7 ms·

Oracle solely sells proprietary software that users can't own; AWS is proprietary software users can't own; Microsoft's suite is proprietary software users can'

by kick 6y ago

Oracle solely sells proprietary software that users can't own; AWS is proprietary software users can't own; Microsoft's suite is proprietary software users can't own: proprietary software is still causing the most harm, people who defend proprietary software are still acting incredibly stupid about it. Like seriously, "seems how a lot of software engineers* are ultimately paid these data" (by proprietary companies). Google is a proprietary software company, so is Facebook, so is twitter. All companies that relentlessly abuse users. Free software advocates meanwhile have a social network with a few hundred thousand active users, they've got privacy-respecting search engines, and have operating systems that don't spy on you. Proprietary software caused the problems you're ranting about, and your comment reeks of "I work at a company that sells proprietary software and am trying desperately to pin my own sins on people releasing software making the world more free." I'm nowhere near a free software extremist. Many of the people I find admirable release proprietary software. But your comment is ridiculous. Proprietary software is undeniably immoral. * "Engineers" is the wrong term because software engineers don't exist.

cormacrelf 6y ago
I'm not saying they're right, but I think the point was that: - GPL code can be used in a program you do not distribute - Not distributing can be done by running it on a server instead of local machines - Run on server almost always means users don't own data It's missing a step, which is that the GPL code in the world was so important that people NEEDED to use it so much that they were willing to change the way they distribute (or don't) their software... that's a pretty tough claim to make out. What's the evidence for that?
- TaylorAlexander 6y ago
  I don’t understand your bit at the end but I just wanted to mention that the AGPL license was created by the FSF in 2002 to address this network loophole. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affero_General_Public_License https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affero_General_Public_License
  - tsimionescu 6y ago
    And recently made irrelevant by Amazon, who discovered how to defeat its purpose while fully respecting its terms (copy the code without any contributions back to the authors, so you don't get any sharing back; do all of the hard work of deployment logic in code you do not share, ensuring people can't really move to self-hosting if they want to patch the software in any way). The AGPL is one of the strangest licenses to me, coming from a foundation that considers running code you can't read or modify as a violation of your human rights, but also making a license designed for software running on someone else's computer entirely, where you have no possibility of any amount of control.
    - cycloptic 6y ago
      That is not the purpose of the AGPL. If you were trying to use the AGPL as some kind of trojan horse to get access to someone's deployment code, then it should be no surprise that it didn't work. Perhaps your codebase is just hard to contribute to? Is it possible your company has not given enough incentive towards outside developers for them to contribute back? It doesn't even have to be money, it starts with making some mutually beneficial promises and then sticking to them. In general I think it is wrong to try and characterize Amazon's developers as being some kind of strange beasts who have somehow figured out how to use open source better than everyone else. They are the same as every other corporate developer in that they'll always take the easiest and cheapest path to success.
      - tsimionescu 6y ago
        The purpose of the AGPL as envisioned by Stallman is to give you as a user of the network-based software some of the same freedoms that you would have as a user of a local GPL program. This would include the freedom to know what code is running,and the freedom to modify that code and run you own version. The ideal outcome of someone running an AGPL server would be that if you find a bug or if they decide to terminate the service, you can host your own version, so you are not locked in. Unfortunately, it turns out that this freedom is very hard to actually guarantee, as the deployment and monitoring of a server can be as daunting as the actual application logic itself. This is somewhat similar to the case of releasing GPL code without the instructions for building that code, but probably far worse. You seem to have assumed I am personally someone who was bitten by this, which is not the case. I am not even a firm believer in FLOSS values. I am just a by-stander observing how these things are used in practice as opposed to their ideals. By the way, even Mongo's initial use of the AGPL was somewhat counter to the spirit of the thing - they also believed that the deployment part is going to be too hard for many companies, so they hoped that companies would come to them to pay for hosted deployments. If they were using the AGPL according to its spirit, they could have made their own deployment and monitoring scripts public and would have defeated Amazon's lock-in attempts that way (of course they could never do that, their whole purpose was to create that lock-in effect for themselves).
stormdennis 6y ago
My users who pay me for my proprietary software also get support from me. Frequently I see pirated software on their machines. I have no doubt that they'd pay me nothing given the opportunity. That's owner operated small businesses for you. You seem to have some utopian ideal where everyone is a giver but that's not the real world.
- lmm 6y ago
  The world doesn't owe you a business plan. If your business fundamentally relies on your users having no way to fix the bugs in the software you are selling them (which is what it means for software to be proprietary), then that is an immoral business.
  - stormdennis 6y ago
    Assuming you write open source software, how do you persuade people to pay for it?
    - fsflover 6y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_models_for_open-source_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_models_for_open-sourc...
      - stormdennis 6y ago
        I don't think any of those models would work in the small business sector that I provide niche software for. The big open source projects supported by the likes of Facebook etc work because writing software is something Facebook do as an aid to their business rather than it being their business per se. So contributing to open source software is purely a way of reducing their own costs and maybe getting some kudos. If your fundamental business is writing software that you need to sell to people then making it open source makes as much sense as a corner shop operating on an honour system.
      - rayiner 6y ago
easytiger 6y ago
> Proprietary software is undeniably immoral. One of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard. Also a complete failure to understand the philosophy behind the success of FLOSS. Generic problems that are widely shared with limited variations in functional need are successful FLOSS solutions or platforms. Specific problems that are more nuanced and meet niche requirements are what works best in commercial software. It philosophically makes no sense to call something immoral because a subset of entities are happy to pay for it to achieve their goals. Symbiotically most FLOSS is supported by these solutions which are often based on them.
- tyrion 6y ago
  > It philosophically makes no sense to call something immoral because a subset of entities are happy to pay for it to achieve their goals. Paying or not paying has nothing to do with the immorality of proprietary software. You can pay for software even if it is not proprietary. I suggest you to watch any talk by Richard Stallman, if you want to understand why some people think proprietary software to be immoral. You might not agree, but for sure it is not something that "philosophically makes no sense".
  - easytiger 6y ago
    > I suggest you to watch any talk by Richard Stallman, if you want to understand why some people think proprietary software to be immoral. You might not agree, but for sure it is not something that "philosophically makes no sense". Yea, I've met Stallman, been to plenty of his talks and had this same discussion for the last 15-20 years. Thanks for the advice though. > immorality of proprietary software. I don't believe it is. Plenty of others accept a perfectly valid dual magisteria as I proposed. Even in the commonly cited logically incongruous value systems that redefine the baseline of ethics I think that view can be accommodated. But the blanket statement that "proprietary software is immoral" is fundamentally broken
  - stormdennis 6y ago
    >You can pay for software even if it is not proprietary You can, hardly anyone does though. Donate buttons make a pittance. Nearly all the times I've given one I get back an almost embarrassingly grateful response because A. the amount I give is always a small fraction of the value I've gained and B. it's obviously a rare event for the receiver.
asdkljas 6y ago
Getting paid for working is immoral too in your own logic.
- galactus 6y ago
  Why? That's a total non sequitor. Free Software is not about being paid or not, its about how software is distributed.
pjmlp 6y ago
And that is why Desktop Linux will never happen, too much immoral software is required for it to ever happen. Software engineers not only do exist on my home country, it is a professional title protected by law, not something that one calls themselves after a six week bootcamp.
- welterde 6y ago
  I don't see how those two are connected in any way. There exists plenty of proprietary software for linux as well - it's not like there is anything on the linux desktop platform that prevents this from existing?
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    The fight back from the community that makes such companies loose interest in GNU/Linux, specially the attack of FOSS clones.
    - welterde 6y ago
      This doesn't make much sense.. the FOSS clones also exist on Windows and OSX. And lots of Windows software isn't available on OSX either (and vice versa).. How are you gonna blame that on the FOSS community?
      - pjmlp 6y ago
        Except that those communities are willing to pay for software. Announce any "evil proprietary" software in places like HN, which should be about doing business to start with, and the top comments happen to be about forking, making FOSS clones and not paying a dime to evil overloards. Qt being discussed here is a very good example, tons of comments on how not to pay Qt, switch to alternatives, and how much evil they are for wanting remuneration for their work. Naturally companies then turn into the Apple, Google and Microsoft customer communities instead.
        6y ago
jack_h 6y ago
> Proprietary software is undeniably immoral. At this point no discussion can be had as it depends on a persons own beliefs which are rarely changed by fact or argument. This also skips over any nuance concerning the benefits, costs, and externalities of a particular subject.
thePunisher 6y ago
I agree somewhat. But you have to realize that developing and maintaining software is incredibly expensive and time consuming. I, for example, hate Android for spying on me all the time, but I realize that developing such a complicated operating system takes a lot of effort and Google isn't doing this out of altruism.
tsimionescu 6y ago
Google and Microsoft are some of the biggest contributors to free software in the world. Free software is mostly a way for huge companies to cooperate on IP, at this moment, or roughly equivalent to shareware for smaller companies who want to give you a taste of the software before you have to commit to buying. There are definitely many exceptions, such as Mozilla and GNU and others, but some of the highest profile software fall in either the first category (Linux, Clang, Kubernetes, Docker, MySQL, OpenJDK, PostgreSQL) or the second (old AGPL MongoDB, ElasticSearch, CentOS).

by kick 6y ago

cormacrelf 6y ago

I'm not saying they're right, but I think the point was that: - GPL code can be used in a program you do not distribute - Not distributing can be done by running it on a server instead of local machines - Run on server almost always means users don't own data It's missing a step, which is that the GPL code in the world was so important that people NEEDED to use it so much that they were willing to change the way they distribute (or don't) their software... that's a pretty tough claim to make out. What's the evidence for that?

TaylorAlexander 6y ago
I don’t understand your bit at the end but I just wanted to mention that the AGPL license was created by the FSF in 2002 to address this network loophole. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affero_General_Public_License https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affero_General_Public_License
- tsimionescu 6y ago
  And recently made irrelevant by Amazon, who discovered how to defeat its purpose while fully respecting its terms (copy the code without any contributions back to the authors, so you don't get any sharing back; do all of the hard work of deployment logic in code you do not share, ensuring people can't really move to self-hosting if they want to patch the software in any way). The AGPL is one of the strangest licenses to me, coming from a foundation that considers running code you can't read or modify as a violation of your human rights, but also making a license designed for software running on someone else's computer entirely, where you have no possibility of any amount of control.
  - cycloptic 6y ago
    That is not the purpose of the AGPL. If you were trying to use the AGPL as some kind of trojan horse to get access to someone's deployment code, then it should be no surprise that it didn't work. Perhaps your codebase is just hard to contribute to? Is it possible your company has not given enough incentive towards outside developers for them to contribute back? It doesn't even have to be money, it starts with making some mutually beneficial promises and then sticking to them. In general I think it is wrong to try and characterize Amazon's developers as being some kind of strange beasts who have somehow figured out how to use open source better than everyone else. They are the same as every other corporate developer in that they'll always take the easiest and cheapest path to success.
    - tsimionescu 6y ago
      The purpose of the AGPL as envisioned by Stallman is to give you as a user of the network-based software some of the same freedoms that you would have as a user of a local GPL program. This would include the freedom to know what code is running,and the freedom to modify that code and run you own version. The ideal outcome of someone running an AGPL server would be that if you find a bug or if they decide to terminate the service, you can host your own version, so you are not locked in. Unfortunately, it turns out that this freedom is very hard to actually guarantee, as the deployment and monitoring of a server can be as daunting as the actual application logic itself. This is somewhat similar to the case of releasing GPL code without the instructions for building that code, but probably far worse. You seem to have assumed I am personally someone who was bitten by this, which is not the case. I am not even a firm believer in FLOSS values. I am just a by-stander observing how these things are used in practice as opposed to their ideals. By the way, even Mongo's initial use of the AGPL was somewhat counter to the spirit of the thing - they also believed that the deployment part is going to be too hard for many companies, so they hoped that companies would come to them to pay for hosted deployments. If they were using the AGPL according to its spirit, they could have made their own deployment and monitoring scripts public and would have defeated Amazon's lock-in attempts that way (of course they could never do that, their whole purpose was to create that lock-in effect for themselves).

stormdennis 6y ago

My users who pay me for my proprietary software also get support from me. Frequently I see pirated software on their machines. I have no doubt that they'd pay me nothing given the opportunity. That's owner operated small businesses for you. You seem to have some utopian ideal where everyone is a giver but that's not the real world.

lmm 6y ago
The world doesn't owe you a business plan. If your business fundamentally relies on your users having no way to fix the bugs in the software you are selling them (which is what it means for software to be proprietary), then that is an immoral business.
- stormdennis 6y ago
  Assuming you write open source software, how do you persuade people to pay for it?
  - fsflover 6y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_models_for_open-source_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_models_for_open-sourc...
    - stormdennis 6y ago
      I don't think any of those models would work in the small business sector that I provide niche software for. The big open source projects supported by the likes of Facebook etc work because writing software is something Facebook do as an aid to their business rather than it being their business per se. So contributing to open source software is purely a way of reducing their own costs and maybe getting some kudos. If your fundamental business is writing software that you need to sell to people then making it open source makes as much sense as a corner shop operating on an honour system.
    - rayiner 6y ago

easytiger 6y ago

> Proprietary software is undeniably immoral. One of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard. Also a complete failure to understand the philosophy behind the success of FLOSS. Generic problems that are widely shared with limited variations in functional need are successful FLOSS solutions or platforms. Specific problems that are more nuanced and meet niche requirements are what works best in commercial software. It philosophically makes no sense to call something immoral because a subset of entities are happy to pay for it to achieve their goals. Symbiotically most FLOSS is supported by these solutions which are often based on them.

tyrion 6y ago
> It philosophically makes no sense to call something immoral because a subset of entities are happy to pay for it to achieve their goals. Paying or not paying has nothing to do with the immorality of proprietary software. You can pay for software even if it is not proprietary. I suggest you to watch any talk by Richard Stallman, if you want to understand why some people think proprietary software to be immoral. You might not agree, but for sure it is not something that "philosophically makes no sense".
- easytiger 6y ago
  > I suggest you to watch any talk by Richard Stallman, if you want to understand why some people think proprietary software to be immoral. You might not agree, but for sure it is not something that "philosophically makes no sense". Yea, I've met Stallman, been to plenty of his talks and had this same discussion for the last 15-20 years. Thanks for the advice though. > immorality of proprietary software. I don't believe it is. Plenty of others accept a perfectly valid dual magisteria as I proposed. Even in the commonly cited logically incongruous value systems that redefine the baseline of ethics I think that view can be accommodated. But the blanket statement that "proprietary software is immoral" is fundamentally broken
- stormdennis 6y ago
  >You can pay for software even if it is not proprietary You can, hardly anyone does though. Donate buttons make a pittance. Nearly all the times I've given one I get back an almost embarrassingly grateful response because A. the amount I give is always a small fraction of the value I've gained and B. it's obviously a rare event for the receiver.

asdkljas 6y ago

Getting paid for working is immoral too in your own logic.

galactus 6y ago
Why? That's a total non sequitor. Free Software is not about being paid or not, its about how software is distributed.

pjmlp 6y ago

And that is why Desktop Linux will never happen, too much immoral software is required for it to ever happen. Software engineers not only do exist on my home country, it is a professional title protected by law, not something that one calls themselves after a six week bootcamp.

welterde 6y ago
I don't see how those two are connected in any way. There exists plenty of proprietary software for linux as well - it's not like there is anything on the linux desktop platform that prevents this from existing?
- pjmlp 6y ago
  The fight back from the community that makes such companies loose interest in GNU/Linux, specially the attack of FOSS clones.
  - welterde 6y ago
    This doesn't make much sense.. the FOSS clones also exist on Windows and OSX. And lots of Windows software isn't available on OSX either (and vice versa).. How are you gonna blame that on the FOSS community?
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      Except that those communities are willing to pay for software. Announce any "evil proprietary" software in places like HN, which should be about doing business to start with, and the top comments happen to be about forking, making FOSS clones and not paying a dime to evil overloards. Qt being discussed here is a very good example, tons of comments on how not to pay Qt, switch to alternatives, and how much evil they are for wanting remuneration for their work. Naturally companies then turn into the Apple, Google and Microsoft customer communities instead.
      - 6y ago

jack_h 6y ago

> Proprietary software is undeniably immoral. At this point no discussion can be had as it depends on a persons own beliefs which are rarely changed by fact or argument. This also skips over any nuance concerning the benefits, costs, and externalities of a particular subject.

thePunisher 6y ago

I agree somewhat. But you have to realize that developing and maintaining software is incredibly expensive and time consuming. I, for example, hate Android for spying on me all the time, but I realize that developing such a complicated operating system takes a lot of effort and Google isn't doing this out of altruism.

tsimionescu 6y ago

Google and Microsoft are some of the biggest contributors to free software in the world. Free software is mostly a way for huge companies to cooperate on IP, at this moment, or roughly equivalent to shareware for smaller companies who want to give you a taste of the software before you have to commit to buying. There are definitely many exceptions, such as Mozilla and GNU and others, but some of the highest profile software fall in either the first category (Linux, Clang, Kubernetes, Docker, MySQL, OpenJDK, PostgreSQL) or the second (old AGPL MongoDB, ElasticSearch, CentOS).