5 ms·

The Failure of Open Source Initiative

7 points by JasonGoldman 3y ago

commoner 3y ago
This website "Collective Source" is an egregious attempt to rebrand source-available software as open source, even when the software doesn't meet the basic standards of the Open Source Definition, which is widely accepted by the FOSS community as the definition of the term open source: https://opensource.org/osd/ https://opensource.org/osd/. The Server Side Public License used by MongoDB is a source-available software license, but not an open source software license because it discriminates against how the software can be used. > The Open Source Initiative was often regarded as a one-man show as it has never had more than a single full-time employee at any time. This particular statement is laughable when you take a closer look at what's happening. The Open Source Initiative has a list of volunteers and staff (https://opensource.org/volunteersandstaff/ https://opensource.org/volunteersandstaff/), list of associated organizations (https://opensource.org/associations/ https://opensource.org/associations/), and list of affiliated organizations (https://opensource.org/affiliates/ https://opensource.org/affiliates/). On the other hand, "Collective Source" is a website that does not list a single name on it. It claims to be backed by a "community", but only links to yet another website called "Research Solutions" that is just a Discourse forum with a single user on it named "user1" (https://web.archive.org/web/20230818204124/https://forum.resoldev.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230818204124/https://forum.res...). How ironic that "Collective Source"/"Research Solutions" is falsely criticizing the Open Source Initiative for being "regarded as a one-man show", when that phrase is a more apt description of "Collective Source" itself.
- JasonGoldman 3y ago
  The article doesn't suggest that the main criticism of OSI was its "one-man show" operation. That's just what the work hours in the tax filings show and is mentioned as an answer to "Who was behind OSI?" > MongoDB is a source-available software license, but not an open source software license because it discriminates against how the software can be used That's exactly what the OSI's definition of open source suggests. So, if we accept OSI as the arbiter of open source definition you're absolutely right. And that's something that needs to be fixed (we do need to consider discriminating against hostile competitors and giving developers the right to protect their open source projects from being hijacked by bad actors). The point of the article is that the OSI's definition has not been updated for too long and the community deserves a definition relevant to the present time. Given the trajectory of technological advances, I would be really surprised if in 100 years from now people are still adhering to software guidelines published in 1997. I think sometime between now and 100 years from now we upgrade to better guidelines. Each individual and company will get there at their own pace.
  - commoner 3y ago
    I see that you are the author of these "Collective Source"/"Research Solutions" pages, based on the social media username listed on your HN profile. The purpose of your entire article is to label the Open Source Initiative as "irrelevant" so that you can promote a weaker definition of the term open source that does not protect the freedom of users to use the software as they wish. While you are entitled to your own opinion, your statement "The Open Source Initiative was often regarded as a one-man show" is false in light of the easily available evidence that the Open Source Initiative is supported by numerous individuals and organizations. Your entire argument is tarnished by this false claim, since the Open Source Initiative has much more credibility than a "community" consisting of an empty Discourse forum, despite the Discourse forum being newer. Nobody is preventing MongoDB Inc. from restricting how MongoDB can be used with their Server Side Public License, which is a source-available software license. Nobody is preventing Facebook from restricting how its source-available project LLaMA 2 can be used. However, the FOSS community overwhelmingly rejects Meta's and MongoDB's attempts to water down the term open source to apply it to software licenses that restrict how its users can use the software. There is no shame in calling a piece of software source-available, since source-available software still offers more transparency than proprietary software with no published source code. But Meta's and MongoDB's efforts to brand their software as open source when they do not allow the freedoms that FOSS users expect from open source software are harmful marketing exercises that threaten the user freedoms championed by the open source software movement, all for the sake of commercial gain. It is important to distinguish between source-available software and open source software so users can properly determine the software that meets their needs based on the freedoms they afford.
    - JasonGoldman 3y ago
      > The purpose of your entire article is to label the Open Source Initiative as "irrelevant" so that you can promote a weaker definition of the term open source that does not protect the freedom of users to use the software as they wish. The current definition allows all users to use the open source software as they wish. The problem is that, as we have learned through experience, some of those users are multi-billion dollar companies who are happy to exploit this unrestricted freedom at the expense of destroying the open source projects. LLaMA 2 expects you to apply for a license only if you have "greater than 700 million monthly active users in the preceding calendar month". The open source initiative corporation relies on financial help from companies like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft. It's not surprising that they are vocal about LLaMA's terms. If you don't have 700 million monthly active users and are not sponsored by tech giants, you're probably fighting for the wrong side. The new definition may be "weaker" or "stronger" depending on your agenda. For one, it would give users the right to protect their privacy. But, this also means that it takes away the freedom to collect and monetize information without users' consent.
- hodgesrm 3y ago
  > This website "Collective Source" is an egregious attempt to rebrand source-available software as open source, ... The article reads like a conspiracy theory. It's definitely novel to use that approach to undermine widely support OSI licensing definitions, but I don't think it will succeed.
  - JasonGoldman 3y ago
    You are welcome to fact check it for yourself.
PeterZaitsev 3y ago
This article stinks. It stinks not just because it anonymous and what it uses bizarre comparisons; For example $120K on salary (including benefits) would barely hire junior engineer in most of the places in USA and it is far from lavish paycheck for executive director. Calling SSPL "modern Open Source License" or focusing on probably assidental OSD edit as main thing OSI does is just silly OSI is by no means perfect but it does not compare to whomever are those collectivesearch folks are
PeterZaitsev 3y ago
It is fine some people want different things than what Open Source Definition provides. Go ahead choose your different terminology - "Collective Source" is just as fine source as any. But no, you want to steal the goodwill of the Open Source name but redefine it to take away freedoms from its users In any case we will continue seeing pollarization in this space https://www.percona.com/blog/the-future-of-open-source-is-polarized/ https://www.percona.com/blog/the-future-of-open-source-is-po...
- JasonGoldman 3y ago
  Thank you for sharing the article. It makes many points that I found spot on. Choosing a different phrase than open source defeats the purpose of improving "open source". Imaging you want to bring down and rebuild a temple because it's constructed with asbestos (which now we know is carcinogenic) but some locals chain themselves to it and ask you to go build yourself another temple somewhere else. The goal is to reconstruct the temple to make it better for everyone. My intention is not to be insensitive to some people's attachment to what they have chosen to worship (i.e. the software guidelines of 1997), but the absence of a practical solution would continue to hurt the [small] developers and users. This is where it matters to be clear on whose solution we are trying to solve: hackers/hobbyists, software engineers, software companies, consumers, or everyone! Something that I would consider a possible weakness of your article is that it suggests too many groups as the beneficiaries of the open source software. Open source as defined by OSI is not supposed to solve everyone's problem. It's mainly concerned with the needs of hackers. That's why I prefer the term "hackable software" over "open source" or "free software". The rights/freedoms that open source offers are mainly hacking rights. That was the whole idea from the beginning. https://forum.resoldev.com/t/what-is-hackable-software/22 https://forum.resoldev.com/t/what-is-hackable-software/22 A mere consumer of software, or a software company can also benefit from open source, but open source demonstrably does not take all their needs into account. https://forum.resoldev.com/t/is-open-source-relevant-to-your-needs/18 https://forum.resoldev.com/t/is-open-source-relevant-to-your... We can, however, update the definition to take the needs of more groups into account, and acknowledge their relevance to the open source community. Then it would make more sense for your customers to care about open source. As for the companies that rely on an open source business model, I think there's really not any single event that is going to eliminate their need to pivot. Perhaps the competition would shift users' demand more toward privacy and security and away from hacking rights. That would put the followers of 1997 guidelines at a disadvantage. Many customers would prefer to use software that is not just "AS IS", but rather actively audited for them for free when their alternative choice is to choose a legacy open source and cross their fingers that "someone else" have audited the files. As your second paragraph under "Open source is not for everyone" suggests, it's probably going to be a pendulum swing as it has always been. At first there was too many restrictions, now there is not enough restrictions. Maybe zigzag is the way to go forward. I doubt any solution would be good forever, not even a better open source definition.

7 points by JasonGoldman 3y ago

This website "Collective Source" is an egregious attempt to rebrand source-available software as open source, even when the software doesn't meet the basic standards of the Open Source Definition, which is widely accepted by the FOSS community as the definition of the term open source: https://opensource.org/osd/ https://opensource.org/osd/. The Server Side Public License used by MongoDB is a source-available software license, but not an open source software license because it discriminates against how the software can be used. > The Open Source Initiative was often regarded as a one-man show as it has never had more than a single full-time employee at any time. This particular statement is laughable when you take a closer look at what's happening. The Open Source Initiative has a list of volunteers and staff (https://opensource.org/volunteersandstaff/ https://opensource.org/volunteersandstaff/), list of associated organizations (https://opensource.org/associations/ https://opensource.org/associations/), and list of affiliated organizations (https://opensource.org/affiliates/ https://opensource.org/affiliates/). On the other hand, "Collective Source" is a website that does not list a single name on it. It claims to be backed by a "community", but only links to yet another website called "Research Solutions" that is just a Discourse forum with a single user on it named "user1" (https://web.archive.org/web/20230818204124/https://forum.resoldev.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230818204124/https://forum.res...). How ironic that "Collective Source"/"Research Solutions" is falsely criticizing the Open Source Initiative for being "regarded as a one-man show", when that phrase is a more apt description of "Collective Source" itself.

JasonGoldman 3y ago
The article doesn't suggest that the main criticism of OSI was its "one-man show" operation. That's just what the work hours in the tax filings show and is mentioned as an answer to "Who was behind OSI?" > MongoDB is a source-available software license, but not an open source software license because it discriminates against how the software can be used That's exactly what the OSI's definition of open source suggests. So, if we accept OSI as the arbiter of open source definition you're absolutely right. And that's something that needs to be fixed (we do need to consider discriminating against hostile competitors and giving developers the right to protect their open source projects from being hijacked by bad actors). The point of the article is that the OSI's definition has not been updated for too long and the community deserves a definition relevant to the present time. Given the trajectory of technological advances, I would be really surprised if in 100 years from now people are still adhering to software guidelines published in 1997. I think sometime between now and 100 years from now we upgrade to better guidelines. Each individual and company will get there at their own pace.
- commoner 3y ago
  I see that you are the author of these "Collective Source"/"Research Solutions" pages, based on the social media username listed on your HN profile. The purpose of your entire article is to label the Open Source Initiative as "irrelevant" so that you can promote a weaker definition of the term open source that does not protect the freedom of users to use the software as they wish. While you are entitled to your own opinion, your statement "The Open Source Initiative was often regarded as a one-man show" is false in light of the easily available evidence that the Open Source Initiative is supported by numerous individuals and organizations. Your entire argument is tarnished by this false claim, since the Open Source Initiative has much more credibility than a "community" consisting of an empty Discourse forum, despite the Discourse forum being newer. Nobody is preventing MongoDB Inc. from restricting how MongoDB can be used with their Server Side Public License, which is a source-available software license. Nobody is preventing Facebook from restricting how its source-available project LLaMA 2 can be used. However, the FOSS community overwhelmingly rejects Meta's and MongoDB's attempts to water down the term open source to apply it to software licenses that restrict how its users can use the software. There is no shame in calling a piece of software source-available, since source-available software still offers more transparency than proprietary software with no published source code. But Meta's and MongoDB's efforts to brand their software as open source when they do not allow the freedoms that FOSS users expect from open source software are harmful marketing exercises that threaten the user freedoms championed by the open source software movement, all for the sake of commercial gain. It is important to distinguish between source-available software and open source software so users can properly determine the software that meets their needs based on the freedoms they afford.
  - JasonGoldman 3y ago
    > The purpose of your entire article is to label the Open Source Initiative as "irrelevant" so that you can promote a weaker definition of the term open source that does not protect the freedom of users to use the software as they wish. The current definition allows all users to use the open source software as they wish. The problem is that, as we have learned through experience, some of those users are multi-billion dollar companies who are happy to exploit this unrestricted freedom at the expense of destroying the open source projects. LLaMA 2 expects you to apply for a license only if you have "greater than 700 million monthly active users in the preceding calendar month". The open source initiative corporation relies on financial help from companies like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft. It's not surprising that they are vocal about LLaMA's terms. If you don't have 700 million monthly active users and are not sponsored by tech giants, you're probably fighting for the wrong side. The new definition may be "weaker" or "stronger" depending on your agenda. For one, it would give users the right to protect their privacy. But, this also means that it takes away the freedom to collect and monetize information without users' consent.
hodgesrm 3y ago
> This website "Collective Source" is an egregious attempt to rebrand source-available software as open source, ... The article reads like a conspiracy theory. It's definitely novel to use that approach to undermine widely support OSI licensing definitions, but I don't think it will succeed.
- JasonGoldman 3y ago
  You are welcome to fact check it for yourself.

PeterZaitsev 3y ago

This article stinks. It stinks not just because it anonymous and what it uses bizarre comparisons; For example $120K on salary (including benefits) would barely hire junior engineer in most of the places in USA and it is far from lavish paycheck for executive director. Calling SSPL "modern Open Source License" or focusing on probably assidental OSD edit as main thing OSI does is just silly OSI is by no means perfect but it does not compare to whomever are those collectivesearch folks are

PeterZaitsev 3y ago

It is fine some people want different things than what Open Source Definition provides. Go ahead choose your different terminology - "Collective Source" is just as fine source as any. But no, you want to steal the goodwill of the Open Source name but redefine it to take away freedoms from its users In any case we will continue seeing pollarization in this space https://www.percona.com/blog/the-future-of-open-source-is-polarized/ https://www.percona.com/blog/the-future-of-open-source-is-po...

JasonGoldman 3y ago
Thank you for sharing the article. It makes many points that I found spot on. Choosing a different phrase than open source defeats the purpose of improving "open source". Imaging you want to bring down and rebuild a temple because it's constructed with asbestos (which now we know is carcinogenic) but some locals chain themselves to it and ask you to go build yourself another temple somewhere else. The goal is to reconstruct the temple to make it better for everyone. My intention is not to be insensitive to some people's attachment to what they have chosen to worship (i.e. the software guidelines of 1997), but the absence of a practical solution would continue to hurt the [small] developers and users. This is where it matters to be clear on whose solution we are trying to solve: hackers/hobbyists, software engineers, software companies, consumers, or everyone! Something that I would consider a possible weakness of your article is that it suggests too many groups as the beneficiaries of the open source software. Open source as defined by OSI is not supposed to solve everyone's problem. It's mainly concerned with the needs of hackers. That's why I prefer the term "hackable software" over "open source" or "free software". The rights/freedoms that open source offers are mainly hacking rights. That was the whole idea from the beginning. https://forum.resoldev.com/t/what-is-hackable-software/22 https://forum.resoldev.com/t/what-is-hackable-software/22 A mere consumer of software, or a software company can also benefit from open source, but open source demonstrably does not take all their needs into account. https://forum.resoldev.com/t/is-open-source-relevant-to-your-needs/18 https://forum.resoldev.com/t/is-open-source-relevant-to-your... We can, however, update the definition to take the needs of more groups into account, and acknowledge their relevance to the open source community. Then it would make more sense for your customers to care about open source. As for the companies that rely on an open source business model, I think there's really not any single event that is going to eliminate their need to pivot. Perhaps the competition would shift users' demand more toward privacy and security and away from hacking rights. That would put the followers of 1997 guidelines at a disadvantage. Many customers would prefer to use software that is not just "AS IS", but rather actively audited for them for free when their alternative choice is to choose a legacy open source and cross their fingers that "someone else" have audited the files. As your second paragraph under "Open source is not for everyone" suggests, it's probably going to be a pendulum swing as it has always been. At first there was too many restrictions, now there is not enough restrictions. Maybe zigzag is the way to go forward. I doubt any solution would be good forever, not even a better open source definition.