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That part seemed like their own spin on the decision, to me. I agree with you: they shouldn’t control the term.

busterarm 5y ago
They determined the guidelines of what constitutes being Open Source. Absolutely they should control the term. Just look at all of the companies out there with "source-available" licenses masquerading as Open Source. Neo4j themselves here uses "Open Source" in all of their marketing materials and should be just as guilty as this fork of false advertising.
- phendrenad2 5y ago
  OSI doesn't need to control what licenses qualify as "open source" for neo4j to be sued for false advertising.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- hn_version_0023 5y ago
  Hard disagreement from me. The courts get to decide, not some random organization that clearly has an interest in promoting themselves.
  - prepend 5y ago
    OSI is not random and, while not perfect, are a pretty good steward of the concept. They’re a non-profit with a clear goal and broad membership. Not sure who else would be better.
- kube-system 5y ago
  1. “Open source” as a term predates the OSI 2. There are organizations other than OSI which have their own opinions on what they consider a “valid” open source license. 3. Some licenses are functionally open source but not approved by OSI because of their limited use. Furthermore, public domain works aren’t licensed at all. 4. OSI has no trademark on “open source”. OSI’s opinion is only as good as other people agree with it.
  - prepend 5y ago
    > There are organizations other than OSI which have their own opinions on what they consider a “valid” open source license. What other organizations have credible claims? I’ve only heard of companies that have created non-open licenses and are trying to redefine the term (eg, open core, etc)
    - kube-system 5y ago
      The organizations that you think are credible, are credible. The term is not legally protected. Personally, when Subway calls their sandwiches "good", I think they are actually making non-good sandwiches, and they're trying to redefine the term. Both "good" and "open source" are descriptive terms that are subjective. The OSI recognizes this themselves: > "Open Source" is not and cannot become a trademark. > there is virtually no chance that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office would register the mark "open source"; the mark is too descriptive https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.php https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.p...
      - prepend 5y ago
        > The organizations that you think are credible, are credible. The term is not legally protected. Credible to me, but I don’t get to decide what’s credible. We live in a society, etc etc. that’s why I asked. Subway can’t call the cold cut combo sandwich a fried chicken sandwich even though I think they are a credible organization. They would be wrong. If there’s some other org that is credible and is credible using open source, I’d like to know. Just like Subway would not be credible if they claimed their non-organic sandwich was organic. The examples I’m familiar with are companies trying to benefit from open source as a positive marketing term and I don’t think are credible.
        kube-system 5y ago
        The reasons people can’t sell a product with a blatantly wrong label is because it is fraudulent. However, when words gain widespread use to mean something else, then people can certainly use them that way. OSI might vehemently argue against people using “open source” to describe source available works, but… people do it. Someone does it in every comment section discussing this topic. People post their source code on GitHub without a license and call it open source. For several decades before the OSI was founded, the phrase “open source intelligence” was used to describe works that were public available, not those that were licensed in any particular way. It is, factually, not uncommon for people to use it differently than the OSI prescribes. The fact that people have a disagreement on the use of the term is exactly why people have leeway in the use of the term. To use food as an example, there are a ton of foods that are culinarily labeled “incorrectly”. The reason why they are legal to sell is because people used the words that way. If you want to use “fried” as an example: consider refried beans. They are often not even fried once! https://wearenotfoodies.com/culinary-misnomers-or-danish-pastries-are-not-danish/ https://wearenotfoodies.com/culinary-misnomers-or-danish-pas... “Organic” is a different story, it’s regulated in many places.
kabdib 5y ago
I disagree with some of their requirements for open source licenses, and will continue to call the code that I have open sourced over the years as "open source" despite them. Their attempt to occupy the term is a little offensive. Correction: They came up with the name, so it's theirs. I'll leave my public embarrassment here.
- busterarm 5y ago
  They occupy the term because they literally coined it, if you know your history.[1] OS came to us from the OSD, written by the OSI and after hot debate in the early days of what should and shouldn't be Free Software. It was specifically a reaction to the FSF and a rejection of that group's activism, which didn't fit what they were trying to do. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software (specifically the first section starting with End of the 90s)
  - kabdib 5y ago
    You are correct. I will retract my statement.
  - CogitoCogito 5y ago
    They didn’t coin the term: https://lunduke.substack.com/p/who-really-coined-the-term-open-source?s=r https://lunduke.substack.com/p/who-really-coined-the-term-op...
    - busterarm 5y ago
      From the perspective of popularizing and bringing it into mainstream usage, they surely did. Digging further is for extreme nitpickers. Gutenberg didn't "invent" the printing press either. Movable type dates back to 11th century China if you really want accurate attribution. Except for the purposes of the history of the modern world, Gutenberg's invention is most relevant/accurate. My internet usage started on university systems back in the 80s, along with BBS and usenet and I had never heard the term Open Source even once until 1998.

They determined the guidelines of what constitutes being Open Source. Absolutely they should control the term. Just look at all of the companies out there with "source-available" licenses masquerading as Open Source. Neo4j themselves here uses "Open Source" in all of their marketing materials and should be just as guilty as this fork of false advertising.

phendrenad2 5y ago
OSI doesn't need to control what licenses qualify as "open source" for neo4j to be sued for false advertising.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
hn_version_0023 5y ago
Hard disagreement from me. The courts get to decide, not some random organization that clearly has an interest in promoting themselves.
- prepend 5y ago
  OSI is not random and, while not perfect, are a pretty good steward of the concept. They’re a non-profit with a clear goal and broad membership. Not sure who else would be better.
kube-system 5y ago
1. “Open source” as a term predates the OSI 2. There are organizations other than OSI which have their own opinions on what they consider a “valid” open source license. 3. Some licenses are functionally open source but not approved by OSI because of their limited use. Furthermore, public domain works aren’t licensed at all. 4. OSI has no trademark on “open source”. OSI’s opinion is only as good as other people agree with it.
- prepend 5y ago
  > There are organizations other than OSI which have their own opinions on what they consider a “valid” open source license. What other organizations have credible claims? I’ve only heard of companies that have created non-open licenses and are trying to redefine the term (eg, open core, etc)
  - kube-system 5y ago
    The organizations that you think are credible, are credible. The term is not legally protected. Personally, when Subway calls their sandwiches "good", I think they are actually making non-good sandwiches, and they're trying to redefine the term. Both "good" and "open source" are descriptive terms that are subjective. The OSI recognizes this themselves: > "Open Source" is not and cannot become a trademark. > there is virtually no chance that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office would register the mark "open source"; the mark is too descriptive https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.php https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.p...
    - prepend 5y ago
      > The organizations that you think are credible, are credible. The term is not legally protected. Credible to me, but I don’t get to decide what’s credible. We live in a society, etc etc. that’s why I asked. Subway can’t call the cold cut combo sandwich a fried chicken sandwich even though I think they are a credible organization. They would be wrong. If there’s some other org that is credible and is credible using open source, I’d like to know. Just like Subway would not be credible if they claimed their non-organic sandwich was organic. The examples I’m familiar with are companies trying to benefit from open source as a positive marketing term and I don’t think are credible.
      - kube-system 5y ago
        The reasons people can’t sell a product with a blatantly wrong label is because it is fraudulent. However, when words gain widespread use to mean something else, then people can certainly use them that way. OSI might vehemently argue against people using “open source” to describe source available works, but… people do it. Someone does it in every comment section discussing this topic. People post their source code on GitHub without a license and call it open source. For several decades before the OSI was founded, the phrase “open source intelligence” was used to describe works that were public available, not those that were licensed in any particular way. It is, factually, not uncommon for people to use it differently than the OSI prescribes. The fact that people have a disagreement on the use of the term is exactly why people have leeway in the use of the term. To use food as an example, there are a ton of foods that are culinarily labeled “incorrectly”. The reason why they are legal to sell is because people used the words that way. If you want to use “fried” as an example: consider refried beans. They are often not even fried once! https://wearenotfoodies.com/culinary-misnomers-or-danish-pastries-are-not-danish/ https://wearenotfoodies.com/culinary-misnomers-or-danish-pas... “Organic” is a different story, it’s regulated in many places.

kabdib 5y ago

I disagree with some of their requirements for open source licenses, and will continue to call the code that I have open sourced over the years as "open source" despite them. Their attempt to occupy the term is a little offensive. Correction: They came up with the name, so it's theirs. I'll leave my public embarrassment here.

busterarm 5y ago
They occupy the term because they literally coined it, if you know your history.[1] OS came to us from the OSD, written by the OSI and after hot debate in the early days of what should and shouldn't be Free Software. It was specifically a reaction to the FSF and a rejection of that group's activism, which didn't fit what they were trying to do. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software (specifically the first section starting with End of the 90s)
- kabdib 5y ago
  You are correct. I will retract my statement.
- CogitoCogito 5y ago
  They didn’t coin the term: https://lunduke.substack.com/p/who-really-coined-the-term-open-source?s=r https://lunduke.substack.com/p/who-really-coined-the-term-op...
  - busterarm 5y ago
    From the perspective of popularizing and bringing it into mainstream usage, they surely did. Digging further is for extreme nitpickers. Gutenberg didn't "invent" the printing press either. Movable type dates back to 11th century China if you really want accurate attribution. Except for the purposes of the history of the modern world, Gutenberg's invention is most relevant/accurate. My internet usage started on university systems back in the 80s, along with BBS and usenet and I had never heard the term Open Source even once until 1998.