12 ms·

It's not okay to pretend your software is open source

186 points by Bl4ckb0ne 8y ago

huzy 8y ago
What an empty, ranting, and rage-fueled post. >They’re in for a long wait - we’re not going to forget about shady, dishonest, and unethical companies like Redis Labs. We also won't forget about how you've harassed so many people throughout the years Mr. Drew DeVault. Are you going to add antirez (or anteriz as you call him) to that list?
- Semaphor 8y ago
  > We also won't forget about how you've harassed so many people throughout the years Mr. Drew. Care for a background link for those out of the loop?
  - wlesieutre 8y ago
    Also apparently out of the loop, but a new account created specifically to trash the author of the blog post has me skeptical...
  - myWindoonn 8y ago
    I've operated in a community with him, many years ago. He was toxic, but he was also a teenager. Everybody that you'll meet on HN is some sort of manipulative narcissist; those who aren't don't share their faces.
  - kabes 8y ago
    Drew is known to be a bit of an asshole. E.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18156980 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18156980
    - JasonFruit 8y ago
      Read through all of that, came back. So he is prickly but skilled, and some people get their feelings hurt. I can't see anywhere he did worse than smack down someone he saw as annoying and not useful. I'd work with him, but I don't know that he'd find me useful!
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
  - vntok 8y ago
    It's not whataboutism. Harassing people was not okay then, and it's not okay now either.
_wmd 8y ago
If you don't like software with these new style licenses, then don't use software with these new style licenses. Explain what it is that apparently so deeply violates your right to exist, but puritanical screaming and finger-pointing black & white contrasts never really convinces people of anything. All these rants are lame. The best comment I've heard so far w.r.t. CC is how it complicates acquisition of software by businesses. That's a hugely legit complaint -- but the same complaint applied to the GPL not more than 2 decades ago. Companies adjusted before, assuming value exists in this new breed of license, they'll adjust again. Meanwhile as a free software author, I'm very happy to see smaller companies experimenting with methods to protect their work in whatever way they see fit. Hopefully something "socially acceptable" comes from all this that might be useful to me at some stage in future. Finally it's worth remembering that there is a HUGE degree of freedom to explore between closed source, pay-only software and free software as we have it today. I have yet to see a recent example of a license that removes what for me is the greatest benefit of all: the ability to fix and debug things without opening a ticket. Fundamentalist shouting matches erupting every time someone tries something new reminds me of another modern debate - religion, and like there, the loudest and most annoying rarely have meaningful new information to share ---- There is another angle that seems very interesting. Industry consolidation and typical policy within large companies towards employees working on free software ("you can't unless it's approved & we own copyright") means 'the movement' that existed in the 90s is all but dead and gone. Any big real development that happens in the open typically happens because some employer is explicitly paying an employee to advance their agenda through technical means (see e.g. Kubernetes). To me, a new license that not only incentivized but made practical and sustainable large software projects independent of those large consolidated employers is far more valuable than not having to toss a few dimes in the pot if that software is used in some circumstances where profit is made.
- staticassertion 8y ago
  > Meanwhile as a free software author, I'm very happy to see smaller companies experimenting with methods to protect their work in whatever way they see fit. Hopefully something "socially acceptable" comes from all this that might be useful to me at some stage in future. Me too. I like to see companies trying out these ways of making OSS a reasonable choice.
staticassertion 8y ago
I believe I'm in the minority when I say this. Ultimately, if I choose to, I will license my project however I want. If I want to restrict others from selling my product I will do so. Calling it Apache 2.0 + Common Clause makes sense, it's an extremely well known license and it's easier to start there and then say "but with some restrictions". That said, I do see the issue that people may use this software and not understand that the restrictions are there (but they clearly didn't look at the license) so changing the name is a reasonable ask. This article definitely reads as overdramatic, as do the repeated comments on the subject.
- vorpalhex 8y ago
  These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! You can't make a substantive change to a license and pretend it's a small deal. You can't hijack core tenants of a license, and then just put a little disclaimer at the bottom. "Buy one get one half off! *The one half off is actually just a plastic model and doesn't do anything" Abusing FOSS licenses to try and control your users software while still using their claim strikes me as pretty bad faith. If you want to use a dual license, that's fine - just do that. "Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product" -> See? Done, easy, nobody upset. Don't pretend "Hey, this is open source, except it isn't, and please give me your money."
  - 99052882514569 8y ago
    >These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! Don't buy them, don't eat them. >"Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product" -> See? Done, easy, nobody upset. Don't pretend "Hey, this is open source, except it isn't, and please give me your money." None of that makes any sense. Creative Commons simply restricts selling the software itself. The software is still distributed free, and you can still sell a derivative.
kowdermeister 8y ago
He should have been linked to one repo to have some context. Is the commons clause limited to the project itself or can I still sell my software using a library with a commons clause?
hendzen 8y ago
At the end of the day, open source projects need developers... and developers need to eat. These license changes have been forced by the business reality of larger cloud companies capturing all the value created by open source communities and leaving OSS developers to starve. Who deserves the value created by Redis? Antirez and the Redis Labs developers? Or Jeff Bezos?
- vorpalhex 8y ago
  If you want to publish open source and not have cloud companies use it for their own profit without contributing back, there's a license for that called the GPL. If you want to write software and get paid for it, then ask for money for your software instead of handing it out as open source then changing your mind once it's popular. In common parlance that's called a bait and switch.
  - kryptiskt 8y ago
    Cloud companies can use GPL code without contributing back as they're not distributing it.
  - detaro 8y ago
    GPL does nothing of the sort. If AGPL is a worthy tradeoff overall is debated a lot.
- emersion 8y ago
  This is not the point. The point is: stop calling open-source stuff that isn't. You shouldn't lie to your users.
  - rocqua 8y ago
    So this is just a very harsh discussion of semantics? Moreover, one where the argument is based on common understanding of a term, rather than a literal interpretation of the term. Because a literal interpretation of open-source is a system where the 'source'(code) is open (to read). Indeed many people understand it to mean more, but that doesn't make that understanding indisputably correct.
stevenacreman 8y ago
People are upvoting the title because I guess they agree to some extent. It seems everyone starting an open source project nowadays needs to protect against the cloud providers. The topic on here about the new CI tool from the creator of Ansible also had an element of this. But I actually quite liked his solution. He gives everything away for free and the source is open. You just cannot profit from his work unless you join a partner system. Maybe I'm being naive but that seemed like it may work. Although not sure how you qualify not being used for commercial benefit if the software you're building with the CI tool produces a paid product. I think the software creator would only really enforce the license if you started a business up doing hosted CI with it or offering it as a cloud service.
- icebraining 8y ago
  The question is not whether it works or not. This new alternative to open source may be great, we're just asking people to clearly distinguish their new model as such.
myWindoonn 8y ago
At least non-free licensing gives us an easy way to tell which software is not worth using. It's funny how these recent packages in the news all have FLOSS alternatives: * Mongo? Why not Pg? * GitLab? Why not Fossil? * Redis? Why not better architecture? * Vespene? Why not Nix tools? You may see each of these as flamebait. I see each of these as a discussion that, here on HN, usually ends in stalemate. What I'm suggesting, then, is that we simply allow these package authors to tip the scales decisively for us: Reject non-FLOSS and the path is clear.
- vorpalhex 8y ago
  Mongo and PG are not quite alternatives. That make different kinds of consistency promises. One FOSS alternative to Mongo that offers similar consistency behaviors is RethinkDB. An alternative to Redis if you don't need persistence is plain old Memcache.
- icebraining 8y ago
  Redis is still pure FOSS (BSD licensed). Only the extra modules got the license change.
freehunter 8y ago
I agree that if you've labeled your software incorrectly as open source and you've been corrected, it should be re-labeled and the problem shouldn't be ignored. I will say, though, that personally I feel "free" software has a labelling problem. I'm not heavily engaged in the open-source movement, and a lot of the terms and wording and licensing confuses me to the point where I don't want to use it because I'm not sure what legal or press hell I might be unleashing in the future. The fact that "free" needs to be clarified with "free as in beer" or "free as in speech" is the most notable. Any thesaurus can give a dozen or more great words to use other than the ambiguous "free". Some of the OSI/FSF licenses can be (in my opinion) just as restrictive and encumbered (albeit in different ways) as non-free/non-open licenses. The biggest ambiguity to me is having multiple pieces of software with different licenses. I've seen some Ruby gems where they're GPL'd, and I'm not sure what the definition of "modified" means as it pertains to when I need to redistribute the code. If I used MIT licensed code inside of a GPL application, do I need to release the MIT code too? What if I need to use non-free code in an otherwise GPL codebase? I'm just SOL? Do I need to guarantee my released GPL code works, or can I release completely broken code and still satisfy the license? And this post highlights that pretty well those franken-licensing problems. What the hell is Commons Clause? I've never even heard of it... or maybe I did hear of it and like the post says I just thought it was Apache Commons or Creative Commons. Again, ambiguous terms that have tons of better words in a thesaurus. FSF/OSI have changed the world for the better for sure, but like with the million and a half Linux distros, the tyranny of choice ends up making the process harder. I've never released any of my code as open-source because to be honest, I have no idea what "open source" actually means.
- esotericn 8y ago
  If you want to provide the source to your software, you put the code on the Internet and you're done. You don't need to even choose a licence. That only comes in to play if you concern yourself with downstream users that care about licensing. It really only becomes complicated when you want to release it and _also_ monetise it or restrict its use. Licenses exist because of how this is ultimately at odds with how software actually works - it's basically legal DRM. (I think licensing has valid uses in the current environment, but it's worth keeping in mind how absurd it is as a concept, it's basically a massive hack).
npr11 8y ago
This post seemed aggressive and vague to me. I'm not even sure what problem the author has with these licenses. I _think_ the issue is confusing naming - which seems pretty solvable - and not a fundamental problem with "dual licensing" / "source available" / "commons clause" software? People can develop software out in the open and say "use it as it is, for free!", "use it as part of a new product, for free!", but also say "please do not sell this software as it is" and "please do not make and sell an almost-identical product using this software". That seems good to me, if the other option is closed-source. E.g. I could make a product, you can use it for free, I will try to make money selling consulting services around the product (you can compete with me on that!) just don't sell the software. I am happy to be corrected if there is a problem with these licenses being misused (or misrepresented as free and open source), but the post didn't give any examples.
- hatsunearu 8y ago
  https://commonsclause.com/ https://commonsclause.com/ >People can develop software out in the open and say "use it as it is, for free!", "use it as part of a new product, for free!", but also say "please do not sell this software as it is" and "please do not make and sell an almost-identical product using this software". The Common Clause isn't about preventing shovelware, it's specifically about restricting the user's freedom to sell any derivative work--it straight up says in the 1st FAQ that it's to transition existing actually FOSS projects to non-libre software. Also that's just the way SirCmpwn writes!
- emersion 8y ago
  There are two issues. First, naming is confusing, as you said, and wording implies "<open source license> + something more" instead of "<open source license> but with more restrictions". Second, some open-source projects choosing the Commons Clause still say they are FOSS. Choosing Commons Clause is your choice, lying to your users is different.
- Bartweiss 8y ago
  > I could make a product, you can use it for free, I will try to make money selling consulting services around the product (you can compete with me on that!) just don't sell the software. I agree that even if it's not FOSS, this is a healthy and reasonable way to profit from software. Unfortunately, the Commons Clause explicitly forbids this healthy use. “Sell” means...to provide to third parties, for a fee or other consideration (including without limitation fees for hosting or consulting/ support services related to the Software), a product or service whose value derives, entirely or substantially, from the functionality of the Software Imagine that you create new a new project greatly improving Commons Clause software, offer it for free, and offer paid consulting exclusively on your project, while refusing any work that involves consulting about the code you didn't write. That would still violate the license, which says that only the original license holder can do consulting on anything that's substantially derived from the core code. As written, there's no way at all to make money downstream from Commons Clause code, no matter how much value you add.
madshiva 8y ago
This is true but who read these licence ? Agree, continue, next, move on btw I don't give a shit.
kijin 8y ago
Creative commons licenses have had optional NC (no commercial use) and ND (no derivative works) clauses for years. FOSS purists don't like them, but a lot of artists depend on those clauses to make a living. There is no widely recognized equivalent of a CC-BY-NC license for software, partly because neither the FSF nor OSI will recognize such a license. Maybe someone needs to write one nonetheless. And stick it on their software clearly and unambiguously. They obviously think that OSI-approved licenses don't suit their needs. Then don't use them, period. The author is right that "Apache 2.0 + Commons Clause" is potentially misleading. We've seen "GPLv2 + Classpath Exception" before, but that was to give additional permissions, not a restriction. Similarly, most examples of dual-licensing don't add restrictions to either license. Adding a restriction is something new. It's understandable that people find it disingenuous. Just write a new license already and call it Redis Labs Open License (RLOL) or something like that. I'm sure antirez would be rather unhappy if you forked Redis, deleted a bunch of features, and called it Redis Lite. At least have the courtesy of changing the name if you're going to use an incompatible license.
Fuxy 8y ago
I don't understand why everyone is so against his point as far as I'm aware even wikipedia says under "Open source license"[1] that "Licenses which only permit non-commercial redistribution or modification of the source code for personal use only are generally not considered as open-source licenses." So his point is valid you can't advertise your product as open source if it's not and you shouldn't be allowed to trick the community into thinking it is. Companies can use whatever license they like it's their right but advertising it as open source when it isn't just to take advantage of the now large community of open source contributors is not acceptable. Using “Apache+Commons Clause” is just one way used to trick people into believing it's open source when it's not; you may not be using it like that but do you honestly think a company with a team of lawyers didn't do this intentionally so they can take advantage of the open source community? [1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license)
zekevermillion 8y ago
People are talking past each other here b/c we can't decide if we're concerned primarily with the ethics of software freedom, or just with confusion of Open Source (TM) labeling. This discussion says to me that maybe RMS was right to insist on using the term "free software", and to refuse to promote "open source". When we debate the merits of an "open source" (or more confusingly, a "FOSS") license, people end up talking past each other. Are we talking about what is an effective licensing / development strategy, or are we talking about software ethics? People who do not agree with the free software ethos are understandably confused to find themselves criticized on moral grounds for choosing a license that makes source available but does not permit full exercise of user freedom. Hey, I thought we called it open source b/c we didn't want to focus on user freedom as ideology? Right? Maybe that was a mistake. My personal view is that there is no logical problem in an author talking about open source as the basis for a restrictive, source-available license -- as long as there is no implication that the license is endorsed by a particular standards body. And conversely if you are a proponent of software freedom, maybe you have to recognize that there is some merit in referring to this as "free software" instead of something else, to avoid confusion.
koonsolo 8y ago
We need a different name for this, so either - Source-available software (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software) - Shared source (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_Source_Initiative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_Source_Initiative) So that it's clear that source code is available in some form, but it's not open source.
- duckerude 8y ago
  Shared source ranges from actual free software to software that you aren't allowed to modify or redistribute, and it's only used by Microsoft. I don't think it's a good idea to expand the meaning to cover software that isn't Microsoft's.
  - koonsolo 8y ago
    So we need a different name, I don't really care which. But I think it's clear we need one to make the distinction.
barnson 8y ago
Blocking the sale or hosting of software is one thing; Commons Clause also blocks any "consulting/ support services related to the Software." That's way too broad; is a system that uses Redis "related to the Software"? It's also short-sighted: it limits the ecosystem's growth to the ability of one company to expand and take on "consulting/ support services."
nqzero 8y ago
i'm sympathetic to (and in the same boat) as the developers that are considering "licenses" like this one. but i agree with the author that the language being used is fraudulent and the terms are one-sided (hence the quotes). i've made an attempt at coming up with a license that better bridges the gap between open and closed. my goals were: * pay to use the software * assure developers that they can also monetize their work * assure users that prices won't change unpredictably https://github.com/db4j/pupl/blob/master/PUPL.md https://github.com/db4j/pupl/blob/master/PUPL.md would love any feedback or alternative licenses that capture similar elements
fiatjaf 8y ago
Why is there a canonical definition of free English words guarded by an institution? Isn't the English language free and open?
mrjn 8y ago
(Author of Dgraph here). To Drew Devault: Just came across this article, and there's no comments section in your blog post. > Finally, I have some praise to offer. Dgraph was briefly licensed under Apache plus the Commons Clause, and had the sort of misleading and false information this article decries on their marketing website, docs, and so on. However, they’ve rolled it back, and Dgraph is now using the Apache 2.0 license with no modifications. Thank you! Please don't "praise" us. When we switched to the clause (back in April 2018), we had changed wordings on our site (we don't do any marketing, so not sure which marketing website you're referring to) to not mention open source but to mention liberally licensed (which I strongly hold that Apache + Commons Clause is, more so than AGPL). There was no false or misleading information. In fact, that was pointed out to you multiple times, but that didn't change your rhetoric. Dgraph is no longer under Commons Clause and (its core) is under Apache 2.0 license, so I think I can speak as an open-source guy here. There are people like me out there, who'd like to ensure that they can make a livelihood out of writing open source software, without asking for donations, or doing another job. We'd also like to ensure that if we run a company around open source, that company can be sustainable and profitable. If your answer to these people is to switch to closed source, then you're doing a bad job of promoting open source. In fact, your attitude towards open source is damaging to anybody who is willing to spend their time and effort building open source and expects to make a good living out of it.

186 points by Bl4ckb0ne 8y ago

huzy 8y ago

What an empty, ranting, and rage-fueled post. >They’re in for a long wait - we’re not going to forget about shady, dishonest, and unethical companies like Redis Labs. We also won't forget about how you've harassed so many people throughout the years Mr. Drew DeVault. Are you going to add antirez (or anteriz as you call him) to that list?

Semaphor 8y ago
> We also won't forget about how you've harassed so many people throughout the years Mr. Drew. Care for a background link for those out of the loop?
- wlesieutre 8y ago
  Also apparently out of the loop, but a new account created specifically to trash the author of the blog post has me skeptical...
- myWindoonn 8y ago
  I've operated in a community with him, many years ago. He was toxic, but he was also a teenager. Everybody that you'll meet on HN is some sort of manipulative narcissist; those who aren't don't share their faces.
- kabes 8y ago
  Drew is known to be a bit of an asshole. E.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18156980 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18156980
  - JasonFruit 8y ago
    Read through all of that, came back. So he is prickly but skilled, and some people get their feelings hurt. I can't see anywhere he did worse than smack down someone he saw as annoying and not useful. I'd work with him, but I don't know that he'd find me useful!
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
- vntok 8y ago
  It's not whataboutism. Harassing people was not okay then, and it's not okay now either.

_wmd 8y ago

If you don't like software with these new style licenses, then don't use software with these new style licenses. Explain what it is that apparently so deeply violates your right to exist, but puritanical screaming and finger-pointing black & white contrasts never really convinces people of anything. All these rants are lame. The best comment I've heard so far w.r.t. CC is how it complicates acquisition of software by businesses. That's a hugely legit complaint -- but the same complaint applied to the GPL not more than 2 decades ago. Companies adjusted before, assuming value exists in this new breed of license, they'll adjust again. Meanwhile as a free software author, I'm very happy to see smaller companies experimenting with methods to protect their work in whatever way they see fit. Hopefully something "socially acceptable" comes from all this that might be useful to me at some stage in future. Finally it's worth remembering that there is a HUGE degree of freedom to explore between closed source, pay-only software and free software as we have it today. I have yet to see a recent example of a license that removes what for me is the greatest benefit of all: the ability to fix and debug things without opening a ticket. Fundamentalist shouting matches erupting every time someone tries something new reminds me of another modern debate - religion, and like there, the loudest and most annoying rarely have meaningful new information to share ---- There is another angle that seems very interesting. Industry consolidation and typical policy within large companies towards employees working on free software ("you can't unless it's approved & we own copyright") means 'the movement' that existed in the 90s is all but dead and gone. Any big real development that happens in the open typically happens because some employer is explicitly paying an employee to advance their agenda through technical means (see e.g. Kubernetes). To me, a new license that not only incentivized but made practical and sustainable large software projects independent of those large consolidated employers is far more valuable than not having to toss a few dimes in the pot if that software is used in some circumstances where profit is made.

staticassertion 8y ago
> Meanwhile as a free software author, I'm very happy to see smaller companies experimenting with methods to protect their work in whatever way they see fit. Hopefully something "socially acceptable" comes from all this that might be useful to me at some stage in future. Me too. I like to see companies trying out these ways of making OSS a reasonable choice.

staticassertion 8y ago

I believe I'm in the minority when I say this. Ultimately, if I choose to, I will license my project however I want. If I want to restrict others from selling my product I will do so. Calling it Apache 2.0 + Common Clause makes sense, it's an extremely well known license and it's easier to start there and then say "but with some restrictions". That said, I do see the issue that people may use this software and not understand that the restrictions are there (but they clearly didn't look at the license) so changing the name is a reasonable ask. This article definitely reads as overdramatic, as do the repeated comments on the subject.

vorpalhex 8y ago
These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! You can't make a substantive change to a license and pretend it's a small deal. You can't hijack core tenants of a license, and then just put a little disclaimer at the bottom. "Buy one get one half off! *The one half off is actually just a plastic model and doesn't do anything" Abusing FOSS licenses to try and control your users software while still using their claim strikes me as pretty bad faith. If you want to use a dual license, that's fine - just do that. "Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product" -> See? Done, easy, nobody upset. Don't pretend "Hey, this is open source, except it isn't, and please give me your money."
- 99052882514569 8y ago
  >These are brownies, but they happen to contain a bit of horse shit. Not a lot, it's just like a tiny sprinkling on top, but they are definitely still brownies! Don't buy them, don't eat them. >"Hey, you can use this for free if you don't make any money, but we want 10% if you're using this in a paid product" -> See? Done, easy, nobody upset. Don't pretend "Hey, this is open source, except it isn't, and please give me your money." None of that makes any sense. Creative Commons simply restricts selling the software itself. The software is still distributed free, and you can still sell a derivative.

kowdermeister 8y ago

He should have been linked to one repo to have some context. Is the commons clause limited to the project itself or can I still sell my software using a library with a commons clause?

hendzen 8y ago

At the end of the day, open source projects need developers... and developers need to eat. These license changes have been forced by the business reality of larger cloud companies capturing all the value created by open source communities and leaving OSS developers to starve. Who deserves the value created by Redis? Antirez and the Redis Labs developers? Or Jeff Bezos?

vorpalhex 8y ago
If you want to publish open source and not have cloud companies use it for their own profit without contributing back, there's a license for that called the GPL. If you want to write software and get paid for it, then ask for money for your software instead of handing it out as open source then changing your mind once it's popular. In common parlance that's called a bait and switch.
- kryptiskt 8y ago
  Cloud companies can use GPL code without contributing back as they're not distributing it.
- detaro 8y ago
  GPL does nothing of the sort. If AGPL is a worthy tradeoff overall is debated a lot.
emersion 8y ago
This is not the point. The point is: stop calling open-source stuff that isn't. You shouldn't lie to your users.
- rocqua 8y ago
  So this is just a very harsh discussion of semantics? Moreover, one where the argument is based on common understanding of a term, rather than a literal interpretation of the term. Because a literal interpretation of open-source is a system where the 'source'(code) is open (to read). Indeed many people understand it to mean more, but that doesn't make that understanding indisputably correct.

stevenacreman 8y ago

People are upvoting the title because I guess they agree to some extent. It seems everyone starting an open source project nowadays needs to protect against the cloud providers. The topic on here about the new CI tool from the creator of Ansible also had an element of this. But I actually quite liked his solution. He gives everything away for free and the source is open. You just cannot profit from his work unless you join a partner system. Maybe I'm being naive but that seemed like it may work. Although not sure how you qualify not being used for commercial benefit if the software you're building with the CI tool produces a paid product. I think the software creator would only really enforce the license if you started a business up doing hosted CI with it or offering it as a cloud service.

icebraining 8y ago
The question is not whether it works or not. This new alternative to open source may be great, we're just asking people to clearly distinguish their new model as such.

myWindoonn 8y ago

At least non-free licensing gives us an easy way to tell which software is not worth using. It's funny how these recent packages in the news all have FLOSS alternatives: * Mongo? Why not Pg? * GitLab? Why not Fossil? * Redis? Why not better architecture? * Vespene? Why not Nix tools? You may see each of these as flamebait. I see each of these as a discussion that, here on HN, usually ends in stalemate. What I'm suggesting, then, is that we simply allow these package authors to tip the scales decisively for us: Reject non-FLOSS and the path is clear.

vorpalhex 8y ago
Mongo and PG are not quite alternatives. That make different kinds of consistency promises. One FOSS alternative to Mongo that offers similar consistency behaviors is RethinkDB. An alternative to Redis if you don't need persistence is plain old Memcache.
icebraining 8y ago
Redis is still pure FOSS (BSD licensed). Only the extra modules got the license change.

freehunter 8y ago

I agree that if you've labeled your software incorrectly as open source and you've been corrected, it should be re-labeled and the problem shouldn't be ignored. I will say, though, that personally I feel "free" software has a labelling problem. I'm not heavily engaged in the open-source movement, and a lot of the terms and wording and licensing confuses me to the point where I don't want to use it because I'm not sure what legal or press hell I might be unleashing in the future. The fact that "free" needs to be clarified with "free as in beer" or "free as in speech" is the most notable. Any thesaurus can give a dozen or more great words to use other than the ambiguous "free". Some of the OSI/FSF licenses can be (in my opinion) just as restrictive and encumbered (albeit in different ways) as non-free/non-open licenses. The biggest ambiguity to me is having multiple pieces of software with different licenses. I've seen some Ruby gems where they're GPL'd, and I'm not sure what the definition of "modified" means as it pertains to when I need to redistribute the code. If I used MIT licensed code inside of a GPL application, do I need to release the MIT code too? What if I need to use non-free code in an otherwise GPL codebase? I'm just SOL? Do I need to guarantee my released GPL code works, or can I release completely broken code and still satisfy the license? And this post highlights that pretty well those franken-licensing problems. What the hell is Commons Clause? I've never even heard of it... or maybe I did hear of it and like the post says I just thought it was Apache Commons or Creative Commons. Again, ambiguous terms that have tons of better words in a thesaurus. FSF/OSI have changed the world for the better for sure, but like with the million and a half Linux distros, the tyranny of choice ends up making the process harder. I've never released any of my code as open-source because to be honest, I have no idea what "open source" actually means.

esotericn 8y ago
If you want to provide the source to your software, you put the code on the Internet and you're done. You don't need to even choose a licence. That only comes in to play if you concern yourself with downstream users that care about licensing. It really only becomes complicated when you want to release it and _also_ monetise it or restrict its use. Licenses exist because of how this is ultimately at odds with how software actually works - it's basically legal DRM. (I think licensing has valid uses in the current environment, but it's worth keeping in mind how absurd it is as a concept, it's basically a massive hack).

npr11 8y ago

This post seemed aggressive and vague to me. I'm not even sure what problem the author has with these licenses. I _think_ the issue is confusing naming - which seems pretty solvable - and not a fundamental problem with "dual licensing" / "source available" / "commons clause" software? People can develop software out in the open and say "use it as it is, for free!", "use it as part of a new product, for free!", but also say "please do not sell this software as it is" and "please do not make and sell an almost-identical product using this software". That seems good to me, if the other option is closed-source. E.g. I could make a product, you can use it for free, I will try to make money selling consulting services around the product (you can compete with me on that!) just don't sell the software. I am happy to be corrected if there is a problem with these licenses being misused (or misrepresented as free and open source), but the post didn't give any examples.

hatsunearu 8y ago
https://commonsclause.com/ https://commonsclause.com/ >People can develop software out in the open and say "use it as it is, for free!", "use it as part of a new product, for free!", but also say "please do not sell this software as it is" and "please do not make and sell an almost-identical product using this software". The Common Clause isn't about preventing shovelware, it's specifically about restricting the user's freedom to sell any derivative work--it straight up says in the 1st FAQ that it's to transition existing actually FOSS projects to non-libre software. Also that's just the way SirCmpwn writes!
emersion 8y ago
There are two issues. First, naming is confusing, as you said, and wording implies "<open source license> + something more" instead of "<open source license> but with more restrictions". Second, some open-source projects choosing the Commons Clause still say they are FOSS. Choosing Commons Clause is your choice, lying to your users is different.
Bartweiss 8y ago
> I could make a product, you can use it for free, I will try to make money selling consulting services around the product (you can compete with me on that!) just don't sell the software. I agree that even if it's not FOSS, this is a healthy and reasonable way to profit from software. Unfortunately, the Commons Clause explicitly forbids this healthy use. “Sell” means...to provide to third parties, for a fee or other consideration (including without limitation fees for hosting or consulting/ support services related to the Software), a product or service whose value derives, entirely or substantially, from the functionality of the Software Imagine that you create new a new project greatly improving Commons Clause software, offer it for free, and offer paid consulting exclusively on your project, while refusing any work that involves consulting about the code you didn't write. That would still violate the license, which says that only the original license holder can do consulting on anything that's substantially derived from the core code. As written, there's no way at all to make money downstream from Commons Clause code, no matter how much value you add.

madshiva 8y ago

This is true but who read these licence ? Agree, continue, next, move on btw I don't give a shit.

kijin 8y ago

Creative commons licenses have had optional NC (no commercial use) and ND (no derivative works) clauses for years. FOSS purists don't like them, but a lot of artists depend on those clauses to make a living. There is no widely recognized equivalent of a CC-BY-NC license for software, partly because neither the FSF nor OSI will recognize such a license. Maybe someone needs to write one nonetheless. And stick it on their software clearly and unambiguously. They obviously think that OSI-approved licenses don't suit their needs. Then don't use them, period. The author is right that "Apache 2.0 + Commons Clause" is potentially misleading. We've seen "GPLv2 + Classpath Exception" before, but that was to give additional permissions, not a restriction. Similarly, most examples of dual-licensing don't add restrictions to either license. Adding a restriction is something new. It's understandable that people find it disingenuous. Just write a new license already and call it Redis Labs Open License (RLOL) or something like that. I'm sure antirez would be rather unhappy if you forked Redis, deleted a bunch of features, and called it Redis Lite. At least have the courtesy of changing the name if you're going to use an incompatible license.

Fuxy 8y ago

I don't understand why everyone is so against his point as far as I'm aware even wikipedia says under "Open source license"[1] that "Licenses which only permit non-commercial redistribution or modification of the source code for personal use only are generally not considered as open-source licenses." So his point is valid you can't advertise your product as open source if it's not and you shouldn't be allowed to trick the community into thinking it is. Companies can use whatever license they like it's their right but advertising it as open source when it isn't just to take advantage of the now large community of open source contributors is not acceptable. Using “Apache+Commons Clause” is just one way used to trick people into believing it's open source when it's not; you may not be using it like that but do you honestly think a company with a team of lawyers didn't do this intentionally so they can take advantage of the open source community? [1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_license)

zekevermillion 8y ago

People are talking past each other here b/c we can't decide if we're concerned primarily with the ethics of software freedom, or just with confusion of Open Source (TM) labeling. This discussion says to me that maybe RMS was right to insist on using the term "free software", and to refuse to promote "open source". When we debate the merits of an "open source" (or more confusingly, a "FOSS") license, people end up talking past each other. Are we talking about what is an effective licensing / development strategy, or are we talking about software ethics? People who do not agree with the free software ethos are understandably confused to find themselves criticized on moral grounds for choosing a license that makes source available but does not permit full exercise of user freedom. Hey, I thought we called it open source b/c we didn't want to focus on user freedom as ideology? Right? Maybe that was a mistake. My personal view is that there is no logical problem in an author talking about open source as the basis for a restrictive, source-available license -- as long as there is no implication that the license is endorsed by a particular standards body. And conversely if you are a proponent of software freedom, maybe you have to recognize that there is some merit in referring to this as "free software" instead of something else, to avoid confusion.

koonsolo 8y ago

We need a different name for this, so either - Source-available software (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software) - Shared source (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_Source_Initiative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_Source_Initiative) So that it's clear that source code is available in some form, but it's not open source.

duckerude 8y ago
Shared source ranges from actual free software to software that you aren't allowed to modify or redistribute, and it's only used by Microsoft. I don't think it's a good idea to expand the meaning to cover software that isn't Microsoft's.
- koonsolo 8y ago
  So we need a different name, I don't really care which. But I think it's clear we need one to make the distinction.

barnson 8y ago

Blocking the sale or hosting of software is one thing; Commons Clause also blocks any "consulting/ support services related to the Software." That's way too broad; is a system that uses Redis "related to the Software"? It's also short-sighted: it limits the ecosystem's growth to the ability of one company to expand and take on "consulting/ support services."

nqzero 8y ago

i'm sympathetic to (and in the same boat) as the developers that are considering "licenses" like this one. but i agree with the author that the language being used is fraudulent and the terms are one-sided (hence the quotes). i've made an attempt at coming up with a license that better bridges the gap between open and closed. my goals were: * pay to use the software * assure developers that they can also monetize their work * assure users that prices won't change unpredictably https://github.com/db4j/pupl/blob/master/PUPL.md https://github.com/db4j/pupl/blob/master/PUPL.md would love any feedback or alternative licenses that capture similar elements

fiatjaf 8y ago

Why is there a canonical definition of free English words guarded by an institution? Isn't the English language free and open?

mrjn 8y ago

(Author of Dgraph here). To Drew Devault: Just came across this article, and there's no comments section in your blog post. > Finally, I have some praise to offer. Dgraph was briefly licensed under Apache plus the Commons Clause, and had the sort of misleading and false information this article decries on their marketing website, docs, and so on. However, they’ve rolled it back, and Dgraph is now using the Apache 2.0 license with no modifications. Thank you! Please don't "praise" us. When we switched to the clause (back in April 2018), we had changed wordings on our site (we don't do any marketing, so not sure which marketing website you're referring to) to not mention open source but to mention liberally licensed (which I strongly hold that Apache + Commons Clause is, more so than AGPL). There was no false or misleading information. In fact, that was pointed out to you multiple times, but that didn't change your rhetoric. Dgraph is no longer under Commons Clause and (its core) is under Apache 2.0 license, so I think I can speak as an open-source guy here. There are people like me out there, who'd like to ensure that they can make a livelihood out of writing open source software, without asking for donations, or doing another job. We'd also like to ensure that if we run a company around open source, that company can be sustainable and profitable. If your answer to these people is to switch to closed source, then you're doing a bad job of promoting open source. In fact, your attitude towards open source is damaging to anybody who is willing to spend their time and effort building open source and expects to make a good living out of it.