7 ms·

It's exactly that. It gives us a little chance to fight against the Giants. In 5 years the initial version becomes Apache 2.0 then the next version and so on a

It's exactly that. It gives us a little chance to fight against the Giants. In 5 years the initial version becomes Apache 2.0 then the next version and so on and so forth. CockroachDB uses similar license. MariaDB uses that, Redpanda Data and others. You are right that acronym is confusing - it's not Boost license, it's Business License. Every major technological startup turned away from BSD/Apache 2.0 licenses due to inability to compete with cloud providers without technological edge.

JoshTriplett 4y ago
I certainly don't think you should pick a permissive license, and find yourself under competition from companies running your own software. However, I'm sad that instead of going with an Open Source license that protects against that, you're using a proprietary license. That alone is a nonstarter for many users, not because they want to compete with you but because they want to protect themselves and make sure they have a firm foundation to build on. Much of the software you're citing as examples moved from Open Source to proprietary, harming their users in the process, and causing many users to seek alternatives.
- jitl 4y ago
  Do you think AGPL offers such protection? I think even AGPL is fine for Amazon et al, they are happy to dump the code somewhere while selling a managed service with enough wrapper layers. But AGPL is toxic also for self-hosters who aren’t trying to build a managed hosting service, since it applies equally against all parties.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - rglullis 4y ago
    AGPL does not require source distribution of your application, unless the AGPL code is accessed directly by your users. So, if this were AGPL and I have an closed webservice that uses this, it is in the clear.
    - jitl 4y ago
      But then Amazon is free to host this as a paid service and take all the money.
      - rglullis 4y ago
        Redis is doing just fine, PostgreSQL is doing just fine. They are both real open source. The performance improvements are not worth the legal/compliance overhead of adding non-FOSS to my stack. Much less so if the performance improvements are due just to some optimization choice in the underlying system. In the next 5 years, it will be easier to have Redis adding the io_ring optimizations than for this new project to become uniquely better.
        jitl 4y ago
        Now I’m curious where you work and how compliance requires FOSS!
        rglullis 4y ago
        You misunderstood. What I am saying is that is precisely because I am working on projects of different sizes and potentially with different customers, I do not want to have the burden of having to check if the projects have specific compliance requirements. I have a SaaS [0], my own (AGPL, by the way) open source project [1] and also work have the occasional contract job. It's much easier to say "just use Redis because it is FOSS and it gets the job done" across the board then to try to special-case the tools based on licensing requirements. [0]: https://communick.com https://communick.com [1]: https://hub20.io https://hub20.io
      - adastra22 4y ago
        And? AGPL is not a non-commercial license. If Amazon wanted to provide such a service, they would certainly be permitted to. As long as they provided any changes they make to the the AGPL source code. The AGPL would not "infect" their hosting infrastructure.
  - goodpoint 4y ago
    > AGPL is toxic also for self-hosters who aren’t trying to build a managed hosting service Absolutely not. First of all, you can always use any software under AGPL as released without any limitation. Secondly, if you were to make changes and release them you can still run it any way you want. Thirdly, if you are making changes for internal use, and for some reasons your really want to keep them secret, you can STILL run the database to your heart's contents as long as you don't provide it as a service to the public. AGPL is much more permissive than people think. It's just providing a degree of protection to developers and and users from patent trolls and other uncooperative entities.
    - jitl 4y ago
      Exactly - the grandparent is asking “can a true copy left / Free Software license protect a young startup from Amazon reselling their software”, and my assertion is no, it cant.
      - josephcsible 4y ago
        Can you give an example of an AGPL product being resold by Amazon or someone like them?
        adastra22 4y ago
        Mastodon is AGPL and there are various cloud hosting providers. There really aren't that many popular AGPL server software to start with though, so it's an unfairly biased question.
        jitl 4y ago
        MongoDB is the most famous example to transition from AGPL to a closed license. MongoDB was AGPL until October 16, 2018. Since October 16, 2018, it uses Server Side Public License (SSPL), which they authored. From their FAQ: > The market is quickly moving to consume most software as a service. This is a time of incredible opportunity for open source projects, with the potential to foster a new wave of great open source server side software. The reality, however, is that once an open source project becomes interesting, it is too easy for large cloud vendors to capture all the value but contribute nothing back to the community. HN discussion from 2018: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18229452 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18229452 FAQ: https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license/faq https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license... Today, MongoDB is an AWS partner: https://aws.amazon.com/quickstart/architecture/mongodb/ https://aws.amazon.com/quickstart/architecture/mongodb/ The most recent notable example of open-source software going closed because of Amazon specifically is Elasticsearch, which switched from Apache to SSPL. The announcement blog post was titled "Amazon: NOT OK - why we had to change Elastic licensing". HN discussion from 2021: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25833781 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25833781 FAQ: https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing
- romange 4y ago
  We do not choose AGPL so we would not harm our users. Lets not confuse the means and the goal here. AGPL is copyleft and restricting. Fair users refuse using it. OSI does not help technological companies to find a fair solution and force us to go outside of "OSS".
  - riquito 4y ago
    I don't want to enter in the merit of your company's choice, it's definitely up to you what license to use, but I'm confused about that statement around AGPL. How would AGPL harm users?
    - bpicolo 4y ago
      The lawyers often ban AGPL at tech cos
      - JoshTriplett 4y ago
        Which means they may pay for an alternative to the AGPL.
        blackoil 4y ago
        More likely they'll ignore the s/w. Huge amount of talent is working in such companies. Using AGPL will practically exclude them from interacting with the s/w. Also, smaller companies like to play safe. If FAANG with their million lawyers aren't touching it, why should I take the risk.
        true_religion 4y ago
        Because unlike FAANG you don’t have millions of engineers to create the software from scratch. Companies pay for databases (Oracle, Gemstone, MsSQL, anything at Amazon). Almost all the risks (price changes, maintenance costs, etc.) can be managed adequately via a long term enterprise contract.
      - 4y ago
benatkin 4y ago
> Every major technological startup turned away from BSD/Apache 2.0 licenses due to inability to compete with cloud providers without technological edge. No, there are plenty that still use permissive licenses. GitLab uses MIT and a custom license for EE: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/licensing.html https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/licensing.html Deno uses an MIT license and has some secret sauce that is currently just in hosted services AFAIK: https://github.com/denoland/deno/blob/main/LICENSE.md https://github.com/denoland/deno/blob/main/LICENSE.md PlanetScale has hosted services and an open source tool called Vitess which is Apache licensed: https://planetscale.com/ https://planetscale.com/ https://github.com/vitessio/vitess https://github.com/vitessio/vitess Finally Redis has a BSD licensed core, a source available license for additional modules, and a closed source license for enterprise. https://redis.com/legal/licenses/ https://redis.com/legal/licenses/
- romange 4y ago
  Redis has a BSD license because it was written by antirez who did not intend to make it a commercial enterprise. Today its too late to change and wont help Redis Inc to protect their ip. We looked at elastic, mongodb, cocroach labs, mariadb, redpanda, atlassian, grafana labs , scylladb. The last two are agpl but the motivation is the same: to protect themselves.
stinkiephish 4y ago
Bravo for picking the BSL and writing your license the way you have. It shows maturity in that you and your company know what they are doing and intend to be there for the long haul.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
PeterZaitsev 4y ago
MariaDB is GPL there are some enterprise components which are BSL. Was excited to see the project but now seeing it is not Open Source it means 1/10th of value

JoshTriplett 4y ago

I certainly don't think you should pick a permissive license, and find yourself under competition from companies running your own software. However, I'm sad that instead of going with an Open Source license that protects against that, you're using a proprietary license. That alone is a nonstarter for many users, not because they want to compete with you but because they want to protect themselves and make sure they have a firm foundation to build on. Much of the software you're citing as examples moved from Open Source to proprietary, harming their users in the process, and causing many users to seek alternatives.

jitl 4y ago
Do you think AGPL offers such protection? I think even AGPL is fine for Amazon et al, they are happy to dump the code somewhere while selling a managed service with enough wrapper layers. But AGPL is toxic also for self-hosters who aren’t trying to build a managed hosting service, since it applies equally against all parties.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- rglullis 4y ago
  AGPL does not require source distribution of your application, unless the AGPL code is accessed directly by your users. So, if this were AGPL and I have an closed webservice that uses this, it is in the clear.
  - jitl 4y ago
    But then Amazon is free to host this as a paid service and take all the money.
    - rglullis 4y ago
      Redis is doing just fine, PostgreSQL is doing just fine. They are both real open source. The performance improvements are not worth the legal/compliance overhead of adding non-FOSS to my stack. Much less so if the performance improvements are due just to some optimization choice in the underlying system. In the next 5 years, it will be easier to have Redis adding the io_ring optimizations than for this new project to become uniquely better.
      - jitl 4y ago
        Now I’m curious where you work and how compliance requires FOSS!
        rglullis 4y ago
        You misunderstood. What I am saying is that is precisely because I am working on projects of different sizes and potentially with different customers, I do not want to have the burden of having to check if the projects have specific compliance requirements. I have a SaaS [0], my own (AGPL, by the way) open source project [1] and also work have the occasional contract job. It's much easier to say "just use Redis because it is FOSS and it gets the job done" across the board then to try to special-case the tools based on licensing requirements. [0]: https://communick.com https://communick.com [1]: https://hub20.io https://hub20.io
    - adastra22 4y ago
      And? AGPL is not a non-commercial license. If Amazon wanted to provide such a service, they would certainly be permitted to. As long as they provided any changes they make to the the AGPL source code. The AGPL would not "infect" their hosting infrastructure.
- goodpoint 4y ago
  > AGPL is toxic also for self-hosters who aren’t trying to build a managed hosting service Absolutely not. First of all, you can always use any software under AGPL as released without any limitation. Secondly, if you were to make changes and release them you can still run it any way you want. Thirdly, if you are making changes for internal use, and for some reasons your really want to keep them secret, you can STILL run the database to your heart's contents as long as you don't provide it as a service to the public. AGPL is much more permissive than people think. It's just providing a degree of protection to developers and and users from patent trolls and other uncooperative entities.
  - jitl 4y ago
    Exactly - the grandparent is asking “can a true copy left / Free Software license protect a young startup from Amazon reselling their software”, and my assertion is no, it cant.
    - josephcsible 4y ago
      Can you give an example of an AGPL product being resold by Amazon or someone like them?
      - adastra22 4y ago
        Mastodon is AGPL and there are various cloud hosting providers. There really aren't that many popular AGPL server software to start with though, so it's an unfairly biased question.
      - jitl 4y ago
        MongoDB is the most famous example to transition from AGPL to a closed license. MongoDB was AGPL until October 16, 2018. Since October 16, 2018, it uses Server Side Public License (SSPL), which they authored. From their FAQ: > The market is quickly moving to consume most software as a service. This is a time of incredible opportunity for open source projects, with the potential to foster a new wave of great open source server side software. The reality, however, is that once an open source project becomes interesting, it is too easy for large cloud vendors to capture all the value but contribute nothing back to the community. HN discussion from 2018: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18229452 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18229452 FAQ: https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license/faq https://www.mongodb.com/licensing/server-side-public-license... Today, MongoDB is an AWS partner: https://aws.amazon.com/quickstart/architecture/mongodb/ https://aws.amazon.com/quickstart/architecture/mongodb/ The most recent notable example of open-source software going closed because of Amazon specifically is Elasticsearch, which switched from Apache to SSPL. The announcement blog post was titled "Amazon: NOT OK - why we had to change Elastic licensing". HN discussion from 2021: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25833781 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25833781 FAQ: https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing
romange 4y ago
We do not choose AGPL so we would not harm our users. Lets not confuse the means and the goal here. AGPL is copyleft and restricting. Fair users refuse using it. OSI does not help technological companies to find a fair solution and force us to go outside of "OSS".
- riquito 4y ago
  I don't want to enter in the merit of your company's choice, it's definitely up to you what license to use, but I'm confused about that statement around AGPL. How would AGPL harm users?
  - bpicolo 4y ago
    The lawyers often ban AGPL at tech cos
    - JoshTriplett 4y ago
      Which means they may pay for an alternative to the AGPL.
      - blackoil 4y ago
        More likely they'll ignore the s/w. Huge amount of talent is working in such companies. Using AGPL will practically exclude them from interacting with the s/w. Also, smaller companies like to play safe. If FAANG with their million lawyers aren't touching it, why should I take the risk.
        true_religion 4y ago
        Because unlike FAANG you don’t have millions of engineers to create the software from scratch. Companies pay for databases (Oracle, Gemstone, MsSQL, anything at Amazon). Almost all the risks (price changes, maintenance costs, etc.) can be managed adequately via a long term enterprise contract.
    - 4y ago

benatkin 4y ago

> Every major technological startup turned away from BSD/Apache 2.0 licenses due to inability to compete with cloud providers without technological edge. No, there are plenty that still use permissive licenses. GitLab uses MIT and a custom license for EE: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/licensing.html https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/development/licensing.html Deno uses an MIT license and has some secret sauce that is currently just in hosted services AFAIK: https://github.com/denoland/deno/blob/main/LICENSE.md https://github.com/denoland/deno/blob/main/LICENSE.md PlanetScale has hosted services and an open source tool called Vitess which is Apache licensed: https://planetscale.com/ https://planetscale.com/ https://github.com/vitessio/vitess https://github.com/vitessio/vitess Finally Redis has a BSD licensed core, a source available license for additional modules, and a closed source license for enterprise. https://redis.com/legal/licenses/ https://redis.com/legal/licenses/

romange 4y ago
Redis has a BSD license because it was written by antirez who did not intend to make it a commercial enterprise. Today its too late to change and wont help Redis Inc to protect their ip. We looked at elastic, mongodb, cocroach labs, mariadb, redpanda, atlassian, grafana labs , scylladb. The last two are agpl but the motivation is the same: to protect themselves.

stinkiephish 4y ago

Bravo for picking the BSL and writing your license the way you have. It shows maturity in that you and your company know what they are doing and intend to be there for the long haul.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

PeterZaitsev 4y ago

MariaDB is GPL there are some enterprise components which are BSL. Was excited to see the project but now seeing it is not Open Source it means 1/10th of value