many of those companies even bothered to check the license, given how fast they have to move? Airbnb, Netflix, and Dropbox? I guarantee you all of those companies have lawyers that reviewed the license.
  - chaostheory 9y ago
    Sure they have lawyers, but I highly doubt they reviewed it and I don't blame them since open source licenses have been pretty vanilla for over a decade now. The only companies that actually even really reviewed open source in terms of legal implications were extremely risk averse ones like the telecoms... in the 90s and early 2000s. Of course I could be wrong especially if any of those companies use a tool that checks licenses (I have my doubts).
danmaz74 9y ago
Amazon is the poster child of idiotic software patents, see 1-click buying. If this makes their software development more expensive, I'll be really glad.

notaboutdave 9y ago

Easy workaround: Install Preact. No code changes required, at least not for me last year.

k__ 9y ago
even the creator of preact said he doesn't know if he infringed FB patents with the creation of preact, because nobody knows what React covering patents FB holds.
- kybernetikos 9y ago
  And in this, the situation is exactly the same as with any front end library, or even not using one at all. It's almost impossible to know if you're infringing any patents.
ec109685 9y ago
Wouldn't Preact run into the same hypothetical patents as React?

cbhl 9y ago

It's worth noting this "you can't sue us for violating your patents if you use our non-free open source software" is working as designed. Facebook claims that if every company adopted a React-like license, that software patents as we know it would basically die. It's worth noting that both Google and Facebook's patent lawyers are generally of the opinion that software patents are net bad, but differ in their opinions of how to express that intent without exposing their companies to additional risk from patent trolls. If you want to be acquired, then this is the opposite of what you want. You file patents for every part of the product you can; you audit your dependencies to avoid copyleft (AGPL and GPL) and React-like licenses, so your software can be folded into a 100% closed source product or shut down or whatever your acquirer wants. If you run a start-up, and you're worried about the React license, you should be speaking to your own legal counsel about the best way forward.

oh_sigh 9y ago
This would have no effect on NPEs, which are the most pernicious types of patent trolls as I see it today.
- cbhl 9y ago
  Right. The way of dealing with NPEs in the short term is to have patents (encourage employees to file for patents, and acquire companies with patents before NPEs do). My understanding is that Facebook's long term vision is that no productive entity can assert its software patent rights, which should then make it politically viable to lobby for laws to be changed to invalidate all software patents altogether.
danmaz74 9y ago
This seems to be the case: the wording is pretty obscure and IANAL, but the risk if you use React and sue Facebook for patent infringement should only be that they can counter-sue you for any patents they may hold that apply to React. And be careful: if Facebook has any patents related to React, they could very well cover also the React alternatives: I seriously doubt that eg the author of Vue.js researched if they were violating and FB React-related patents. Edit: here the link to the patent grant https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS > A "Necessary Claim" is a claim of a patent owned by Facebook that is necessarily infringed by the Software standing alone. This should mean that the patent grant only covers you from being sued for any patents covering React technology, and that is the only protection you lose if you sue Facebook.

danielrhodes 9y ago

Are companies getting asked about React in M&A due diligence or has any lawyer recommended this, because otherwise this post is pure clickbait.

rtpg 9y ago
code licenses come up in even simple funding rounds. IP happens in due diligence to avoid "oh actually this one freelancer owns all the code"-style situations.

jasonkester 9y ago

I really like the idea behind this license. They want to see a world where software patents no longer exist. So they write a term into their licensing that makes it really difficult for people who do like software patents to use their stuff. I think I will move my projects over to a similar license. The only thing I would change would be to broaden it to invalidate if your company sued anybody over any patent. If everybody did that, maybe software patents would finally go away.

pavanky 9y ago
This would only encourage fragmentation. Large companies have to resources to not use your software and create a competing product.
- AstralStorm 9y ago
  I think you meant encouraging centralization. And yes, big players will often find it cheaper to undercut you via reimplement than a sale. (Or force you to capitulate then get your employees.)
imtringued 9y ago
>Facebook claims that if every company adopted a React-like license, that software patents as we know it would basically die. If you think patents shouldn't exist then why is the purpose of the license to protect a single company from patent lawsuits. Why isn't the license covering any patent lawsuits of any kind to any party like the ASL does? Why does the license only protect facebook? What if there are patents that apply to react that facebook doesn't own? Patent trolls can't sue facebook but they can still sue users of react and continue to use react. >If everybody did that, maybe software patents would finally go away. No because facebook can still sue you for other software patents for internal software they didn't release. Facebook's patent grant is a halfassed solution. They are either outright malicious and merely acting in self interest or blatantly incompetent. But since they are unwilling to change the license and patent grant I'm betting on the former.
- 9y ago

chrisco255 9y ago

Do most software startups even have patentable technology? I'm rather curious about this. Most consumer and SaaS apps I know of are built on non-patented software so I generally question this advice. The fridge example was a case in point of how ridiculously low the odds of any company getting into patent litigation with Facebook are. To go to battle with FB you're gonna need millions and it's going to take years. That's not a light decision.

snarfy 9y ago
It's purely anecdata but I've worked for a dozen different companies in my career. The only companies that are still around today are the companies that had patents.
- chrisco255 9y ago
  I worked for a $5 billion 25 year old company that had no patents to its name (until this year). What matters is execution and distribution, above and beyond patents, especially in software.

sheetjs 9y ago

There was a time when React was Apache v2! https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/3bbed150ab58a07b0c4faf64126b4c9349eecfea/LICENSE https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/3bbed150ab58a07b0c4fa... shows that license. Has anyone seriously explored forking React from the last Apache v2 version?

mattnewton 9y ago
AFAICT that version still had patents.txt no?
- chrisco255 9y ago
  I checked on the repo and I didn't see it.
chrisco255 9y ago
If they published React under Apache v2 at one point in time, how can they later re-release under a new license and claim patent rights on it then? Since, assuming whatever patents they own covered this version of React as well...wouldn't that be considered prior art?
- sirclueless 9y ago
  I don't understand this argument. They are the owners of the patents in question. That gives them a limited monopoly on the rights to use those patents, and can create any number of products using the patents, and offer them to you under any number of licenses. Facebook re-licensing React doesn't create prior art, any more than an inventor manufacturing a new product using a patent they own would create prior art.
  - ktta 9y ago
    IANAL, and might be (likely) totally wrong. Here's my take on GP's comment. Apache v2 has an patent clause which explicitly waives the rights of the licensor over the patents they might have on the licensed code. So, presumably, it doesn't matter if the current project has a patent because it was once licensed under Apache v2, and the so those patents can't really be exercised. Unless, any new additions since changing the license are patented. Since you can say the only code you've used with the current license is the diff from since it was Apache licensed. But all of this is moot since you can't even take the risk of getting sued over a case which cannot be thrown out, because you might be bankrupt by the time the case is over. Also the current discussion isn't just about the current codebase. It is about using any of FB's projects using this license and problems over suing FB (and its affiliates) for any patent infringement. (Oculus comes to mind because it presumably has tons of important patents)

hoodoof 9y ago

"Look, we were going to buy you for $500million but our thorough due diligence has turned over a rather nasty stone that you probably wished we didn't look under. You know what I mean don't you? YES - we found out your dirty little secret that you're using ReactJS. Due to this, we have decided to pull the deal in favor of your competitor who uses AngularJS. What you need to understand is that although you've cornered the market with your superb software and business model, we are dead serious about never buying companies that have built on ReactJS. We have a deep, and we think entirely valid, concern that Facebook will, at a point in time, suddenly pull the carpet from under you and Mark Zuckerberg will be laughing at us saying 'suckers... we sure got you with the whole ReactJS ruse didn't we!'" "We're also not very enthused about you building on Amazon - surprised you'd take a risk like that, it doesn't indicate much business sense." "Sorry to say, but your business, due to the ReactJS decision, is worth $0."

kybernetikos 9y ago
If you're using angular, you're almost certainly using Typescript which contains this less extreme version of the same sort of patent clause: 3. Grant of Patent License. Subject to the terms and conditions of this License, each Contributor hereby grants to You a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable (except as stated in this section) patent license to make, have made, use, offer to sell, sell, import, and otherwise transfer the Work, where such license applies only to those patent claims licensable by such Contributor that are necessarily infringed by their Contribution(s) alone or by combination of their Contribution(s) with the Work to which such Contribution(s) was submitted. 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. As I understand it, Angular in general doesn't contain a patent grant at all. Believing that that is superior to a grant that is removed in certain circumstances requires some contentious legal argument that as far as I know has not been demonstrated to stand up in court.
- zilian 9y ago

guelo 9y ago

This doesn't convince me. As a consumer patents and patent lawsuits are almost always bad. Patents reduce options in the market, lawsuits between companies waste resources, startups being acquired reduce market options. The only real argument is that it will prevent communities from forming. But I don't buy it. Open source needs competition too, monolythic ecosystems are bad. As an example, Apple didn't want to contribute to gcc so they created LLVM which is a boon to everybody.

h8liu 9y ago
apple did not create llvm. llvm started as an academic project, and apple took advantage from its ecosystem -- same as many other companies did.

k__ 9y ago

What is the safe alternative here? I mean probably FB got patents. and Probably they have at least one that covers things React can do. Almost every framework moved to components and virtual DOM. So there is a big chance that any framework out there could infringe some of these React patents. So their either can revoke your React license when you sue them or Sue you over patent infringement if you don't use React

kybernetikos 9y ago
It almost makes you wonder if startups should make a point of using react somewhere, even if it's just peripheral so as to be sure that they have a patent license for whatever frontend framework they are using.
Lazare 9y ago
You're mostly right, except: > revoke your React license when you sue them Incorrect; all they can do is revoke your patent grant and then sue you for patent infringement. They can't "revoke your React license". So the difference is, if you use React they can only sue you for patent infringement if you sue them first; if you use something else they can sue you no matter what... ...if they have a patent on React. Despite your breezy assertion, patents are public, people have looked, and none have been found.
- k__ 9y ago
  So other libraries can't be sued because there are no patents to be infringed? And it doesn't matter that FB terminates the patent grant if you sue them, because there were no patents to start with?
pluma 9y ago
Have you watched Wargames? The only winning move is not to play. If you have code, you're at risk of being sued over software patents. In the end if you do get sued it likely won't be Google or Facebook, it will be some patent troll you've never heard of that randomly extorts companies into bankruptcy and can't be countersued because they're a non-practicing entity (i.e. they don't have code). Maybe Facebook has patents for React. Maybe Facebook has patents for other libraries. Maybe other companies have patents for React. You won't find out until it's too late, so stop worrying.

hoodoof 9y ago

"So you've sewn up the market eh? Here's your check for $500million." "But don't you want to know what technology we built it with?" "No."

skrebbel 9y ago

This is a badly written article full of FUD. It's written by an angry backend engineer, not a lawyer, and it shows. He goes from this: > The instant you sue Facebook, your patent rights for React — and any other Facebook ‘open source’ technology you happen to use) — are automatically revoked. To this: > If you use React, you cannot go against Facebook for any patent they hold. Full period. "Full period", really? Because the first does not imply the second. This is now how patent law works. Now, I'm not a lawyer either, but broad assertions like these should tell you that there's emotion at work here, not reason. In his fourth update, he made a list of companies that add something about patents to their open source licenses, implying that somehow that that proves something. So the thing that people confuse here is patents and copyrights. The BSD license grants you the right to use works copyrighted by Facebook people and contributors. The patents clause, further, promises that should Facebook hold any patents that cover the OSS, they won't use them against you, unless you sue them first. There is the whole idea floating around the internet that a BSD license somehow ensures that nobody will sue you for patent infringement. I really don't understand where this comes from. Hell, Android is Apache Licensed (which includes a patent grant) and still anyone who makes an Android phone has to pay license fees to all kinds of patent trolls (Microsoft most notably). These things are totally separate. So first, if you sue Facebook for patents, you lose their patent grant (so they can sue you back, which everybody always does anyway - it's the only defense companies have in patent wars). But you don't lose the BSD license or anything. That's not how it works. All you lose is Facebook's promise not to sue you because you use React. Secondly, and this is the core point, patents don't cover code, they cover ideas. Any patents that Facebook might have that, right or wrong, cover React, will surely be written broad enough that they also cover Preact, Inferno, Vue.js probably, and I bet also Angular. Not using React but one of these other libraries therefore makes no difference - in both cases, Facebook can use their React-ish patents to sue you. To my understanding, patent lawsuits rarely get to the nitty gritty details of actual patents in reality. It does not matter whether a Facebook patent written broadly actually covers Vue.js or not - in practice, more often than not, companies will compare the height of the patent stacks they have, and agree on a settlement based on that. All this patent grant says is that Facebook gets to use their patents that cover OSS to make their stack of paper a bit higher. Like they would if they hadn't made a patent grant at all. So, repeat after me: using open source does not shield you from patent infringment lawsuits.

vim_wannabe 9y ago

Does this mean I should primarily use services from startups that use React, so that they won't get acquired and the service shut down?

chippy 9y ago
Also keep monitoring them for when they unviel their latest UI change for usability improvements which sublty removes React for some other framework. This change would be the canary in the mine and would probably be accompanied by changes in terms of use / privacy policy with some subtle word changes. One could almost imagine this monitoring being automated... if it could be backed up with data!

dimillian 9y ago

Yeah because small startups will totally go after Facebook. Make sense. Wow.

askmike 9y ago
Google looking to acquire small startup X? Not anymore because they use React. Wow.

npad 9y ago

What happened to the "software patents are ridiculous and should never be granted" argument? Now it seems that the same sort of people advancing the anti-patent argument are angry about FB's licence. This seems like pretty muddled thinking.

matt4077 9y ago
It seems like the times have changed in that regard. If you hung around on slashdot in the 2000s, it was commonly accepted that software patents are bad, and that the GPL was more good than bad. Now, it appears there are many people thinking they will at some point get filthy rich with their patents. And I've frequently seen the GPL being derided as some sort of communist plot. It's good to see that at least the large companies are still on the side of openness, although I fear what will happen when today's commentators become tomorrow's CEOs. Imagine something like the nodejs ecosystem, except now you'll have to buy a $1000/year subscription to the "node modules starter edition".

amelius 9y ago

I'm not using React for another reason. I don't agree with the way they treat their users (i.e., as a product).

jlebrech 9y ago

my reason is that your app doesn't need the whiz bang reactiveness of react of any other frontend framework just yet. it's just extra overhead.

vladimir-y 9y ago

Can the title be generalized? Like don't use anything from FB?

CityWanderer 9y ago
This is true, all of Facebook's projects have the same PATENTS file. The title is the most clickbaity though, which is the intention of the piece.
- u320 9y ago
  Yarn, RocksDB and ZStandard does not.

matthewmacleod 9y ago

FUD, FUD, FUD. Pure FUD. There are, AFAIK, no known patents on React. This means you can go ahead and sue Facebook for patent violations to your heart's content. The license they granted to you to use any of their patents applied to React (of which there are none) is terminated, and you can merrily continue using React. If this is incorrect, and Facebook actually do hold patents on React, then all of the popular alternatives almost certainly infringe on them as well. So, the worst-case scenario is no different.

raulk 9y ago
> There are, AFAIK, no known patents on React. Really? That's your argument? If there are no public patents today, does it mean there's none in the works? What tells you there won't be a patent tomorrow? Let me ask differently. Assuming you're a software engineer, do you pick your stack based on the status quo? Or do you pick a future-proof stack, based not only in its position today, but its projection tomorrow? What CAN happen today is not as important as what COULD happen tomorrow, based on the legal provisions you're agreeing to by adopting React. > If this is incorrect, and Facebook actually do hold patents on React, then all of the popular alternatives almost certainly infringe on them as well. So, the worst-case scenario is no different. This is absolutely incorrect. It depends on the content of the patent. For example, if FB filed a patent for React Mobile, it would not affect Preact and Inferno, as these frameworks do not deal with mobile rendering.
- matthewmacleod 9y ago
  What tells you there won't be a patent tomorrow? Nothing. But that applies regardless of whether I use React, or I use any other piece of software that Facebook may or may not take a patent out on in the future. Except, in the former case, I at least had a license to begin with. This is absolutely incorrect. It depends on the content of the patent. For example, if FB filed a patent for React Mobile, it would not affect Preact and Inferno, as these frameworks do not deal with mobile rendering. There is a small outside chance that Facebook might patent a particular thing that React does that no other view framework does. It's unlikely to be the case, since most frameworks accomplish the same things in the same way.

bitL 9y ago

It truly seems non-mature businesses should stop relying on open-source with "baggage" and utilize only free software (AGPL3+) that has dual-licensing for commercial use with support as e.g. in Qt, unless you are 100% sure for your product lifecycle you won't get into direct business collision with the "baggage" author.

DonbunEf7 9y ago
AGPL is too toxic to use. Fortunately, there's not much compelling software using it, so it's easy to avoid. Businesses should shun AGPL, period.
- bitL 9y ago
  Why is AGPL toxic? I'd advise all developers to do dual AGPL/commercial license for all their open source projects. AGPL would guarantee that their work is not used by others without giving back anything; commercial one to keep them afloat and allow proper business.

CityWanderer 9y ago

What makes the PATENTS file legally binding? If I install React via NPM/Yarn, or even as a dependency of another project, I will not see this file. LICENSE is a pretty common convention and you could argue I should seek out this file in every one of my dependencies' dependencies - but how would I know to look for PATENTS? Are all statements in the code base legally binding? Could they be hidden in a source file somewhere?

Vinnl 9y ago
Not a lawyer, but I can imagine it can be expected that you do some due diligence before installing it through npm - like checking the website whether their license allows you to use it, and on what terms.
- donkeyd 9y ago
  Exactly. The "they didn't force me to comply" defence hardly ever holds. In the Netherlands, somebody was recently fined for using an image she got from a "free photo's" website. It was a picture that was illegally published on that website, and the judge said she should've checked whether it was actually royalty free. The fine was even higher than expected because she also cropped the picture, which was another breach of copyright, apparently.
  - Confiks 9y ago
    If you refer to the case in De rijdende rechter ("The traveling judge"): she didn't have to pay a fine, but pay damages to the opposing party (which applies to civil rather than criminal law). In addition to that, both parties have agreed to submit to a binding arbitration decision, with the 'judge' actually being the arbitrator, despite what the program's name would suggest. That means that the decision doesn't actually have to follow the law. I personally find it unhelpful that the program never clarifies that it is a display of binding arbitration instead of a decision by a judge. I've seen the layman confuse the two quite a few times.
    - 9y ago

scandox 9y ago

Trust. Trust. Trust and Trust again. My brain becomes exhausted within seconds of reading a licence. Not just because I'm lazy, but because I know that however closely I think I'm reading it, I probably won't be reading it closely enough to be 100% sure of my conclusions (viz. the differences of opinion here from people that actually have read this thing). So what do I do? I trust certain organisations and I don't trust others. No-one in their right mind can trust Facebook. You might as well trust the Ocean.

pluma 9y ago
Here's an idea: if you intend to lock people into a technology so you can sue them later, would you a) build a small library that encourages modular code, has tons of escape hatches to use other libraries and has so few concepts it actually encourages learning the language and solving problems outside the library instead? Or b) build a large monolith that comes with dozens of idiosyncratic concepts and its own way to solve every problem so you build your entire application inside of it? If I was a patent troll, I would create Angular, not React. I don't trust Google, I don't trust Facebook, I don't trust Tilde, I don't trust Evan You. But at least with React I'm not deeply invested in non-transferable knowledge and have easy migration paths if I ever need to move away from it.
- scandox 9y ago
  Probably why I'm still using Backbone - and actively pondering other options!
  - pluma 9y ago
    You think there aren't patents covering Backbone? Or any other part of your applications?
    - scandox 9y ago
      My concern isn't with Patents per se. It's mainly with the good faith of the originator of a particular piece of code. I mean yes there could be Patents covering everything and anything I ever do, but how would I assess such a thing. I haven't got much control over that side of things. However, I can exercise judgement on the source. And my judgement on Facebook is that I never saw them do anything I liked.

pluma 9y ago

Nerds shouldn't write opinion pieces about subject domains they don't understand. Seriously, stop this. Sometimes you just need to admit you have no idea what you're talking about and shut up. The author honestly thinks using Preact or Inferno could protect them from patent lawsuits. Oh, wait, maybe "Facebook holds any software patents on the Virtual DOM or the React APIs" so better use Vue and Cycle. Unless you actually know 1) which patents Facebook holds and 2) which patents are relevant to each framework/library (i.e. React and various its alternatives) stop giving people legal advice about which library they should be using. The cosmic irony would be if Facebook didn't hold any patents covering React to begin with but DID hold patents covering parts of Angular, Ember, Vue and Preact, over which they can sue who they like because Facebook never gave them a patent grant for those. Sounds far-fetched? It isn't because we don't know which actual patents these could be and who holds them. Or for all you know Google might sue you. Or Apple. This isn't a discussion, this is literally just a bunch of nerds ranting on the Internet about problems they don't sufficiently understand, playing Three Blind Men with the elephant that is Software Patents.

emilfihlman 9y ago
_You_ should stop, immediately. Attempting to silence an issue because people are not experts on the issue is beyond immoral. Please reflect on how you are hurting everyone, not helping.
- pluma 9y ago
  There isn't an issue. The issue is software patents. What's hurting people is self-proclaimed experts writing authoritative blog posts about what technologies people should chose and presenting it as if it were legal advice. This entire drama is a 100% repeat of what pops up on almost a monthly basis because some random developer finds out about Facebook's open source patent grant and decides he has an opinion without even understanding the basic underlying concepts. There are legitimate issues worth discussing, especially around the notion of open source purism (i.e. whether React should migrate to the Apache license to make it more compatible). But instead of having these discussions we get ridiculous unfounded opinion pieces by yet another "dude with an opinion" who didn't even bother validating his basic premises.

tchaffee 9y ago

I wonder if Facebook's claims that they are doing this in order to make patents useless would have legal standing. In other words, if they become "evil" about this patent clause at some point in the future and try to enforce this in the bad ways that people are imagining might happen, then doesn't Facebook's clearly and publicly stated intentions hurt any claim they would make which goes against those intentions?

pluma 9y ago

Aside from the validity of the article's claims about patents (see my other tirades about that) I'm not sure the point even makes sense. React, the library, is at its core a glorified templating system. It provides plenty of escape hatches that make migration as well as inclusion of foreign UI components and libraries a breeze. It's stupidly simple to migrate away from. If you are a high valuation startup looking to get acquired for your technology (rather than acquihired) I find it extremely unlikely your valuation hinges on your frontend code. And even if it does I find it extremely unlikely your frontend is tied so closely to React you won't be able to spend, say, 1MM replacing React with Vue or what have you (maybe at the cost of a little pizzazz). If your frontend is animation-heavy, that likely doesn't live in React land. If your frontend is mostly static, it should be trivial to replace React as well. If your startup is valuable, being sued over some frontend library is probably the least of your concerns. If the company looking to acquire you has enough cash in the bank to sue Facebook, they have far more than enough cash in the bank to replace React.

thepompano 9y ago
Just throwing this out there - replacing an entire front-end monolith framework in large part depends on the size/scale of the application, and how well it was implemented to begin with.
- pluma 9y ago
  Okay, so maybe the recommendation should be "build your app around the assumption you may have to swap individual dependencies out in the future". Amazingly enough, this recommendation is also beneficial if it turns out there are patents covering Angular, Vue or Ember.

codingdave 9y ago

Even if everything in this article were 100% correct, which is clearly arguable, think about how this would truly play out. Company X would sue Facebook. Facebook would sue them back for using React... and then... lawsuits would ensue. Attorneys would do their things. Cases would be argued out of court. Lots of legal stuff would be going on, and plenty of time would be had for the engineers to select and move to a new framework. Yes, I think there are problems with the license, and I'm not using React. But do I really think those problems will result in some scenario where you have an overnight show-stopper of your business because of it? Extremely unlikely. Startups need to stop fearing the law and start understanding it.

franciscop 9y ago

The author is making assumptions about what Open Source is and what should or shouldn't be. While many developers would like Open Source to be about "creating communities to build better software together" (myself included), open source just means that everyone can read the code. Different developers and companies might use Open Source for different reason, included but not limited to: reduce Q&A, brand relevance, increase hiring power, strategic positioning, ideals that code should be _libre_, etc. Some companies and devs might even want several of those! In this line, Facebook is a private corporation who I think we all agree their main reason for releasing React.js or any code at all doesn't seem to be purely idealistic. I would say strategic position (the best tool in the dev world, notably against Angular) and increasing their hiring power are really high within their reasons to release Open Source. It is patently absurd to tell companies what to do and patronizing to tell developers what to do. Also, something that I don't see anyone arguing for/against is why so many big companies, even ones competing with Facebook, can use React.js freely and without worries? It's a point that anyone arguing against React is conveniently ignoring but I'd love to hear about.

mhw 9y ago
I don't disagree with your general point, but I don't think we can ascribe a singular objective to Facebook as an entire organisation. It was quite clear from the discussion around the recent github issue asking them to consider relicensing that there are many parties internal to Facebook with a say in the decision, and it's unlikely they all agree on everything. The React developer's motives for releasing React as open source are probably more along the lines of "creating communities to build better software together", and there are obviously others within Facebook who are motivated by protecting Facebook from lawsuits. What we see on the outside is the resulting compromise. See Dan Abramov's comments in the issue, particularly [1] & [2] 1: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316223034 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-... 2: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316739812 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-...
- franciscop 9y ago
  Sure, I totally agree. What I tried to express is that there is probably a hiring and brand push as well for keeping React Open Source, not that it is the only one.

blackoil 9y ago

Someone with knowledge should bring clarity to all this noise! My understanding is, if I sue FB for some patents, they can sue me back with any patents they may hold on React. We do not know of any such patents they own. So practically I am no safer if I use preact/vue or even Angular, since they may own some patents that cover those tech. tldr; Do not sue FB unless you have muscles.

afro88 9y ago

There were a lot of people in the older thread about the patents stuff saying things like "well, are you ever going to sue Facebook?? You don't need to worry about the patents stuff". But consider this: Facebook do something disastrous, like leak a bunch of private or financial data and it affects you really badly. There's a class action against Facebook. Now you can't join it, because you don't wanna rewrite your app without React to ensure Facebook can't counter sue over a patent that may or may not exist on React.

rnijveld 9y ago
Except that the patent grant states that the grant only voids if you sue (or are contributing money to such a cause) because of patents. The grant is still valid if you sue Facebook for non-patent related issues.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

williamle8300 9y ago

Facebook is like the Disney in the tech world. They want to be that trove of intellectual property. They take free-to-use stuff (Disney is cheap ripoff of Hans Christian Anderson's fables), and create "magical" stuff that they protect with their arsenal of lawyers. If Facebook is able to pull the wool over our eyes this time... OSS is gonna be in a bad place in the next century just like how Disney single-handedly lobbied to change public domain laws in America.

epicide 9y ago

> If there is no chance of igniting a community, there is no reason to open source. I see most of this article as a dangerous way of thinking, but especially the above. The mentality I get from this quote (especially combined with its context) is basically: I should only open source something I'm working on if I can build a community around it (that I control/influence/benefit from). Open sourcing your software should be the default. If I make a tool or small library/function, I would more look for a reason NOT to open source it. When I can't think of one, I will open it up, regardless of whether or not there is a "chance of igniting a community".

brawny 9y ago

I have one question that I am interested in knowing. Can someone fork React, change its name, remove patents + bsd, and publish it?