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Heh, the Star Trek thing might have been a bit of an overreach based on people's reactions, but let me see if I can restate the point I was trying to make with

Heh, the Star Trek thing might have been a bit of an overreach based on people's reactions, but let me see if I can restate the point I was trying to make with that little bit. Licenses like MIT give the most possible freedom, particularly with how derivative works are commercialized. Copyleft licenses limit the freedoms of derivative works by forcing them to be copyleft (although with some hacks and exceptions). This limitation means that options for creating a derivative commercial product from copyleft sources are very limited. If you are able to get around the copyleft restriction (like SaaS products developed on GPL and AGPL'd software) then you are able to build a commercial product. But if you want to ship that software to a customer in a licensed product or a piece of hardware, you won't be able to do it without exposing your entire source code to be copyleft. I've heard people argue that copyleft is better because it forces this opening of source on everyone. It's a utopian ideal that I think limits its utility, particularly with regard to derivative works.

yarrel 8y ago
Licenses like MIT don't give "the most possible freedom". I am not more free to modify and repair the software running on an iPhone despite the plethora of BSD and other permissive licenses on it than I am on a laptop running GNU/Linux under the GPL. Likewise if you want to commercially exploit some MIT-licensed software that I have modified and am selling binaries of, you are not more free to commercially exploit that than you would be under the GPL. Copyleft doesn't "force" the "opening" of "source" on anyone. It's a pragmatic measure covering existing software in order to ensure recipients of that software are free to use it as they wish. The GPL doesn't limit utility. You are confusing use value and exchange value. The GPL ensures that software retains its utility for its users. All that said, if you want to give all your software to users under the MIT or Apache licenses knock yourself out.
- SpicyLemonZest 8y ago
  The LGPL works as you're describing; I can license my own code however I want, as long as I let people freely modify all the LGPL libraries it links in. The GPL proper is very deliberately viral.
  - robocat 8y ago
    The LGPL is fine for libraries - but that limits where it can be used. I think the LGPL becomes something just like the GPL for scripting languages because there is no "linking" for many languages. For example an npm package for nodejs can't be made into a "library" - all the source is "compiled" together at runtime.
    - cyphar 8y ago
      If you can replace an LGPL component with a changed version then you don't need to license any additional code under the LGPL. Shared libraries are just one mechanism for doing this.
orangeshark 8y ago
While a license like MIT gives you the most possible freedoms, it also gives the freedom to derivative works to remove all those freedoms. A copyleft license doesn't grant those kind of freedoms so it can try and protect and keep the four essential freedoms[0] in derivatives. I do agree that it is more difficult to commercialize copyleft software. In an ideal world, we would be paying for copyleft software, not giving it away for free. [0]: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
cyphar 8y ago
> Licenses like MIT give the most possible freedom, particularly with how derivative works are commercialized. MIT gives the freedom to make proprietary derivatives. If you excuse the emotive tone, this is a bit like "the freedom to enslave someone". A freedom to do something that impacts another person's freedom is something that we generally don't allow in free societies. The GPL's purpose has always been to guarantee certain freedoms to end-users. If developers cannot restrict end-users freedoms (through proprietary forks) then that is a success, and is a net benefit to society (from the perspective of free software). I get the SaaSS problem, and I think there are many other problems with it aside from licensing. But I don't agree that weaker licensing will solve it (nor do I really think that stronger licensing would solve it).
- joshuamorton 8y ago
  If you're of the opinion that a proprietary for is like slavery, you must also believe that copying is theft, and therefore support increidibly string conventional intellectual property protections (DMCA, media liscences, etc.). Otherwise the same argument applies: no harm becomes anyone due to a proprietary fork, it's copying, not theft. Why worry, let people live and work. The obvious counter to the whole GPL idea is that it thinks the options are "build proprietary" or "build public" when in actuality, the options are often "build proprietary" or "build not at all", and so copyleft liscences leave end users less free to use tools, because the tools that might exist just don't.
  - cyphar 8y ago
    > If you're of the opinion that a proprietary for is like slavery, you must also believe that copying is theft I don't believe proprietary is literally slavery, it was just the most apt analogy I could come up with to show why "the freedom to take away others' freedom" is not seen as a freedom that needs to be protected in other circumstances. I don't see how theft is a good analogy for the freedom to copy. Copying is actually anti-thetical to theft, because theft involves taking away something from someone -- copying something doesn't do that (except in perhaps in more general terms of economics, in some cases). > no harm becomes anyone due to a proprietary fork, it's copying, not theft No harm, until a user is given said software and doesn't have the freedom they'd have with the original version (but they need to use this version because it has certain features, or it's included in an OS which you cannot replace, and so on). I mean, at this point we're no longer talking about permissive licensing. Now we're just talking about straight-up proprietary software which may contain some MIT or BSD code. > the options are often "build proprietary" or "build not at all", so copyleft liscences leave end users less free to use tools, because the tools that might exist just don't. I don't think it makes sense to talk about theoretical tools that might have been written, and how users are not free to use things that don't exist. By this logic, any decision that theoretically might cause less software to exist in the world is against user freedom (and the existence of proprietary software is a good thing for user freedom) -- which is completely unrelated to an actual users experience with the software they do use, and undermines the point of user freedom.

yarrel 8y ago

Licenses like MIT don't give "the most possible freedom". I am not more free to modify and repair the software running on an iPhone despite the plethora of BSD and other permissive licenses on it than I am on a laptop running GNU/Linux under the GPL. Likewise if you want to commercially exploit some MIT-licensed software that I have modified and am selling binaries of, you are not more free to commercially exploit that than you would be under the GPL. Copyleft doesn't "force" the "opening" of "source" on anyone. It's a pragmatic measure covering existing software in order to ensure recipients of that software are free to use it as they wish. The GPL doesn't limit utility. You are confusing use value and exchange value. The GPL ensures that software retains its utility for its users. All that said, if you want to give all your software to users under the MIT or Apache licenses knock yourself out.

SpicyLemonZest 8y ago
The LGPL works as you're describing; I can license my own code however I want, as long as I let people freely modify all the LGPL libraries it links in. The GPL proper is very deliberately viral.
- robocat 8y ago
  The LGPL is fine for libraries - but that limits where it can be used. I think the LGPL becomes something just like the GPL for scripting languages because there is no "linking" for many languages. For example an npm package for nodejs can't be made into a "library" - all the source is "compiled" together at runtime.
  - cyphar 8y ago
    If you can replace an LGPL component with a changed version then you don't need to license any additional code under the LGPL. Shared libraries are just one mechanism for doing this.

orangeshark 8y ago

While a license like MIT gives you the most possible freedoms, it also gives the freedom to derivative works to remove all those freedoms. A copyleft license doesn't grant those kind of freedoms so it can try and protect and keep the four essential freedoms[0] in derivatives. I do agree that it is more difficult to commercialize copyleft software. In an ideal world, we would be paying for copyleft software, not giving it away for free. [0]: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

cyphar 8y ago

> Licenses like MIT give the most possible freedom, particularly with how derivative works are commercialized. MIT gives the freedom to make proprietary derivatives. If you excuse the emotive tone, this is a bit like "the freedom to enslave someone". A freedom to do something that impacts another person's freedom is something that we generally don't allow in free societies. The GPL's purpose has always been to guarantee certain freedoms to end-users. If developers cannot restrict end-users freedoms (through proprietary forks) then that is a success, and is a net benefit to society (from the perspective of free software). I get the SaaSS problem, and I think there are many other problems with it aside from licensing. But I don't agree that weaker licensing will solve it (nor do I really think that stronger licensing would solve it).

joshuamorton 8y ago
If you're of the opinion that a proprietary for is like slavery, you must also believe that copying is theft, and therefore support increidibly string conventional intellectual property protections (DMCA, media liscences, etc.). Otherwise the same argument applies: no harm becomes anyone due to a proprietary fork, it's copying, not theft. Why worry, let people live and work. The obvious counter to the whole GPL idea is that it thinks the options are "build proprietary" or "build public" when in actuality, the options are often "build proprietary" or "build not at all", and so copyleft liscences leave end users less free to use tools, because the tools that might exist just don't.
- cyphar 8y ago
  > If you're of the opinion that a proprietary for is like slavery, you must also believe that copying is theft I don't believe proprietary is literally slavery, it was just the most apt analogy I could come up with to show why "the freedom to take away others' freedom" is not seen as a freedom that needs to be protected in other circumstances. I don't see how theft is a good analogy for the freedom to copy. Copying is actually anti-thetical to theft, because theft involves taking away something from someone -- copying something doesn't do that (except in perhaps in more general terms of economics, in some cases). > no harm becomes anyone due to a proprietary fork, it's copying, not theft No harm, until a user is given said software and doesn't have the freedom they'd have with the original version (but they need to use this version because it has certain features, or it's included in an OS which you cannot replace, and so on). I mean, at this point we're no longer talking about permissive licensing. Now we're just talking about straight-up proprietary software which may contain some MIT or BSD code. > the options are often "build proprietary" or "build not at all", so copyleft liscences leave end users less free to use tools, because the tools that might exist just don't. I don't think it makes sense to talk about theoretical tools that might have been written, and how users are not free to use things that don't exist. By this logic, any decision that theoretically might cause less software to exist in the world is against user freedom (and the existence of proprietary software is a good thing for user freedom) -- which is completely unrelated to an actual users experience with the software they do use, and undermines the point of user freedom.