4 ms·

How did they relicense without one?

by mattl 3y ago

fishnchips 3y ago
How indeed.
- jen20 3y ago
  Directly answered by [1]. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37266016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37266016
  - fishnchips 3y ago
    Answered incorrectly. All the code is relicensed with BUSL header on each and every file.
    - jen20 3y ago
      Again, wrong. Whether that has been done is independent of whether that is permissible, based on copyright assignment.
      - fishnchips 3y ago
        Are you implying they had no right to do that?
        CuriousCosmic 3y ago
        Strictly speaking it is on Hashicorp to prove that they had the right to re-license the code. Which would require listing all contributors and whether a given contributor gave written agreement to re-license the code or whether they had signed a CTA or CLA. To my knowledge they have not done that so anybody whose code is being used without permission could fight them on copyright infringement. And worth noting is that they don't have a particularly small number of contributors. Terraform has over 1700 contributors and many of the other repos have over 1000 contributors or close to 1000 contributors (unsure of the overlap). If they only started requiring a CLA or CTA later into their development, they probably haven't gotten permission from all the rights holders.
    - jeremyjh 3y ago
      Changing the license in the repo does not change the license of files you have already distributed under the MPL. That would require them to revoke all those licenses, which they can't do under the terms of that license that they've already agreed to. This entire thread and OpenTF, and maybe all of OSS itself would probably not exist if that were not the case. In the official repo I can still check out an older commit with the MPL on it, which means they are still distributing code under that license, but it wouldn't matter if that were the case or not under the law. edit: In fact, software as a business ( and many other professions ) would not exist if license terms could be changed or revoked after distribution. License changes for new software to be distributed can change, sure. But short of a breach of contract as outlined in the license itself you cannot change a license you have granted.
      - CuriousCosmic 3y ago
        That's not what they mean. They went through every file in the repository and updated the license to BUSL from MPL. Unless they have approval from each contributor for a given file (or the contributor signed a CTA or CLA), they cannot re-license that particular file. It's still MPL and only once all contributors approve or the MPL code is removed can it be re-licensed to an incompatible license. Of course if they had wanted to move to a compatible license, for a lot of FOSS licenses that is an option. Regardless of whether that is an option for the MPL, they are moving to an incompatible license and could not do this. ---- So their only options for files that they can't convert to the BUSL from the MPL are: 1. Keep contributions to those files under the MPL but require contributors to sign a CTA or CLA guaranteeing those contributions can later be relicensed. 2. Move BUSL contributions out of the file and only keep the MPL contributions in that file until they've all been replaced. Doing otherwise is violating the MPL.
jen20 3y ago
They did not relicense. All HashiCorp have done is made their own future contributions subject to BSL, not relicensed any previous contribution, nor do they have the ability to do that without copyright assignment of each and every contribution, which they do not have (specifically I have never signed a copyright assignment, and nor has at least one other of the top ten contributors of all time). Nothing about MPLv2 prevents inclusion in a commercial product provided the attribution and file-based copyleft provisions are followed.
- foota 3y ago
  Is that something you can do? I wouldn't have thought there previous license would be compatible with the BSL, and so distributing the software under the BSL wouldn't be possible?
  - jaggederest 3y ago
    It's standard for BSD and MIT style licenses and similar to just require the copyright notice be retained in e.g. a LICENSE file or equivalent. A bunch of commercial software right now (cough I'm writing this on MacOS) uses BSD-licensed foundations.
    - jen20 3y ago
      MPLv2 is file-based copyleft, and there are no restrictions on including it in a commercial work provided that changes to MPLv2-licensed files are accessible per the terms. Indeed it’s something of a spiritual successor to CDDL which was designed precisely for that purpose (although reliable sources also say it was designed to be GPL-incompatible, so that is literally a he-said/she-said case).
      - erincandescent 3y ago
        The CDDL is an MPLv1 derivative, so similarities should be unsurprising
  - deleted 3y ago
Jka9rhnDJos 3y ago
Remove the code from the repo, put it in another repo, probably. I don’t remember signing a CLA 7 years ago, but somehow they relicensed without me needing to agree. All my code was pulled out into a separate package/plugin that is still MIT.

How did they relicense without one?

by mattl 3y ago

How did they relicense without one?

fishnchips 3y ago

How indeed.

jen20 3y ago
Directly answered by [1]. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37266016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37266016
- fishnchips 3y ago
  Answered incorrectly. All the code is relicensed with BUSL header on each and every file.
  - jen20 3y ago
    Again, wrong. Whether that has been done is independent of whether that is permissible, based on copyright assignment.
    - fishnchips 3y ago
      Are you implying they had no right to do that?
      - CuriousCosmic 3y ago
        Strictly speaking it is on Hashicorp to prove that they had the right to re-license the code. Which would require listing all contributors and whether a given contributor gave written agreement to re-license the code or whether they had signed a CTA or CLA. To my knowledge they have not done that so anybody whose code is being used without permission could fight them on copyright infringement. And worth noting is that they don't have a particularly small number of contributors. Terraform has over 1700 contributors and many of the other repos have over 1000 contributors or close to 1000 contributors (unsure of the overlap). If they only started requiring a CLA or CTA later into their development, they probably haven't gotten permission from all the rights holders.
  - jeremyjh 3y ago
    Changing the license in the repo does not change the license of files you have already distributed under the MPL. That would require them to revoke all those licenses, which they can't do under the terms of that license that they've already agreed to. This entire thread and OpenTF, and maybe all of OSS itself would probably not exist if that were not the case. In the official repo I can still check out an older commit with the MPL on it, which means they are still distributing code under that license, but it wouldn't matter if that were the case or not under the law. edit: In fact, software as a business ( and many other professions ) would not exist if license terms could be changed or revoked after distribution. License changes for new software to be distributed can change, sure. But short of a breach of contract as outlined in the license itself you cannot change a license you have granted.
    - CuriousCosmic 3y ago
      That's not what they mean. They went through every file in the repository and updated the license to BUSL from MPL. Unless they have approval from each contributor for a given file (or the contributor signed a CTA or CLA), they cannot re-license that particular file. It's still MPL and only once all contributors approve or the MPL code is removed can it be re-licensed to an incompatible license. Of course if they had wanted to move to a compatible license, for a lot of FOSS licenses that is an option. Regardless of whether that is an option for the MPL, they are moving to an incompatible license and could not do this. ---- So their only options for files that they can't convert to the BUSL from the MPL are: 1. Keep contributions to those files under the MPL but require contributors to sign a CTA or CLA guaranteeing those contributions can later be relicensed. 2. Move BUSL contributions out of the file and only keep the MPL contributions in that file until they've all been replaced. Doing otherwise is violating the MPL.

jen20 3y ago

They did not relicense. All HashiCorp have done is made their own future contributions subject to BSL, not relicensed any previous contribution, nor do they have the ability to do that without copyright assignment of each and every contribution, which they do not have (specifically I have never signed a copyright assignment, and nor has at least one other of the top ten contributors of all time). Nothing about MPLv2 prevents inclusion in a commercial product provided the attribution and file-based copyleft provisions are followed.

foota 3y ago
Is that something you can do? I wouldn't have thought there previous license would be compatible with the BSL, and so distributing the software under the BSL wouldn't be possible?
- jaggederest 3y ago
  It's standard for BSD and MIT style licenses and similar to just require the copyright notice be retained in e.g. a LICENSE file or equivalent. A bunch of commercial software right now (cough I'm writing this on MacOS) uses BSD-licensed foundations.
  - jen20 3y ago
    MPLv2 is file-based copyleft, and there are no restrictions on including it in a commercial work provided that changes to MPLv2-licensed files are accessible per the terms. Indeed it’s something of a spiritual successor to CDDL which was designed precisely for that purpose (although reliable sources also say it was designed to be GPL-incompatible, so that is literally a he-said/she-said case).
    - erincandescent 3y ago
      The CDDL is an MPLv1 derivative, so similarities should be unsurprising
- deleted 3y ago

Jka9rhnDJos 3y ago

Remove the code from the repo, put it in another repo, probably. I don’t remember signing a CLA 7 years ago, but somehow they relicensed without me needing to agree. All my code was pulled out into a separate package/plugin that is still MIT.