20 ms·

On React and WordPress

543 points by firasd 9y ago

ljoshua 9y ago
It's too bad that this particular point has become an issue with so many good open source projects. I still think that the risk, even for startups considering acquisition exits, is low (see this great post from a patent/IP attorney [1]), but the fact that it's enough to cause players like the ASF and WordPress to move away from it just means fewer players and less innovation in the ecosystem. IANAL, but I wish the lawyers at Facebook would take one for the team and relax a bit on this (hey, more work for them, a plus!). If you're going to sue Facebook over patent infringement, you're probably going to spend a lot more on the suit itself than the eng costs rewriting a view layer. [1] https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revokable-patent-license-why-its-a-paper-25c40c50b562 https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revok...
- ryanswapp 9y ago
  I agree that the risk of running into legal trouble with Facebook is pretty low for many companies. However, that doesn't make it feel any less dirty. It would be nice if the lawyers at Facebook would take a chill pill on this one but that will never happen. It will be interesting to see where OSS projects from Facebook go moving forward given that the noise surrounding their patent clause seems to get louder and louder. On a side note - I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js
  - hdra 9y ago
    Why not Preact? It seems the react compatibility would be very helpful when they already have such a significant investment into react.
    - taternuts 9y ago
      Could potentially do both interchangeably soon: https://twitter.com/_developit/status/898952382960119808 https://twitter.com/_developit/status/898952382960119808
    - chrisco255 9y ago
      That would explain the short time frame quoted for the rewrite.
    - morgante 9y ago
      Personally, I have a hard time imagining that any Facebook patents you use with React wouldn't also apply to Preact. Then again, I think this whole patents issue is mostly FUD. The number of companies who have to reasonably consider suing Facebook for patent infringement is small and they know who they are.
      - myhf 9y ago
        If you have nothing to hide from Facebook, you have nothing to fear from Facebook.
        fetbaffe 9y ago
        How do you know that?
      - thristian 9y ago
        My understanding is that you lose access to React if you sue Facebook over any patents at all, not just ones that may be relative to React.
        morgante 9y ago
        You lose the patent grant, which applies to all Facebook open source projects (not just React), so they can use all patents they own as part of a defensive portfolio. If initiating a patent war with Facebook is a foreseeable business outcome for you, then you probably shouldn't use React. I remain convinced that logic applies to only a tiny minority of companies.
        samastur 9y ago
        What happens if you are not the one who initiated the patent war? My reading of the license is that you lose Facebook patent grant even if your lawsuit was a response to Facebook's. I am not a fan of (software) patents, but license restrictions are not limited to them either. So what is your recourse if Facebook decides to infringe yours? Assuming this is true (IANAL), would you still feel as comfortable advising companies to use React? I don't begrudge Facebook for their license for the same reasons that Matt stated, but I am highlighting this issue to my clients and would not recommend React's use because of it.
    - ryanswapp 9y ago
      That's true. I wonder if they'd steer clear of Preact just because it is similar to React though? Also, Preact seems to be heavily reliant on the React ecosystem and it wouldn't be much of a rage quit if they picked up the skinnier version of React when that is what they should be doing anyways because... you know... bandwidth.
    - koko775 9y ago
      How does that protect anyone? Any patents covering React would probably cover Preact.
      - egeozcan 9y ago
        (IANAL) But you didn't use React so you never accepted that Patents file?
        mbrock 9y ago
        That's not how it works. The patents file does not take away any rights or impose any obligations. You already have a license to use the React software, because it comes with a BSD license. The patents file is an additional grant of rights. Specifically, the right to immunity against Facebook patents related to React, unless you have yourself initiated a patent lawsuit against Facebook. The Apache License and the Mozilla Public License also contain patent retaliation clauses. Not many people care about this, and not many people even read licenses or think about what they mean, except in the case of React, because it's become a FUD meme. Here's from the Apache License, v2, clause 3: "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." So if you sue over a patent, the Apache patent grant terminates. Here's from the Mozilla Public License, v2, clause 5.2: "If You initiate litigation against any entity by asserting a patent infringement claim (excluding declaratory judgment actions, counter-claims, and cross-claims) alleging that a Contributor Version directly or indirectly infringes any patent, then the rights granted to You by any and all Contributors for the Covered Software under Section 2.1 of this License shall terminate." This is even stronger: if you sue over a patent, the entire license (not just the patent grant) is terminated, so that you would then be violating copyright law by distributing software based on that MPL project. Nobody ever mentions that patent retaliation clauses are fairly common in open source, and nobody definitely goes into any detail about what they mean and how they differ. This issue is a textbook case of FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt).
    - majormajor 9y ago
      That seems like a fine thing to do as a "send a message" type thing, but doesn't seem to help patent wise? Am I misunderstanding the flow? 1) Facebook has patents on some stuff React does. 2) (Assumption) Anything similar enough to be near-source-compatible probably runs a big risk of exposure to those same patents. 3) React is licensed in a way that you can use it without opening yourself up to patent litigation (it grants license to them). 4) Facebook infringes on some more-critical-to-your-business thing. 5) You sue. 6) Facebook sues you for using React (or Preact, from (2)?). If you never use React you never get that patent license anyway, right? So be careful how distinct your replacement is. You'd need to analyze the claims of the patents you're worried about to see if they could still apply. This guy seems to think the same ( https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revokable-patent-license-why-its-a-paper-25c40c50b562 https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revok... ) but also doesn't feel like Facebook would ever use it, though that's not really relevant to the arguments made around the principal here.
      - peterhunt 9y ago
        This is sort of correct, but what you need to understand is by simply putting something on the web you're probably "violating" dozens of patents held by multiple big scary corporations. The big difference here is that FB has specifically described the patent grant, while most open-source projects leave it ambiguous.
  - kendallpark 9y ago
    > I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js I had the same thought. If that's the case, it will be a big boost for Vue.
    - pluma 9y ago
      Vue seems the obvious contender but I doubt completely replacing React with Vue this far into development would only cause a delay of a few weeks. Preact or Inferno seem far more likely, considering they won't require massive rewrites.
      - Flenser 9y ago
        "A very large software company that use Inferno in production already had their legal team look into Inferno. It didn't infringe on any patents." — Dominic Gannaway, creator of infernojs https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14783208 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14783208
        pluma 9y ago
        ...yet.
  - kyriakos 9y ago
    I think preact since they already used react and will only delay them a few weeks preact seems like the more sensible option
    - andybak 9y ago
      I'm unclear on whether Preact solves the issue. On one hand - it's close that it probably infringes on the any patents that cover React On the other - it's not infringing patents that scares people - it's the patent clause in the React licence. If you're not using React, you're not accepting this licence. So Preact seems like it would safe enough - unless you believe that Facebook would one day go on the offensive with React-specific patents. (for the record - this seems unlikely to me)
      - TheCoelacanth 9y ago
        If you assume that Preact infringes any patents that React does, it seems like you are strictly worse off using Preact than using React. If Facebook goes on the offensive, you are protected if you use React but not if you use Preact. If you sue Facebook for patent infringement and they use their patents defensively, you are in exactly the same situation using Preact as you are using React; you don't have a license for the patents in either case.
      - taternuts 9y ago
        What react-specific patents do they have? Preact only borrows concepts like VDOM and the component lifecycle (which isn't new), it's not implemented the same. They share the same API but that's just a name against common events in a component lifecycle, and is mostly for interop and developer ease. I don't see how they could do anything to shut down Preact, though IANAL.
  - ellyagg 9y ago
    > pretty low for many companies C'mon. It's not just pretty low for many companies. It's extremely low for almost all companies. Automattic found it extremely low risk for themselves. If it's not extremely low for almost all companies, then you expect Facebook to initiate patent claims. How soon do you expect to hear that Facebook played offense on them? How many companies do you expect to hear that Facebook threatened or filed against?
    - fauigerzigerk 9y ago
      I would say the risk is extremely low on average, but for any particular startup the odds of having a patent dispute with Facebook are pretty much unknowable. Facebook is a very large, rapidly evolving and expanding tech conglomerate. We don't know what all their activities will be in the not too distant future. Facebook is also a public company. We don't know who will control the company in the future and how their strategy will change.
  - danmaz74 9y ago
    Vue.js... Which is totally guaranteed to not be covered by any possible Facebook patents related to react, right?
    - rk06 9y ago
      That logic can also be used for Angular 2, Preact, inferno etc. So it is meaningless Stop spreading FUD.
      - danmaz74 9y ago
        Yes, that same logic can be applied to Preact, inferno, and maybe even Angular2. But those who spread FUD are those who say you shouldn't use React because it has the patent grant attached.
  - 8ig8 9y ago
    > On a side note - I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js Seems like a good bet. Developers discussing the matter... https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/2733 https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/2733
    - rk06 9y ago
      Looked at the issue, Too many Vue fans are there, if I was a core contributor, I would be tempted to lock the discussion to contributors only.
  - ungzd 9y ago
    If these mysterious patents are about things like "virtual DOM", comparing trees of state or something derived from FRP, then using Vue, Preact, Angular 2, Cycle, Riot, Elm, reflex-dom is not more patent-safe. Moreover, they can sue you even if you are not suing them. It's time to move back to jQuery and Prototype.js. Let's wait 20-30 years until these patents expire so everyone finally can use these nice state-management things.
- cvsh 9y ago
  Matt is a copyleft zealot. Of course he'd drop React over this non-controversy. Anyone paying attention to how he views GPL would come to that conclusion.
  - dangoor 9y ago
    That's honestly not how I read this blog post at all. He came right out and said that they didn't see the patent clause being an issue, but they want Facebook to make that argument and not them.
  - mox1 9y ago
    Did you read the blog post? His main concern is suddenly updating ~25% of all websites to "include" the React license. Imagine Microsoft running a small WordPress site off in the distance somewhere that takes the Wordpress + React update. Tadaa, MS is now in theory bound by the FB patent clause. He doesn't want to be responsible for the potential legal liability of encumbering 25% of the internet with a new license agreement.
    - yawaramin 9y ago
      Microsoft is already using React in public-facing stuff.
      - deleted 9y ago
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      - deleted 9y ago
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- owebmaster 9y ago
  > It's too bad that this particular point has become an issue with so many good open source projects. It is assymetric to think that the solution to this problem is not within Facebook's side.
CharlesW 9y ago
> As our general counsel wrote, we made the decision that we'd never run into the patent issue. That is still true today as it was then, and overall, we’ve been really happy with React. Okay. > …I'm here to say that the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. Am I the only one missing the "why"? > …passing down to our users. Is that the "why"? If so, what does he mean by it? Meaning: What is the "danger" that Matt says Automattic will never run into, but that WordPress users will run into?
- firasd 9y ago
  I think when Matt says "long-term consistency with core" he also means consistency with the philosophical aspects of free software. Note that the piece starts with Facebook's reaction to the Apache Foundation's stance against using React. If I understand correctly, the Calypso project was related to the administrative dashboard in their hosted WP offering (and other widgets that could be used in self-hosted WP.) Going forward it looks like Gutenberg is also about the code in the pages that visitors see on published sites.
  - Viper007Bond 9y ago
    Gutenberg will be distributed with WordPress itself as the new post editor. This means the license(s) used with it will then apply to users of WordPress, who may or may not want to agree with React's license despite Automattic (WordPress.com) being comfortable with it via Calypso (WP.com's front end).
- muglug 9y ago
  It's saddling WordPress's massive user base with Facebook's patent clause – something the userbase likely won't realise they're agreeing to when they use WordPress.
- coldtea 9y ago
  >Is that the "why"? If so, what does he mean by it? Meaning: What is the "danger" that Matt says Automattic will never run into, but that WordPress users will run into? He answered that already. He doesn't believe there's much (if any) danger, but: "we have a lot of problems to tackle, and convincing the world that Facebook’s patent clause is fine isn’t ours to take on. It’s their fight". So what they don't want to "pass down to [their] users" is not something they believe is an actual danger, but the anxiety about the licensing that users would face and the arguments etc that will erupt over this.
KurtMueller 9y ago
I hope they choose Elm.
- chrisco255 9y ago
  Elm would be cool, but would probably isolate WordPress from the massive JS community. Community matters.
- dangoor 9y ago
  That would be a lot of work and take more than a small amount of time compared to switching from React to Preact or some other JS library.
hoodoof 9y ago
>> rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks I love this. How many times in my career have I heard "the rewrite will take us <some short period of time>". Good luck with that estimate.
- dangoor 9y ago
  This is plausible because there are quite a few libraries that have adopted React's model and some have even adopted React's API (Preact). Of course, they could still get sued for patent infringement if Facebook has patents covering certain aspects of React (which, ironically, they wouldn't be under the React license).
- TAForObvReasons 9y ago
  We've migrated reasonably large React projects to Preact using the amazing preact-compat : https://www.npmjs.com/package/preact-compat https://www.npmjs.com/package/preact-compat -- it was really as simple as wiring aliases in the webpack config!
  - maxyme 9y ago
    Isn't it unclear if preact violates Facebook's patents?
    - TAForObvReasons 9y ago
      The current understanding is that none of the patents in the portfolio currently covers React (and by extension, preact). But flipping the switch would satisfy the first-order requirement of not imposing the FB patent grant upon users of WP
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
  - arvinsim 9y ago
    I guess you weren't dependent on Synthetic events then.
sheeshkebab 9y ago
It's getting hard to recommend React when the company controlling it clearly has threatening licensing ideas. Better use something else open source or just pay a license fee to someone for a clearly licensed commercial framework.
- halfteatree 9y ago
  I don't understand this: how are you not strictly better off with the patent grant? This whole fiasco seems to be nothing but FUD. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14780979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14780979 tl;dr: License with no patent grant: Facebook can sue you for infringing patents, even if you are using a clone! License with patent grant: Facebook cannot sue you for infringing patents, unless you do it first.
  - Illniyar 9y ago
    There are two camps - those who believe that an open source license implicitly provides patent grants and those who believe an open source license does not allow patent use. Until such a thing is tested in court (in each country) both ideas have merit. The patent grant is also worded a bit unclearly - implying that if you sue facebook you will lose the copyright, not only the patent right, to use React. Even though the lawyers clarified it in FAQ and other places, the wording is still what it is.
    - notacoward 9y ago
      > The patent grant is also worded a bit unclearly It's not unclear at all. Here's the file. Note that it's separate from the LICENSE file that grants a copyright license. https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS > The license granted hereunder will terminate, automatically and without notice, ... There is no reasonable logical or legal context in which "hereunder" refers to anything except the PATENTS file itself. What lawyers have had to clarify is what should never have been an issue because it was already clear. They're not the ones muddying the waters. Opponents are. We should be asking who is so determined to put this meme out there, and why.
cygned 9y ago
Too bad I wasn't able to setup Hot Module Reloading yet, otherwise I'd switched to Preact. Not because I am concerned of the license itself, but because we are heading towards an acquisition exit and I don't want that to be a factor - who knows, where we're at in like five years?
electriclove 9y ago
I'm glad to see this post. People don't like the Facebook license for React and are willing to invest time and money to steer clear of it. I still don't understand why Facebook changed the RocksDB license so quickly but then took a hard stance on the React license.
- kemonocode 9y ago
  Because React is far more weaponizable and less niche than RocksDB will ever be.
geerlingguy 9y ago
The Drupal community struggled a bit with the decision as well (see https://www.drupal.org/node/2645250 https://www.drupal.org/node/2645250). It seems there are a number of open source communities and enterprise development shops who are just not comfortable with the patent clause. React had a lot of momentum, but it seems alternatives like Vue.js are going to be the long-term winners in terms of being 'the next jQuery' in terms of longevity as a front end standard.
- ergo14 9y ago
  The next jquery will be probably Polymer (since it is a library). VueJS/Angular are bigger frameworks.
  - BinaryIdiot 9y ago
    I very much agree with this. Web components are usable in and out of any framework and once browser support will be there I think they'll be huge. Until then, Polymer helps fill in the missing pieces. Reminds me of jQuery before browser vendors integrated things like selector querying.
- erikpukinskis 9y ago
  I don't think there will ever be another jQuery. Just like there won't be another Michael Jackson. The world is balkanizing, different people use different tools and listen to different music in a way that wasn't typical 10 years ago.
CharlesMerriam2 9y ago
Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt. Many trumpet the problems with patent infringement cases, particularly in the odd calculations of "damages one would have avoided if the infringement potential were known". Few trumpet the real cases of fear, uncertainty, or doubt killing business opportunities. Acquisitions are called off when the IP review finds GPL in a product, or your proprietary networking technology losing its patent protection to Amazon (because someone signed up for AWS for a month, years ago). I believe WordPress made the correct leap not to embrace a "license taint" that would smell bad to cautious users.
- sheeshkebab 9y ago
  AWS dropped that patent clause a couple of months ago, apparently (https://www.geekwire.com/2017/amazon-web-services-drops-controversial-patent-clause-standard-user-agreement/ https://www.geekwire.com/2017/amazon-web-services-drops-cont...)
eblanshey 9y ago
I'm willing to bet $100 they will switch to Vue. It's similar to react (which they want), arguably easier to learn, and the WordPress community comes from a php background, which has already embraced Vue. This is a big plus for plugin developers.
- diminish 9y ago
  Vue would be great but preact seems to be a viable option too. Even riot could ..
  - mplewis 9y ago
    As other commenters have mentioned - if your project violates React patents, and you switch to Preact, it almost certainly continues to violate those same patents.
    - mlsarecmg 9y ago
      Vue is also based on React, it uses the same exact principles internally, although in a less concise and more complex way as it leans heavily in Angulars direction on the outside. All templates are either transpiled or evaluated into createElement-like functions, from then on it has a v-dom and works/diffs/renders/composes like React. This could "violate a react patent" according to you: const Test = () => createElement("div", null, "hello word") No one has ever seen nor referenced a patent for this, but if we're really at that point then i'm afraid everything would violate such a patent.
      - deleted 9y ago
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batmansmk 9y ago
Why does the Facebook license try to push an agenda with a perpendicular concern to the open sourcing of Reactjs? Was the purpose of opensourcing Reactjs a way to not get sued? They lost credibility in my eyes on their intention.
- zodiac 9y ago
  There was an article about that recently - it wasn't proactively pushing an agenda so much as, if FB wanted to release any software as OS, without the grant, the lawyers would have had to review every commit to avoid violating someone else's patent.
  - Flenser 9y ago
    Do you have a link? That would be interesting to read.
    - carussell 9y ago
      https://medium.com/@ji/the-react-license-for-founders-and-ctos-b38d2538f3e5 https://medium.com/@ji/the-react-license-for-founders-and-ct... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15214508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15214508
      - Flenser 9y ago
        Thank you very much. That's very informative.
- whipoodle 9y ago
  What exactly is the agenda they are alleged to be pushing?
hoodoof 9y ago
Lawyers. They sure are spoiling the success for the React folks. You can bet Facebook has alot of them and you can bet their political influence is strong with the upper management. Lawyer: "this thing, this point in the contract, it's VERY VERY important". The more lawyers you get in the room, the more beard pulling, wailing and hand wringing there would be about the dire, dire consequences of taking this stupid clause out. And of course the world would come to an end if no-one listened to lawyers. After I fucked several business deals listening to lawyers say how contracts should be changed, I decided to make my own decisions about what matters and what doesn't in a contract. The real problem for ReactJS is that someone at facebook is listening to the lawyers wring their hands about some possible future that will never happen. facebook should just grow up and tell its lawyers to shut up and go back to doing.... whetever it is they do.
- morgante 9y ago
  > some possible future that will never happen Facebook has been subject to numerous patent litigations and is very likely to be involved in future patent litigations. Maintaining a defensive patent portfolio is an important part of preparing for such litigations, so Facebook's lawyers certainly aren't idly protecting their patents.
  - hoodoof 9y ago
    Yep, exactly what the fb lawyers are saying. These are the sorts of important sounding things that the lawyers are saying and frightening everyone into thinking just how incredibly important this issue is, how much is at stake.
    - zodiac 9y ago
      Well then, do you think they're wrong about it? If so why? How would you address the point about past litigation (e.g. by Yahoo)?
  - ballenf 9y ago
    But that's irrelevant here. FB is likely getting sued by patent holding companies who aren't reliant on or using React. So the patent clause doesn't really get FB anything against patent trolls. It does get them leverage against legitimate patent holders. There have been reports of companies having to pay in some roundabout unspecified way royalties to FB for React as part of a large patent licensing deal. I'm somewhat skeptical of these reports, but if there is direct revenue to FB from this clause it would be the Occam's Razor explanation for their intransigence.
jaequery 9y ago
vue.js will make me want to use Wordpress again
fiatjaf 9y ago
I don't understand why can't you just replace all React with Preact or Inferno-compat. That would take 2 minutes, wouldn't it?
- TheCoreh 9y ago
  If Facebook has patents covering React, these probably also cover Preact, so you'd actually be in a worse position: Potentially violating patents and not having any sort of grand.
  - fstephany 9y ago
    This is not the issue. The patent clause is not about React, it is about the whole Facebook organization.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - fiatjaf 9y ago
    How? Isn't Preact totally different? How can Facebook patent other people's code like that?
    - Flenser 9y ago
      You can patent the idea or algorithm that the code implements, so long as the code isn't old enough to be considered "prior art".
      - fiatjaf 9y ago
        So all other frameworks that use the concept of virtual dom are also owned by React?
        Flenser 9y ago
        They can only be owned by their copyright holders, which is separate from patents. If anyone had a patent on virtual dom / diffing, then they could sue anyone else that used an implementation that was implemented in the same way as the implementation in the patent. That doesn't then mean that they "own" those implementations, only that they can use the courts to stop others using them or pay to licence their patent.
ramphastidae 9y ago
So Calypso, which has been in the works for 2+ years, is going to be completely rewritten?
- kabes 9y ago
  Completely rewritten is a bit of an overstatement. It depends on what road they choose. They could go with a react-API compatible library and the work should be minor. They could go to angular/vue/... which is more work, but they all work component based, so you can keep the entire structure.
pmlnr 9y ago
Did nobody at Automattic read the licence of react before started using it? If this is the case, learn from it, please.
skrebbel 9y ago
Note that WordPress is ditching React not because they believe there's any problem with React's license and patent grant, but because they think their users will be confused and angry. In other words, the baseless and meritless outcry about a perfectly OK patent grant caused this, not the patent grant itself. The subject became taboo, like female nipples in America, and WordPress doesn't want anything to do with the nipples of the open source community.
- markyuckerberg 9y ago
  >> users will be confused and angry What an ironic statement, considering that that combination can be lethal to a company. Besides, have you ever heard anyone say why they prefer to use Facebook even when they are aware that it is tracking their every move? Usually the answer is "convenience". By the same token, not getting confused or angry is also a great convenience to the user. Very few Wordpress users actually care about the baselessness or meritlessness of using one JavaScript library over another. They just want Wordpress to work.
  - skrebbel 9y ago
    I fully agree! I think WordPress made the right move, and I would have done the same in their position. But it's sad that we now have baseless taboos in dev land.
- bodegajed 9y ago
  > baseless and meritless Are you expert in patent law for you to come up with that conclusion though? I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well.
  - notacoward 9y ago
    > I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well. ...as would any non-lawyer's claim otherwise. Do you call them out the same way, or are you selective about where you apply that rule? In actual fact, it only takes a tiny bit of familiarity with patent law to see that a revocable grant can't be worse than no grant at all. Many engineers have such familiarity. If you haven't triggered the revocation clause in the PATENTS file, you're strictly better off than with plain BSD, because you have all the rights you would have had before while Facebook will have given up the right to sue you first (for patent issues related to your use of React). If you have triggered that revocation clause, you're exactly where plain BSD would have put you to begin with. So you're either better off or exactly equal. Never worse. Anyone who claims otherwise either hasn't actually read the PATENTS file, doesn't have even minimal familiarity with how the law works, or is spreading FUD.
0x0 9y ago
Interestingly, Facebook did remove its PATENTS clause on another project they have recently - zstd - https://github.com/facebook/zstd/pull/801 https://github.com/facebook/zstd/pull/801
- stock_toaster 9y ago
  Oh that's awesome. I had been wondering about zstd!
- Flenser 9y ago
  They dual licensed under BSD and GPLv2: https://github.com/facebook/zstd/issues/335#issuecomment-323606863 https://github.com/facebook/zstd/issues/335#issuecomment-323... I expect they did a thorough analysis to work out if any of it was either already patented, or patentable. That doesn't mean they don't have patents though.
mememaestro 9y ago
People here trying to defend the React license but if it was good we wouldn't have this conversation about the license in the first place
nathell 9y ago
A candidate I'd consider: Preact. While it doesn't have quite the same support as regular React does, it is touted as having a mostly-compatible API and its license is pure MIT.
mlsarecmg 9y ago
Not a day goes by ... same came up in the project we're working on as our partners got wind of it and are now complaining. It seriously worries me as it's getting harder and harder to justify React although the technology is sound (perhaps close to perfect). The worst part is that this is already threatening v-dom in general (like Preact, Inferno, Vue, etc.) as people are falsely claiming FB holds a claim on it. The React team should re-think their approach. Is it really worth it to dedicate time and spirit on technology that is dear to us all, that is meant to enable amazing applications, but Facebooks lawyers make it hard for us to use, doesn't even matter if our lawyers understand the patent clause correctly or not because they're the ones having the last say, and as this is snowballing out of control they tend to say no. Dan, Sebastian, Pete, Jason, Brian, Dominic and so on, wish they'd get together, start a competitor called Fiber, or put FB under severe pressure.
us0r 9y ago
The last time the PATENTS file was changed was 3 years ago. It has passed the smell test for Microsoft (and dozens of other large companies) with literal buildings full of attorneys who have more experience with licenses, patents and everything between then most. This issue seems to be a bunch of nothing. What am I missing here?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- whipoodle 9y ago
  You aren't missing anything. What you've pointed out is also the reason I find this all so fishy- it has been the same for years, the risk has been the same for years. No one who was really worried about the patent risk would have accepted a "wait and see" approach. Because... that would be risky to do.
- sheeshkebab 9y ago
  Microsoft probably has a separate IP licensing agreement with Facebook. After all MSFT invested in Facebook in the early days, 10 years ago. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21458486/ns/business-us_business/t/microsoft-invests-million-facebook/ http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21458486/ns/business-us_business/t...
pluma 9y ago
People who ridicule the notion of FUD causing actual harm, pay attention: this is a perfect example of the chilling effects of FUD on software projects. Automattic didn't drop React because it doesn't like the license. Automattic dropped React because the FUD surrounding React's license might rub off on them (and WordPress). It's their right to do so and it's in the best interest of WordPress to avoid being dragged into the patent FUD but it's important to understand that this isn't an act of protest against Facebook, it's FUD in full effect.
- rk06 9y ago
  It was FUD before Apache Foundation placed React's license as Category X. Now, it is not.
  - whipoodle 9y ago
    Why?
  - pluma 9y ago
    Why? If I spread the rumor "maybe bananas contain rat poison" and Whole Foods would stop stocking bananas, how would that in any way legitimise fears of rat poison in bananas?
- bodegajed 9y ago
  Comfort can hurt. Automattic is not comfortable with the Facebook license and you say it like it's a baseless FUD but even if they get a 1% chance of going to court against Facebook then they rather not take that risk of litigation anytime in the future. It's a business decision for the long term as rewriting doesn't cost that much for them.
  - onli 9y ago
    No, that's not what the article says. It says the fears around the license are something they do not want to have to address within their ecosystem. Wordpress itself is comfortable with the license. There is no fear of going to court.
jasonsync 9y ago
I'm here to say that the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks, and may push the release into next year. Just a few weeks? Is it that trivial to swap out a library?
- kotojo 9y ago
  The only way I could see them doing it in a few weeks is swapping it out with something with a very similar api like inferno or preact.
- j_m_b 9y ago
  Yah I LOL'd out that one. A year from now we'll be reading the postmortem of the problems the Gutenberg team has faced swapping out React for another library and how things still aren't quite what they used to be.
- danielharrison 9y ago
  Depends on how it's written. I'd suspect they've done a pretty good job on eeping the engine as decoupled from their code as possible. It'd probably be just a matter of rewriting a translation layer.
- grantpalin 9y ago
  Apparently the Gutenberg Element concept (https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/master/element https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/master/element) wraps React to minimize contact with React itself. So converting to Preact might not take over long. Note that I haven't dug very far into the Gutenberg codebase so at the moment I am just supposing.
whipoodle 9y ago
I respect their stance, but if I were a contributor I'd be bummed. This issue still strikes me as much ado about nothing.
zachruss92 9y ago
I understand why Matt came to this decision and ultimately agree with it. As someone who builds products based on WordPres for other companies, I can understand the concern. Imagine I build a site that uses WordPress 4.9 (or whatever release Gutenberg is will come out in) for a startup. Facebook legitimately copies a startup infringing on their patents (think about the Snapchat/Instagram feature battle), and the startup sues Facebook. They then have their react license revoked and can no longer use WordPress. The same thing applies with React native. On the other hand, I do understand Facebooks reasoning. I'll definitely be watching this over time and hope that a legitimate solution will arise.
mkohlmyr 9y ago
A lot of people here are projecting their dislike of software patents onto this whole issue which is a big mistake. IANAL but I don't see anywhere in the PATENTS file where it restricts this issue to software patents. In fact it explicitly talks about any software, technology, product or service. That means you essentially can't sue them over any patent ever. Not just software. With Facebooks history of "liberal borrowing" when it comes to product, it would be prudent to assume this same strategy might be applied to non-software products and services. I completely understand why WordPress is doing this. It makes a ton of sense. WordPress powers some ridiculous percentage of the web. They are doing The Right Thing (tm) by not stopping every single one of those users from bringing a patent complaint against Facebook. Software or otherwise.
twiddo 9y ago
This is not an appropriate vector to 'fix' patent law. If you want to fix software patents, it should happen across the board and not by companies selectively weaponizing their projects and polluting the whole ecosystem in the veil of open source contributions.
k__ 9y ago
That's why I stopped selling tech. I say I do mobile apps and not React-Native apps. Maybe I do then NativeScript next year or PWAs with Angular.
citygm 9y ago
https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/5084 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/5084 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/4503 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/4503 Do not trust facebook hhvm open source project #5084 HHVM must have a open source foundations in behind #4503

543 points by firasd 9y ago

It's too bad that this particular point has become an issue with so many good open source projects. I still think that the risk, even for startups considering acquisition exits, is low (see this great post from a patent/IP attorney [1]), but the fact that it's enough to cause players like the ASF and WordPress to move away from it just means fewer players and less innovation in the ecosystem. IANAL, but I wish the lawyers at Facebook would take one for the team and relax a bit on this (hey, more work for them, a plus!). If you're going to sue Facebook over patent infringement, you're probably going to spend a lot more on the suit itself than the eng costs rewriting a view layer. [1] https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revokable-patent-license-why-its-a-paper-25c40c50b562 https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revok...

ryanswapp 9y ago
I agree that the risk of running into legal trouble with Facebook is pretty low for many companies. However, that doesn't make it feel any less dirty. It would be nice if the lawyers at Facebook would take a chill pill on this one but that will never happen. It will be interesting to see where OSS projects from Facebook go moving forward given that the noise surrounding their patent clause seems to get louder and louder. On a side note - I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js
- hdra 9y ago
  Why not Preact? It seems the react compatibility would be very helpful when they already have such a significant investment into react.
  - taternuts 9y ago
    Could potentially do both interchangeably soon: https://twitter.com/_developit/status/898952382960119808 https://twitter.com/_developit/status/898952382960119808
  - chrisco255 9y ago
    That would explain the short time frame quoted for the rewrite.
  - morgante 9y ago
    Personally, I have a hard time imagining that any Facebook patents you use with React wouldn't also apply to Preact. Then again, I think this whole patents issue is mostly FUD. The number of companies who have to reasonably consider suing Facebook for patent infringement is small and they know who they are.
    - myhf 9y ago
      If you have nothing to hide from Facebook, you have nothing to fear from Facebook.
      - fetbaffe 9y ago
        How do you know that?
    - thristian 9y ago
      My understanding is that you lose access to React if you sue Facebook over any patents at all, not just ones that may be relative to React.
      - morgante 9y ago
        You lose the patent grant, which applies to all Facebook open source projects (not just React), so they can use all patents they own as part of a defensive portfolio. If initiating a patent war with Facebook is a foreseeable business outcome for you, then you probably shouldn't use React. I remain convinced that logic applies to only a tiny minority of companies.
        samastur 9y ago
        What happens if you are not the one who initiated the patent war? My reading of the license is that you lose Facebook patent grant even if your lawsuit was a response to Facebook's. I am not a fan of (software) patents, but license restrictions are not limited to them either. So what is your recourse if Facebook decides to infringe yours? Assuming this is true (IANAL), would you still feel as comfortable advising companies to use React? I don't begrudge Facebook for their license for the same reasons that Matt stated, but I am highlighting this issue to my clients and would not recommend React's use because of it.
  - ryanswapp 9y ago
    That's true. I wonder if they'd steer clear of Preact just because it is similar to React though? Also, Preact seems to be heavily reliant on the React ecosystem and it wouldn't be much of a rage quit if they picked up the skinnier version of React when that is what they should be doing anyways because... you know... bandwidth.
  - koko775 9y ago
    How does that protect anyone? Any patents covering React would probably cover Preact.
    - egeozcan 9y ago
      (IANAL) But you didn't use React so you never accepted that Patents file?
      - mbrock 9y ago
        That's not how it works. The patents file does not take away any rights or impose any obligations. You already have a license to use the React software, because it comes with a BSD license. The patents file is an additional grant of rights. Specifically, the right to immunity against Facebook patents related to React, unless you have yourself initiated a patent lawsuit against Facebook. The Apache License and the Mozilla Public License also contain patent retaliation clauses. Not many people care about this, and not many people even read licenses or think about what they mean, except in the case of React, because it's become a FUD meme. Here's from the Apache License, v2, clause 3: "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." So if you sue over a patent, the Apache patent grant terminates. Here's from the Mozilla Public License, v2, clause 5.2: "If You initiate litigation against any entity by asserting a patent infringement claim (excluding declaratory judgment actions, counter-claims, and cross-claims) alleging that a Contributor Version directly or indirectly infringes any patent, then the rights granted to You by any and all Contributors for the Covered Software under Section 2.1 of this License shall terminate." This is even stronger: if you sue over a patent, the entire license (not just the patent grant) is terminated, so that you would then be violating copyright law by distributing software based on that MPL project. Nobody ever mentions that patent retaliation clauses are fairly common in open source, and nobody definitely goes into any detail about what they mean and how they differ. This issue is a textbook case of FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt).
  - majormajor 9y ago
    That seems like a fine thing to do as a "send a message" type thing, but doesn't seem to help patent wise? Am I misunderstanding the flow? 1) Facebook has patents on some stuff React does. 2) (Assumption) Anything similar enough to be near-source-compatible probably runs a big risk of exposure to those same patents. 3) React is licensed in a way that you can use it without opening yourself up to patent litigation (it grants license to them). 4) Facebook infringes on some more-critical-to-your-business thing. 5) You sue. 6) Facebook sues you for using React (or Preact, from (2)?). If you never use React you never get that patent license anyway, right? So be careful how distinct your replacement is. You'd need to analyze the claims of the patents you're worried about to see if they could still apply. This guy seems to think the same ( https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revokable-patent-license-why-its-a-paper-25c40c50b562 https://medium.com/@dwalsh.sdlr/react-facebook-and-the-revok... ) but also doesn't feel like Facebook would ever use it, though that's not really relevant to the arguments made around the principal here.
    - peterhunt 9y ago
      This is sort of correct, but what you need to understand is by simply putting something on the web you're probably "violating" dozens of patents held by multiple big scary corporations. The big difference here is that FB has specifically described the patent grant, while most open-source projects leave it ambiguous.
- kendallpark 9y ago
  > I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js I had the same thought. If that's the case, it will be a big boost for Vue.
  - pluma 9y ago
    Vue seems the obvious contender but I doubt completely replacing React with Vue this far into development would only cause a delay of a few weeks. Preact or Inferno seem far more likely, considering they won't require massive rewrites.
    - Flenser 9y ago
      "A very large software company that use Inferno in production already had their legal team look into Inferno. It didn't infringe on any patents." — Dominic Gannaway, creator of infernojs https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14783208 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14783208
      - pluma 9y ago
        ...yet.
- kyriakos 9y ago
  I think preact since they already used react and will only delay them a few weeks preact seems like the more sensible option
  - andybak 9y ago
    I'm unclear on whether Preact solves the issue. On one hand - it's close that it probably infringes on the any patents that cover React On the other - it's not infringing patents that scares people - it's the patent clause in the React licence. If you're not using React, you're not accepting this licence. So Preact seems like it would safe enough - unless you believe that Facebook would one day go on the offensive with React-specific patents. (for the record - this seems unlikely to me)
    - TheCoelacanth 9y ago
      If you assume that Preact infringes any patents that React does, it seems like you are strictly worse off using Preact than using React. If Facebook goes on the offensive, you are protected if you use React but not if you use Preact. If you sue Facebook for patent infringement and they use their patents defensively, you are in exactly the same situation using Preact as you are using React; you don't have a license for the patents in either case.
    - taternuts 9y ago
      What react-specific patents do they have? Preact only borrows concepts like VDOM and the component lifecycle (which isn't new), it's not implemented the same. They share the same API but that's just a name against common events in a component lifecycle, and is mostly for interop and developer ease. I don't see how they could do anything to shut down Preact, though IANAL.
- ellyagg 9y ago
  > pretty low for many companies C'mon. It's not just pretty low for many companies. It's extremely low for almost all companies. Automattic found it extremely low risk for themselves. If it's not extremely low for almost all companies, then you expect Facebook to initiate patent claims. How soon do you expect to hear that Facebook played offense on them? How many companies do you expect to hear that Facebook threatened or filed against?
  - fauigerzigerk 9y ago
    I would say the risk is extremely low on average, but for any particular startup the odds of having a patent dispute with Facebook are pretty much unknowable. Facebook is a very large, rapidly evolving and expanding tech conglomerate. We don't know what all their activities will be in the not too distant future. Facebook is also a public company. We don't know who will control the company in the future and how their strategy will change.
- danmaz74 9y ago
  Vue.js... Which is totally guaranteed to not be covered by any possible Facebook patents related to react, right?
  - rk06 9y ago
    That logic can also be used for Angular 2, Preact, inferno etc. So it is meaningless Stop spreading FUD.
    - danmaz74 9y ago
      Yes, that same logic can be applied to Preact, inferno, and maybe even Angular2. But those who spread FUD are those who say you shouldn't use React because it has the patent grant attached.
- 8ig8 9y ago
  > On a side note - I'll bet WordPress get's rewritten in Vue.js Seems like a good bet. Developers discussing the matter... https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/2733 https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/issues/2733
  - rk06 9y ago
    Looked at the issue, Too many Vue fans are there, if I was a core contributor, I would be tempted to lock the discussion to contributors only.
- ungzd 9y ago
  If these mysterious patents are about things like "virtual DOM", comparing trees of state or something derived from FRP, then using Vue, Preact, Angular 2, Cycle, Riot, Elm, reflex-dom is not more patent-safe. Moreover, they can sue you even if you are not suing them. It's time to move back to jQuery and Prototype.js. Let's wait 20-30 years until these patents expire so everyone finally can use these nice state-management things.
cvsh 9y ago
Matt is a copyleft zealot. Of course he'd drop React over this non-controversy. Anyone paying attention to how he views GPL would come to that conclusion.
- dangoor 9y ago
  That's honestly not how I read this blog post at all. He came right out and said that they didn't see the patent clause being an issue, but they want Facebook to make that argument and not them.
- mox1 9y ago
  Did you read the blog post? His main concern is suddenly updating ~25% of all websites to "include" the React license. Imagine Microsoft running a small WordPress site off in the distance somewhere that takes the Wordpress + React update. Tadaa, MS is now in theory bound by the FB patent clause. He doesn't want to be responsible for the potential legal liability of encumbering 25% of the internet with a new license agreement.
  - yawaramin 9y ago
    Microsoft is already using React in public-facing stuff.
    - deleted 9y ago
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    - deleted 9y ago
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owebmaster 9y ago
> It's too bad that this particular point has become an issue with so many good open source projects. It is assymetric to think that the solution to this problem is not within Facebook's side.

CharlesW 9y ago

> As our general counsel wrote, we made the decision that we'd never run into the patent issue. That is still true today as it was then, and overall, we’ve been really happy with React. Okay. > …I'm here to say that the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. Am I the only one missing the "why"? > …passing down to our users. Is that the "why"? If so, what does he mean by it? Meaning: What is the "danger" that Matt says Automattic will never run into, but that WordPress users will run into?

firasd 9y ago
I think when Matt says "long-term consistency with core" he also means consistency with the philosophical aspects of free software. Note that the piece starts with Facebook's reaction to the Apache Foundation's stance against using React. If I understand correctly, the Calypso project was related to the administrative dashboard in their hosted WP offering (and other widgets that could be used in self-hosted WP.) Going forward it looks like Gutenberg is also about the code in the pages that visitors see on published sites.
- Viper007Bond 9y ago
  Gutenberg will be distributed with WordPress itself as the new post editor. This means the license(s) used with it will then apply to users of WordPress, who may or may not want to agree with React's license despite Automattic (WordPress.com) being comfortable with it via Calypso (WP.com's front end).
muglug 9y ago
It's saddling WordPress's massive user base with Facebook's patent clause – something the userbase likely won't realise they're agreeing to when they use WordPress.
coldtea 9y ago
>Is that the "why"? If so, what does he mean by it? Meaning: What is the "danger" that Matt says Automattic will never run into, but that WordPress users will run into? He answered that already. He doesn't believe there's much (if any) danger, but: "we have a lot of problems to tackle, and convincing the world that Facebook’s patent clause is fine isn’t ours to take on. It’s their fight". So what they don't want to "pass down to [their] users" is not something they believe is an actual danger, but the anxiety about the licensing that users would face and the arguments etc that will erupt over this.

KurtMueller 9y ago

I hope they choose Elm.

chrisco255 9y ago
Elm would be cool, but would probably isolate WordPress from the massive JS community. Community matters.
dangoor 9y ago
That would be a lot of work and take more than a small amount of time compared to switching from React to Preact or some other JS library.

hoodoof 9y ago

>> rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks I love this. How many times in my career have I heard "the rewrite will take us <some short period of time>". Good luck with that estimate.

dangoor 9y ago
This is plausible because there are quite a few libraries that have adopted React's model and some have even adopted React's API (Preact). Of course, they could still get sued for patent infringement if Facebook has patents covering certain aspects of React (which, ironically, they wouldn't be under the React license).
TAForObvReasons 9y ago
We've migrated reasonably large React projects to Preact using the amazing preact-compat : https://www.npmjs.com/package/preact-compat https://www.npmjs.com/package/preact-compat -- it was really as simple as wiring aliases in the webpack config!
- maxyme 9y ago
  Isn't it unclear if preact violates Facebook's patents?
  - TAForObvReasons 9y ago
    The current understanding is that none of the patents in the portfolio currently covers React (and by extension, preact). But flipping the switch would satisfy the first-order requirement of not imposing the FB patent grant upon users of WP
    - deleted 9y ago
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- arvinsim 9y ago
  I guess you weren't dependent on Synthetic events then.

sheeshkebab 9y ago

It's getting hard to recommend React when the company controlling it clearly has threatening licensing ideas. Better use something else open source or just pay a license fee to someone for a clearly licensed commercial framework.

halfteatree 9y ago
I don't understand this: how are you not strictly better off with the patent grant? This whole fiasco seems to be nothing but FUD. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14780979 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14780979 tl;dr: License with no patent grant: Facebook can sue you for infringing patents, even if you are using a clone! License with patent grant: Facebook cannot sue you for infringing patents, unless you do it first.
- Illniyar 9y ago
  There are two camps - those who believe that an open source license implicitly provides patent grants and those who believe an open source license does not allow patent use. Until such a thing is tested in court (in each country) both ideas have merit. The patent grant is also worded a bit unclearly - implying that if you sue facebook you will lose the copyright, not only the patent right, to use React. Even though the lawyers clarified it in FAQ and other places, the wording is still what it is.
  - notacoward 9y ago
    > The patent grant is also worded a bit unclearly It's not unclear at all. Here's the file. Note that it's separate from the LICENSE file that grants a copyright license. https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS > The license granted hereunder will terminate, automatically and without notice, ... There is no reasonable logical or legal context in which "hereunder" refers to anything except the PATENTS file itself. What lawyers have had to clarify is what should never have been an issue because it was already clear. They're not the ones muddying the waters. Opponents are. We should be asking who is so determined to put this meme out there, and why.

cygned 9y ago

Too bad I wasn't able to setup Hot Module Reloading yet, otherwise I'd switched to Preact. Not because I am concerned of the license itself, but because we are heading towards an acquisition exit and I don't want that to be a factor - who knows, where we're at in like five years?

electriclove 9y ago

I'm glad to see this post. People don't like the Facebook license for React and are willing to invest time and money to steer clear of it. I still don't understand why Facebook changed the RocksDB license so quickly but then took a hard stance on the React license.

kemonocode 9y ago
Because React is far more weaponizable and less niche than RocksDB will ever be.

geerlingguy 9y ago

The Drupal community struggled a bit with the decision as well (see https://www.drupal.org/node/2645250 https://www.drupal.org/node/2645250). It seems there are a number of open source communities and enterprise development shops who are just not comfortable with the patent clause. React had a lot of momentum, but it seems alternatives like Vue.js are going to be the long-term winners in terms of being 'the next jQuery' in terms of longevity as a front end standard.

ergo14 9y ago
The next jquery will be probably Polymer (since it is a library). VueJS/Angular are bigger frameworks.
- BinaryIdiot 9y ago
  I very much agree with this. Web components are usable in and out of any framework and once browser support will be there I think they'll be huge. Until then, Polymer helps fill in the missing pieces. Reminds me of jQuery before browser vendors integrated things like selector querying.
erikpukinskis 9y ago
I don't think there will ever be another jQuery. Just like there won't be another Michael Jackson. The world is balkanizing, different people use different tools and listen to different music in a way that wasn't typical 10 years ago.

CharlesMerriam2 9y ago

Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt. Many trumpet the problems with patent infringement cases, particularly in the odd calculations of "damages one would have avoided if the infringement potential were known". Few trumpet the real cases of fear, uncertainty, or doubt killing business opportunities. Acquisitions are called off when the IP review finds GPL in a product, or your proprietary networking technology losing its patent protection to Amazon (because someone signed up for AWS for a month, years ago). I believe WordPress made the correct leap not to embrace a "license taint" that would smell bad to cautious users.

sheeshkebab 9y ago
AWS dropped that patent clause a couple of months ago, apparently (https://www.geekwire.com/2017/amazon-web-services-drops-controversial-patent-clause-standard-user-agreement/ https://www.geekwire.com/2017/amazon-web-services-drops-cont...)

eblanshey 9y ago

I'm willing to bet $100 they will switch to Vue. It's similar to react (which they want), arguably easier to learn, and the WordPress community comes from a php background, which has already embraced Vue. This is a big plus for plugin developers.

diminish 9y ago
Vue would be great but preact seems to be a viable option too. Even riot could ..
- mplewis 9y ago
  As other commenters have mentioned - if your project violates React patents, and you switch to Preact, it almost certainly continues to violate those same patents.
  - mlsarecmg 9y ago
    Vue is also based on React, it uses the same exact principles internally, although in a less concise and more complex way as it leans heavily in Angulars direction on the outside. All templates are either transpiled or evaluated into createElement-like functions, from then on it has a v-dom and works/diffs/renders/composes like React. This could "violate a react patent" according to you: const Test = () => createElement("div", null, "hello word") No one has ever seen nor referenced a patent for this, but if we're really at that point then i'm afraid everything would violate such a patent.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]

batmansmk 9y ago

Why does the Facebook license try to push an agenda with a perpendicular concern to the open sourcing of Reactjs? Was the purpose of opensourcing Reactjs a way to not get sued? They lost credibility in my eyes on their intention.

zodiac 9y ago
There was an article about that recently - it wasn't proactively pushing an agenda so much as, if FB wanted to release any software as OS, without the grant, the lawyers would have had to review every commit to avoid violating someone else's patent.
- Flenser 9y ago
  Do you have a link? That would be interesting to read.
  - carussell 9y ago
    https://medium.com/@ji/the-react-license-for-founders-and-ctos-b38d2538f3e5 https://medium.com/@ji/the-react-license-for-founders-and-ct... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15214508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15214508
    - Flenser 9y ago
      Thank you very much. That's very informative.
whipoodle 9y ago
What exactly is the agenda they are alleged to be pushing?

hoodoof 9y ago

Lawyers. They sure are spoiling the success for the React folks. You can bet Facebook has alot of them and you can bet their political influence is strong with the upper management. Lawyer: "this thing, this point in the contract, it's VERY VERY important". The more lawyers you get in the room, the more beard pulling, wailing and hand wringing there would be about the dire, dire consequences of taking this stupid clause out. And of course the world would come to an end if no-one listened to lawyers. After I fucked several business deals listening to lawyers say how contracts should be changed, I decided to make my own decisions about what matters and what doesn't in a contract. The real problem for ReactJS is that someone at facebook is listening to the lawyers wring their hands about some possible future that will never happen. facebook should just grow up and tell its lawyers to shut up and go back to doing.... whetever it is they do.

morgante 9y ago
> some possible future that will never happen Facebook has been subject to numerous patent litigations and is very likely to be involved in future patent litigations. Maintaining a defensive patent portfolio is an important part of preparing for such litigations, so Facebook's lawyers certainly aren't idly protecting their patents.
- hoodoof 9y ago
  Yep, exactly what the fb lawyers are saying. These are the sorts of important sounding things that the lawyers are saying and frightening everyone into thinking just how incredibly important this issue is, how much is at stake.
  - zodiac 9y ago
    Well then, do you think they're wrong about it? If so why? How would you address the point about past litigation (e.g. by Yahoo)?
- ballenf 9y ago
  But that's irrelevant here. FB is likely getting sued by patent holding companies who aren't reliant on or using React. So the patent clause doesn't really get FB anything against patent trolls. It does get them leverage against legitimate patent holders. There have been reports of companies having to pay in some roundabout unspecified way royalties to FB for React as part of a large patent licensing deal. I'm somewhat skeptical of these reports, but if there is direct revenue to FB from this clause it would be the Occam's Razor explanation for their intransigence.

jaequery 9y ago

vue.js will make me want to use Wordpress again

fiatjaf 9y ago

I don't understand why can't you just replace all React with Preact or Inferno-compat. That would take 2 minutes, wouldn't it?

TheCoreh 9y ago
If Facebook has patents covering React, these probably also cover Preact, so you'd actually be in a worse position: Potentially violating patents and not having any sort of grand.
- fstephany 9y ago
  This is not the issue. The patent clause is not about React, it is about the whole Facebook organization.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- fiatjaf 9y ago
  How? Isn't Preact totally different? How can Facebook patent other people's code like that?
  - Flenser 9y ago
    You can patent the idea or algorithm that the code implements, so long as the code isn't old enough to be considered "prior art".
    - fiatjaf 9y ago
      So all other frameworks that use the concept of virtual dom are also owned by React?
      - Flenser 9y ago
        They can only be owned by their copyright holders, which is separate from patents. If anyone had a patent on virtual dom / diffing, then they could sue anyone else that used an implementation that was implemented in the same way as the implementation in the patent. That doesn't then mean that they "own" those implementations, only that they can use the courts to stop others using them or pay to licence their patent.

ramphastidae 9y ago

So Calypso, which has been in the works for 2+ years, is going to be completely rewritten?

kabes 9y ago
Completely rewritten is a bit of an overstatement. It depends on what road they choose. They could go with a react-API compatible library and the work should be minor. They could go to angular/vue/... which is more work, but they all work component based, so you can keep the entire structure.

pmlnr 9y ago

Did nobody at Automattic read the licence of react before started using it? If this is the case, learn from it, please.

skrebbel 9y ago

Note that WordPress is ditching React not because they believe there's any problem with React's license and patent grant, but because they think their users will be confused and angry. In other words, the baseless and meritless outcry about a perfectly OK patent grant caused this, not the patent grant itself. The subject became taboo, like female nipples in America, and WordPress doesn't want anything to do with the nipples of the open source community.

markyuckerberg 9y ago
>> users will be confused and angry What an ironic statement, considering that that combination can be lethal to a company. Besides, have you ever heard anyone say why they prefer to use Facebook even when they are aware that it is tracking their every move? Usually the answer is "convenience". By the same token, not getting confused or angry is also a great convenience to the user. Very few Wordpress users actually care about the baselessness or meritlessness of using one JavaScript library over another. They just want Wordpress to work.
- skrebbel 9y ago
  I fully agree! I think WordPress made the right move, and I would have done the same in their position. But it's sad that we now have baseless taboos in dev land.
bodegajed 9y ago
> baseless and meritless Are you expert in patent law for you to come up with that conclusion though? I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well.
- notacoward 9y ago
  > I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well. ...as would any non-lawyer's claim otherwise. Do you call them out the same way, or are you selective about where you apply that rule? In actual fact, it only takes a tiny bit of familiarity with patent law to see that a revocable grant can't be worse than no grant at all. Many engineers have such familiarity. If you haven't triggered the revocation clause in the PATENTS file, you're strictly better off than with plain BSD, because you have all the rights you would have had before while Facebook will have given up the right to sue you first (for patent issues related to your use of React). If you have triggered that revocation clause, you're exactly where plain BSD would have put you to begin with. So you're either better off or exactly equal. Never worse. Anyone who claims otherwise either hasn't actually read the PATENTS file, doesn't have even minimal familiarity with how the law works, or is spreading FUD.

0x0 9y ago

Interestingly, Facebook did remove its PATENTS clause on another project they have recently - zstd - https://github.com/facebook/zstd/pull/801 https://github.com/facebook/zstd/pull/801

stock_toaster 9y ago
Oh that's awesome. I had been wondering about zstd!
Flenser 9y ago
They dual licensed under BSD and GPLv2: https://github.com/facebook/zstd/issues/335#issuecomment-323606863 https://github.com/facebook/zstd/issues/335#issuecomment-323... I expect they did a thorough analysis to work out if any of it was either already patented, or patentable. That doesn't mean they don't have patents though.

mememaestro 9y ago

People here trying to defend the React license but if it was good we wouldn't have this conversation about the license in the first place

nathell 9y ago

A candidate I'd consider: Preact. While it doesn't have quite the same support as regular React does, it is touted as having a mostly-compatible API and its license is pure MIT.

mlsarecmg 9y ago

Not a day goes by ... same came up in the project we're working on as our partners got wind of it and are now complaining. It seriously worries me as it's getting harder and harder to justify React although the technology is sound (perhaps close to perfect). The worst part is that this is already threatening v-dom in general (like Preact, Inferno, Vue, etc.) as people are falsely claiming FB holds a claim on it. The React team should re-think their approach. Is it really worth it to dedicate time and spirit on technology that is dear to us all, that is meant to enable amazing applications, but Facebooks lawyers make it hard for us to use, doesn't even matter if our lawyers understand the patent clause correctly or not because they're the ones having the last say, and as this is snowballing out of control they tend to say no. Dan, Sebastian, Pete, Jason, Brian, Dominic and so on, wish they'd get together, start a competitor called Fiber, or put FB under severe pressure.

us0r 9y ago

The last time the PATENTS file was changed was 3 years ago. It has passed the smell test for Microsoft (and dozens of other large companies) with literal buildings full of attorneys who have more experience with licenses, patents and everything between then most. This issue seems to be a bunch of nothing. What am I missing here?

deleted 9y ago
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whipoodle 9y ago
You aren't missing anything. What you've pointed out is also the reason I find this all so fishy- it has been the same for years, the risk has been the same for years. No one who was really worried about the patent risk would have accepted a "wait and see" approach. Because... that would be risky to do.
sheeshkebab 9y ago
Microsoft probably has a separate IP licensing agreement with Facebook. After all MSFT invested in Facebook in the early days, 10 years ago. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21458486/ns/business-us_business/t/microsoft-invests-million-facebook/ http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21458486/ns/business-us_business/t...

pluma 9y ago

People who ridicule the notion of FUD causing actual harm, pay attention: this is a perfect example of the chilling effects of FUD on software projects. Automattic didn't drop React because it doesn't like the license. Automattic dropped React because the FUD surrounding React's license might rub off on them (and WordPress). It's their right to do so and it's in the best interest of WordPress to avoid being dragged into the patent FUD but it's important to understand that this isn't an act of protest against Facebook, it's FUD in full effect.

rk06 9y ago
It was FUD before Apache Foundation placed React's license as Category X. Now, it is not.
- whipoodle 9y ago
  Why?
- pluma 9y ago
  Why? If I spread the rumor "maybe bananas contain rat poison" and Whole Foods would stop stocking bananas, how would that in any way legitimise fears of rat poison in bananas?
bodegajed 9y ago
Comfort can hurt. Automattic is not comfortable with the Facebook license and you say it like it's a baseless FUD but even if they get a 1% chance of going to court against Facebook then they rather not take that risk of litigation anytime in the future. It's a business decision for the long term as rewriting doesn't cost that much for them.
- onli 9y ago
  No, that's not what the article says. It says the fears around the license are something they do not want to have to address within their ecosystem. Wordpress itself is comfortable with the license. There is no fear of going to court.

jasonsync 9y ago

I'm here to say that the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks, and may push the release into next year. Just a few weeks? Is it that trivial to swap out a library?

kotojo 9y ago
The only way I could see them doing it in a few weeks is swapping it out with something with a very similar api like inferno or preact.
j_m_b 9y ago
Yah I LOL'd out that one. A year from now we'll be reading the postmortem of the problems the Gutenberg team has faced swapping out React for another library and how things still aren't quite what they used to be.
danielharrison 9y ago
Depends on how it's written. I'd suspect they've done a pretty good job on eeping the engine as decoupled from their code as possible. It'd probably be just a matter of rewriting a translation layer.
grantpalin 9y ago
Apparently the Gutenberg Element concept (https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/master/element https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/master/element) wraps React to minimize contact with React itself. So converting to Preact might not take over long. Note that I haven't dug very far into the Gutenberg codebase so at the moment I am just supposing.

whipoodle 9y ago

I respect their stance, but if I were a contributor I'd be bummed. This issue still strikes me as much ado about nothing.

zachruss92 9y ago

I understand why Matt came to this decision and ultimately agree with it. As someone who builds products based on WordPres for other companies, I can understand the concern. Imagine I build a site that uses WordPress 4.9 (or whatever release Gutenberg is will come out in) for a startup. Facebook legitimately copies a startup infringing on their patents (think about the Snapchat/Instagram feature battle), and the startup sues Facebook. They then have their react license revoked and can no longer use WordPress. The same thing applies with React native. On the other hand, I do understand Facebooks reasoning. I'll definitely be watching this over time and hope that a legitimate solution will arise.

mkohlmyr 9y ago

A lot of people here are projecting their dislike of software patents onto this whole issue which is a big mistake. IANAL but I don't see anywhere in the PATENTS file where it restricts this issue to software patents. In fact it explicitly talks about any software, technology, product or service. That means you essentially can't sue them over any patent ever. Not just software. With Facebooks history of "liberal borrowing" when it comes to product, it would be prudent to assume this same strategy might be applied to non-software products and services. I completely understand why WordPress is doing this. It makes a ton of sense. WordPress powers some ridiculous percentage of the web. They are doing The Right Thing (tm) by not stopping every single one of those users from bringing a patent complaint against Facebook. Software or otherwise.

twiddo 9y ago

This is not an appropriate vector to 'fix' patent law. If you want to fix software patents, it should happen across the board and not by companies selectively weaponizing their projects and polluting the whole ecosystem in the veil of open source contributions.

k__ 9y ago

That's why I stopped selling tech. I say I do mobile apps and not React-Native apps. Maybe I do then NativeScript next year or PWAs with Angular.

citygm 9y ago

https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/5084 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/5084 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/4503 https://github.com/facebook/hhvm/issues/4503 Do not trust facebook hhvm open source project #5084 HHVM must have a open source foundations in behind #4503