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I know this might be unpopular with OSS idealists, but I wonder if it might be time for a new license, or indeed if there are already (small 'o') open source li

I know this might be unpopular with OSS idealists, but I wonder if it might be time for a new license, or indeed if there are already (small 'o') open source licenses that would help with this sort of things. What I'm thinking of is a license almost identical to the MIT and/or Apache 2.0 license, but with a clause that prohibits mega-corps from wholesale rebranding and using your code. I have a few OSS projects myself, and help maintain a larger one, and I love the spirit of OSS, so I'm a little split on this one. But I don't really think Microsoft's actions here are truely in the spirit of OSS. Yes, the license allows it, but is it aligned with the OSS ethos? Is it "right"?

nojs 6y ago
Wouldn’t that be GPL?
- GordonS 6y ago
  No, that puts restrictions on everyone, which are so harsh many organisations (even startups) wouldn't touch GPL'd code with a bargepole. I was thinking more along the ideas of adding restrictions only for corporations of a certain size, or perhaps only if they intend to use it in a certain way - kind of like the licenses that exclude large cloud operators like AWS from using your work without contributing back.
- huhtenberg 6y ago
  No, of course not. But the viral nature of GPL and the notion of "derived works" may be of some use here.
Dayshine 6y ago
> with a clause that prohibits mega-corps from wholesale rebranding and using your code That didn't happen in this case. They took the ideas, and took his knowledge by leading him on and interviewing him for an acqui-hire. They didn't take his code (in C#) and rewrite it in to C++.
andrew_ 6y ago
Exactly why I started relicensing all of my projects under MPL-2.0. The decision followed an attempt by a webpack team member to wholesale copy a project of mine into the project without attribution or licensing (which is a separate issue). Decided then and there that I needed something more restrictive that still allowed for collaboration.

nojs 6y ago

Wouldn’t that be GPL?

GordonS 6y ago
No, that puts restrictions on everyone, which are so harsh many organisations (even startups) wouldn't touch GPL'd code with a bargepole. I was thinking more along the ideas of adding restrictions only for corporations of a certain size, or perhaps only if they intend to use it in a certain way - kind of like the licenses that exclude large cloud operators like AWS from using your work without contributing back.
huhtenberg 6y ago
No, of course not. But the viral nature of GPL and the notion of "derived works" may be of some use here.

Dayshine 6y ago

> with a clause that prohibits mega-corps from wholesale rebranding and using your code That didn't happen in this case. They took the ideas, and took his knowledge by leading him on and interviewing him for an acqui-hire. They didn't take his code (in C#) and rewrite it in to C++.

andrew_ 6y ago

Exactly why I started relicensing all of my projects under MPL-2.0. The decision followed an attempt by a webpack team member to wholesale copy a project of mine into the project without attribution or licensing (which is a separate issue). Decided then and there that I needed something more restrictive that still allowed for collaboration.