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I know of several situations where entrepreneurs in europe put substantial money on the table in projects which were funded by grants from the government. It wo

by b20000 5y ago

I know of several situations where entrepreneurs in europe put substantial money on the table in projects which were funded by grants from the government. It would be really bad for entrepreneurship in europe if it would be required to make software open source the moment some grant money is involved. Let's imagine you spend 500K of your savings, and the government gives you a 50K grant. Now you need to open source your software, and your competitors can run off with your 500K investment! the grant money offsets the insanely high taxes and should be no strings attached to stimulate entrepreneurship.

Forgeties79 5y ago
I can’t tell based on the information on the site, but there may be some nuance to the threshold where this becomes a requirement. I imagine it will not be an all or nothing situation, but I am not sure ultimately. Also, if there was a bunch of public code available because of grant funding, that means - in theory - many people might not have to invest their own money (or quite as much) because there is more out there they can use due to this law. Ultimately it boils down to the language of the law and the I social scenario.
- b20000 5y ago
  ah yes, in good european fashion, there will be all kinds of complicated and time consuming rules and processes. that is what the countries in the EU and the commission do best. make it nearly impossible for small bootstrapped companies to be competitive and get their shit done. and if I as an entrepreneur put money into something, I expect to own it. even if a grant was involved. after all, I already paid taxes to make those grants possible in the first place.
  - Forgeties79 5y ago
    Frankly it sounds like you're prematurely grinding your axe. We don't have enough details to really form an opinion like that. As a fellow entrepreneur I am excited at the idea of more open collaboration/resources for people writing code. Hell imagine a world without GitHub. I'm curious to see the nitty gritty here myself.
    - b20000 5y ago
      the reason why i react like this is that i have seen a proposal like what i describe a few years ago in a country in europe.
Rexxar 5y ago
This doesn't require open source for everything that receive a grant. The text of the open letter is “Implement legislation requiring that publicly financed software developed for the public sector be made publicly available under a Free and Open Source Software licence.” It's more like if the tax office build a software to compute taxes, you can use it to compute your taxes, add a simplified a gui for basic users or incorporate it in your ERP.
- b20000 5y ago
  i understand, but the next step is what i wrote.

by b20000 5y ago

Forgeties79 5y ago

I can’t tell based on the information on the site, but there may be some nuance to the threshold where this becomes a requirement. I imagine it will not be an all or nothing situation, but I am not sure ultimately. Also, if there was a bunch of public code available because of grant funding, that means - in theory - many people might not have to invest their own money (or quite as much) because there is more out there they can use due to this law. Ultimately it boils down to the language of the law and the I social scenario.

b20000 5y ago
ah yes, in good european fashion, there will be all kinds of complicated and time consuming rules and processes. that is what the countries in the EU and the commission do best. make it nearly impossible for small bootstrapped companies to be competitive and get their shit done. and if I as an entrepreneur put money into something, I expect to own it. even if a grant was involved. after all, I already paid taxes to make those grants possible in the first place.
- Forgeties79 5y ago
  Frankly it sounds like you're prematurely grinding your axe. We don't have enough details to really form an opinion like that. As a fellow entrepreneur I am excited at the idea of more open collaboration/resources for people writing code. Hell imagine a world without GitHub. I'm curious to see the nitty gritty here myself.
  - b20000 5y ago
    the reason why i react like this is that i have seen a proposal like what i describe a few years ago in a country in europe.

Rexxar 5y ago

This doesn't require open source for everything that receive a grant. The text of the open letter is “Implement legislation requiring that publicly financed software developed for the public sector be made publicly available under a Free and Open Source Software licence.” It's more like if the tax office build a software to compute taxes, you can use it to compute your taxes, add a simplified a gui for basic users or incorporate it in your ERP.

b20000 5y ago
i understand, but the next step is what i wrote.