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That's the main thing I have against the Rust people. They seem to like pushover licenses instead of GPL, perhaps in the hopes of getting hired by one of the bi

That's the main thing I have against the Rust people. They seem to like pushover licenses instead of GPL, perhaps in the hopes of getting hired by one of the big tech corps at some point. If only they realized what made free software so resilient over years..

gpderetta 4y ago
I'm a big fan of copyleft licenses, but when the objective is to push the industry toward a better standard, as opposed to a specific implementation, permissive OSS licenses make sense.
- celeritascelery 4y ago
  I hadn’t considered this angle. Maybe using permissive licenses will improve business adoption.
pas 4y ago
The intention behind GPL is great, but it's a technologist response to a social issue. If we want a software commons we have to say that upfront, not try to imply it via legalese, and then get offended when fractions emerge.
kzrdude 4y ago
Not sure it's fair to generalize over all "Rust people" I've worked in the community and it's annoying that it's so against GPL in some corners, but most people are just pragmatic. They use whatever license is the norm for sharing with their community. Now that Rust is becoming less tight knit it might open up, hopefully, to more diversity in licenses.
- alwayslikethis 4y ago
  It isn't. I don't intend to generalize to everyone using Rust. But there is a large overlap between Rust evangelists and anti-GPL activists, it seems. I don't want to believe this, but it almost looks like a corporate conspiracy to undermine free software.
  - nindalf 4y ago
    Too much conspiracy theory. AFAIK there definitely is a preference for Apache/MIT dual licence but this is probably because of the influence of the Rust compiler itself. Most of the initial Rust code was written by people involved with and in service of the Rust compiler. Since that’s licensed MIT/Apache, their code had to be as well if it wanted to be used in the compiler. There were people who used funky licenses like WTFPL (whatever the fuck you want to) and Unlicense (public domain) but they came around and licensed to MIT/Apache for uniformity with the rest of the ecosystem. Maybe if the compiler had been GPL the ecosystem might have been as well, but that’s a what if. We’ll never know if a hypothetical GPL Rust would have had the same path to success as the existing Rust.
  - timeon 4y ago
    Slint (Rust gui library) for example is GPL.

gpderetta 4y ago

I'm a big fan of copyleft licenses, but when the objective is to push the industry toward a better standard, as opposed to a specific implementation, permissive OSS licenses make sense.

celeritascelery 4y ago
I hadn’t considered this angle. Maybe using permissive licenses will improve business adoption.

pas 4y ago

The intention behind GPL is great, but it's a technologist response to a social issue. If we want a software commons we have to say that upfront, not try to imply it via legalese, and then get offended when fractions emerge.

kzrdude 4y ago

Not sure it's fair to generalize over all "Rust people" I've worked in the community and it's annoying that it's so against GPL in some corners, but most people are just pragmatic. They use whatever license is the norm for sharing with their community. Now that Rust is becoming less tight knit it might open up, hopefully, to more diversity in licenses.

alwayslikethis 4y ago
It isn't. I don't intend to generalize to everyone using Rust. But there is a large overlap between Rust evangelists and anti-GPL activists, it seems. I don't want to believe this, but it almost looks like a corporate conspiracy to undermine free software.
- nindalf 4y ago
  Too much conspiracy theory. AFAIK there definitely is a preference for Apache/MIT dual licence but this is probably because of the influence of the Rust compiler itself. Most of the initial Rust code was written by people involved with and in service of the Rust compiler. Since that’s licensed MIT/Apache, their code had to be as well if it wanted to be used in the compiler. There were people who used funky licenses like WTFPL (whatever the fuck you want to) and Unlicense (public domain) but they came around and licensed to MIT/Apache for uniformity with the rest of the ecosystem. Maybe if the compiler had been GPL the ecosystem might have been as well, but that’s a what if. We’ll never know if a hypothetical GPL Rust would have had the same path to success as the existing Rust.
- timeon 4y ago
  Slint (Rust gui library) for example is GPL.