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> it didn’t protect them from rich freeloaders. You offer a free software package to the world, so that anyone can use it as they see fit. Some guy uses your

> it didn’t protect them from rich freeloaders. You offer a free software package to the world, so that anyone can use it as they see fit. Some guy uses your software package. How exactly has that guy became a freeloader in this story?

mcv 8y ago
Because they have money and don't use it to support the community. Nobody is saying it explicitly, but of course we want small indie people to be able to use stuff for free while rich corporations foot the bill. But it's hard to codify that in a way that doesn't explicitly so, and it's hard to enforce a rule where something is free only if you're small or poor, but it costs money if you're big and rich. And to see the largest corporation in the world use Open Source stuff for free without sharing anything back to the community, well, that doesn't sit right with a lot of people.
- geezerjay 8y ago
  > Because they have money Seriously?
  - toyg 8y ago
    You forgot "and don't use it to support the community". It's not compensation, it's help for the community that made the profit possible, so that it can grow further. There is the law, and there is the spirit of the law. When the law fails to produce the outcomes it was designed for, there is a problem.
    - mcv 8y ago
      Exactly. Things would look a lot different if Amazon was an active contributor of improvements to MongoDB. Plenty of companies are actively involved in the open source projects they use. It often makes a lot of business sense too: it helps the project develop in the direction they need, and by sharing their changes in that direction, they ensure that there's a community that supports the features they need, and from which they can hire experienced developers if they need to. It makes a lot of sense, especially for smaller companies. But Amazon in this case doesn't use MongoDB for something they need, they just want to make it available to their customers. They have no opinion on what their customers need from MongoDB, so they're happy to just tag along for free.
- rjf72 8y ago
  It's not at all hard to have a license where something is free for noncommercial or limited commercial usage, and premium otherwise. This is an extremely typical model for many products today whose licenses you could use as inspiration. See for instance things like Microsoft's Visual Studio. And the nice thing is that contract law is really quite powerful and very much on your side when it comes to enforcement. You don't need Microsoft's legal department to enforce your rights. In my opinion I feel like the real issue is that many in the open source community want to have their cake and eat it to. They want to put ideas out there ostensibly for free and be part of the social communal movement, but when those ideas are actually used to generate value - they want to see the checks roll in. That's just not how it works. Look at products that are funded by donations. There are some exceptions, but the general rule is that they end up grossly underfunded and have to be more and more aggressive with requests for donations just to stay afloat. If people want payment, then demand payment. If you want to give away something for free, don't ever expect to get paid for it.
  - toyg 8y ago
    It's not unreasonable to wish for a middle ground where small actors don't have to pay and big actors do. > a license where something is free for noncommercial or limited commercial usage, and premium otherwise. That's basically what Mongo have switched to. Unfortunately, this broke other bits of community, because playing with licenses is actually not that easy. My point is that, maybe, we need a new license that can reflect the changed times. GPL 3 wanted to be that license, but it doesn't look like it succeeded. The new licenses attempted piecemeal by this or that company (like Mongo) will always fail to cut it, because the are typically not written by people with significant experience and knowledge in this particular field (license-writing). Maybe it's time for interested companies and expert stakeholders (FSF etc) to come together and try to agree on something that could move us all forward.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - helen___keller 8y ago
      Just to be clear, the FSF does not agree with your distinction. The FSF only endorses free software, which means free for all users, commercial or noncommercial ( https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html ): >Proprietary software is another name for nonfree software. In the past we subdivided nonfree software into “semifree software”, which could be modified and redistributed noncommercially, and “proprietary software”, which could not be. But we have dropped that distinction and now use “proprietary software” as synonymous with nonfree software. >The Free Software Foundation follows the rule that we cannot install any proprietary program on our computers except temporarily for the specific purpose of writing a free replacement for that very program. Aside from that, we feel there is no possible excuse for installing a proprietary program.
- BeetleB 8y ago
  >Nobody is saying it explicitly, but of course we want small indie people to be able to use stuff for free while rich corporations foot the bill. Who is "we" here? Certainly not the FSF. Why does OSI approve licenses that clearly don't care about this (e.g. GPL)?
warpech 8y ago
Freeloader on open source software is someone who runs profit by selling it to a major market without contributing back to the project. Why? Because the freeloader increases the demand side for the software (more users translate to more feature requests, more bug reports), without increasing the supply side (resources for people who work it). This puts pressure onto the project that is hard to sustain in the long term and MongoDB took a step to fight it.
- BeetleB 8y ago
  >Freeloader on open source software is someone who runs profit by selling it to a major market without contributing back to the project. Something the GPL allows: It's poor form to use derogatory terms when open source explicitly says "This is OK".

mcv 8y ago

Because they have money and don't use it to support the community. Nobody is saying it explicitly, but of course we want small indie people to be able to use stuff for free while rich corporations foot the bill. But it's hard to codify that in a way that doesn't explicitly so, and it's hard to enforce a rule where something is free only if you're small or poor, but it costs money if you're big and rich. And to see the largest corporation in the world use Open Source stuff for free without sharing anything back to the community, well, that doesn't sit right with a lot of people.

geezerjay 8y ago
> Because they have money Seriously?
- toyg 8y ago
  You forgot "and don't use it to support the community". It's not compensation, it's help for the community that made the profit possible, so that it can grow further. There is the law, and there is the spirit of the law. When the law fails to produce the outcomes it was designed for, there is a problem.
  - mcv 8y ago
    Exactly. Things would look a lot different if Amazon was an active contributor of improvements to MongoDB. Plenty of companies are actively involved in the open source projects they use. It often makes a lot of business sense too: it helps the project develop in the direction they need, and by sharing their changes in that direction, they ensure that there's a community that supports the features they need, and from which they can hire experienced developers if they need to. It makes a lot of sense, especially for smaller companies. But Amazon in this case doesn't use MongoDB for something they need, they just want to make it available to their customers. They have no opinion on what their customers need from MongoDB, so they're happy to just tag along for free.
rjf72 8y ago
It's not at all hard to have a license where something is free for noncommercial or limited commercial usage, and premium otherwise. This is an extremely typical model for many products today whose licenses you could use as inspiration. See for instance things like Microsoft's Visual Studio. And the nice thing is that contract law is really quite powerful and very much on your side when it comes to enforcement. You don't need Microsoft's legal department to enforce your rights. In my opinion I feel like the real issue is that many in the open source community want to have their cake and eat it to. They want to put ideas out there ostensibly for free and be part of the social communal movement, but when those ideas are actually used to generate value - they want to see the checks roll in. That's just not how it works. Look at products that are funded by donations. There are some exceptions, but the general rule is that they end up grossly underfunded and have to be more and more aggressive with requests for donations just to stay afloat. If people want payment, then demand payment. If you want to give away something for free, don't ever expect to get paid for it.
- toyg 8y ago
  It's not unreasonable to wish for a middle ground where small actors don't have to pay and big actors do. > a license where something is free for noncommercial or limited commercial usage, and premium otherwise. That's basically what Mongo have switched to. Unfortunately, this broke other bits of community, because playing with licenses is actually not that easy. My point is that, maybe, we need a new license that can reflect the changed times. GPL 3 wanted to be that license, but it doesn't look like it succeeded. The new licenses attempted piecemeal by this or that company (like Mongo) will always fail to cut it, because the are typically not written by people with significant experience and knowledge in this particular field (license-writing). Maybe it's time for interested companies and expert stakeholders (FSF etc) to come together and try to agree on something that could move us all forward.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - helen___keller 8y ago
    Just to be clear, the FSF does not agree with your distinction. The FSF only endorses free software, which means free for all users, commercial or noncommercial ( https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.en.html ): >Proprietary software is another name for nonfree software. In the past we subdivided nonfree software into “semifree software”, which could be modified and redistributed noncommercially, and “proprietary software”, which could not be. But we have dropped that distinction and now use “proprietary software” as synonymous with nonfree software. >The Free Software Foundation follows the rule that we cannot install any proprietary program on our computers except temporarily for the specific purpose of writing a free replacement for that very program. Aside from that, we feel there is no possible excuse for installing a proprietary program.
BeetleB 8y ago
>Nobody is saying it explicitly, but of course we want small indie people to be able to use stuff for free while rich corporations foot the bill. Who is "we" here? Certainly not the FSF. Why does OSI approve licenses that clearly don't care about this (e.g. GPL)?

warpech 8y ago

Freeloader on open source software is someone who runs profit by selling it to a major market without contributing back to the project. Why? Because the freeloader increases the demand side for the software (more users translate to more feature requests, more bug reports), without increasing the supply side (resources for people who work it). This puts pressure onto the project that is hard to sustain in the long term and MongoDB took a step to fight it.

BeetleB 8y ago
>Freeloader on open source software is someone who runs profit by selling it to a major market without contributing back to the project. Something the GPL allows: It's poor form to use derogatory terms when open source explicitly says "This is OK".