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Seeing as the license is derived from VVVVV's I was interested in comparing comments so far to a similar one there: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2201165

Seeing as the license is derived from VVVVV's I was interested in comparing comments so far to a similar one there: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22011655 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22011655 I very much enjoy Melos and Marina's games. "Anodyne 2" is a must play to anyone who loved the Zelda series as it's a mishmash of 3D N64 gameplay with over the head 2D dungeoning. It has such uniqueness and strangeness that I still remember it years later. "Even the Ocean" was also memorable to me. It is not the masterpiece A2 was IMO but the issues held weight. And having an unconventional protagonist in terms of body type, ethnicity, and sexual orientation was so novel at the time to me. Thanks for opening the source code! I know HN members will be super critical as to "Oh this isn't Open Source" but you have the licenses available for review and that's where it really matters. The fact that the code is out there for review is a huge step and I hope more devs do it as it's a form of historical preservation in my eyes.

Pannoniae 3y ago
>"I know HN members will be super critical as to "Oh this isn't Open Source" but you have the licenses available for review and that's where it really matters. The fact that the code is out there for review is a huge step and I hope more devs do it as it's a form of historical preservation in my eyes." Exactly, and every time something like this happens, the inevitable "this is not really open" comes up, often in a quite hostile way. That's an absolutely destructive approach (because if it was fully open source, and some large studio just stole the game and re-released it, the same crowd would say they knew the consequences of open sourcing) The "open code but not under an OSI licence" approach is I think the most beneficial for everyone (if we are talking about commercial software): users can inspect their copies, developers can learn from it and modify it, and the developers can live safely knowing that no one will steal their work or threaten to fork it.
- kiba 3y ago
  Nobody is demanding that you should open source it. Just don't call it open source if you are not going to make it open source.
  - Pannoniae 3y ago
    Well the source is open for everyone to see..... it's just not capital Open Source as defined by the OSI. My personal opinion is that OSI shouldn't have a faux-trademark over that word, and people should be able to use that expression freely even if it doesn't conform to that definition, if the code is available.
    - reedciccio 3y ago
      That will lead to even more confusion in the minds of the hundreds of policy makers and courts worldwide, who already have plenty of opportunities to be confused. More: https://blog.opensource.org/court-affirms-its-false-advertising-to-claim-software-is-open-source-when-its-not/ https://blog.opensource.org/court-affirms-its-false-advertis... Use other terms, there are plenty of other options
      - Pannoniae 3y ago
        I agree with what you say, but the blog post you linked is hugely misleading. (remember, it's the OSI blog, of course they are going to twist it for their goals) The court did not affirm that "calling your non-OSI-approved licence open source is false advertising". As in the judgement: "It is undisputed that Defendants made the statements at issue to convince customers to adopt ONgDB over Neo4j EE. Because Defendants misrepresented ONgDB as a free version of Neo4j EE licensed under the APGL, there is no doubt that this price differential (free versus paid) was likely to influence customers purchasing decisions. See Hinojos v. Kohl’s Corp., 718 F.3d 1098, 1106–1107 (9th Cir. 2013), as amended on denial of reh’g and reh’g en banc (July 8, 2013) (recognizing under the UCL that price is material to purchasing decisions). Thus, the Court finds that Defendants’ statements suggesting that customers could obtain a “free and open source drop in replacement” for Neo4j EE were material." What the court did affirm is that the upstream licence was a modified AGPL with additional restrictions. The defendant has stripped those restrictions (claiming the AGPL "you may remove" clause allowed them to) and distributed the product as "free and open source". This was false advertising as they were not capable of stripping the Commons Clause and the copyright identification. Notably, this does not mean that it's false advertising to claim your software is "open source" when it is not OSI-approved, it means that if you offer a modified version of a piece of software, you can't advertise it as "free and open source" when the forked version is still bound by the Commons Clause prohibiting selling it in any way.
seanclayton 3y ago
It's certainly better than "you can't look at the source code." I encourage the developer to not call it open source and use other terms such as "source available" or say the the source is public, etc. Open Source is an ecosystem that this project admits it does not support (meaning, open source projects is not what this aims to be "compatible" with) or is a part of. When projects misuse the term "open source," it can dilute the meaning and value of the open source model and ecosystem, making it harder for users and developers to understand and trust open source initiatives.
- RicardoLuis0 3y ago
  that's the altered part -- those more restrictive terms of the VVVVVV license only apply to the _assets_, and the license for the source code itself is far more liberal: https://github.com/analgesicproductions/Even-The-Ocean-Open-Source/blob/main/License.md#part-2-game-source-code https://github.com/analgesicproductions/Even-The-Ocean-Open-...

Pannoniae 3y ago

>"I know HN members will be super critical as to "Oh this isn't Open Source" but you have the licenses available for review and that's where it really matters. The fact that the code is out there for review is a huge step and I hope more devs do it as it's a form of historical preservation in my eyes." Exactly, and every time something like this happens, the inevitable "this is not really open" comes up, often in a quite hostile way. That's an absolutely destructive approach (because if it was fully open source, and some large studio just stole the game and re-released it, the same crowd would say they knew the consequences of open sourcing) The "open code but not under an OSI licence" approach is I think the most beneficial for everyone (if we are talking about commercial software): users can inspect their copies, developers can learn from it and modify it, and the developers can live safely knowing that no one will steal their work or threaten to fork it.

kiba 3y ago
Nobody is demanding that you should open source it. Just don't call it open source if you are not going to make it open source.
- Pannoniae 3y ago
  Well the source is open for everyone to see..... it's just not capital Open Source as defined by the OSI. My personal opinion is that OSI shouldn't have a faux-trademark over that word, and people should be able to use that expression freely even if it doesn't conform to that definition, if the code is available.
  - reedciccio 3y ago
    That will lead to even more confusion in the minds of the hundreds of policy makers and courts worldwide, who already have plenty of opportunities to be confused. More: https://blog.opensource.org/court-affirms-its-false-advertising-to-claim-software-is-open-source-when-its-not/ https://blog.opensource.org/court-affirms-its-false-advertis... Use other terms, there are plenty of other options
    - Pannoniae 3y ago
      I agree with what you say, but the blog post you linked is hugely misleading. (remember, it's the OSI blog, of course they are going to twist it for their goals) The court did not affirm that "calling your non-OSI-approved licence open source is false advertising". As in the judgement: "It is undisputed that Defendants made the statements at issue to convince customers to adopt ONgDB over Neo4j EE. Because Defendants misrepresented ONgDB as a free version of Neo4j EE licensed under the APGL, there is no doubt that this price differential (free versus paid) was likely to influence customers purchasing decisions. See Hinojos v. Kohl’s Corp., 718 F.3d 1098, 1106–1107 (9th Cir. 2013), as amended on denial of reh’g and reh’g en banc (July 8, 2013) (recognizing under the UCL that price is material to purchasing decisions). Thus, the Court finds that Defendants’ statements suggesting that customers could obtain a “free and open source drop in replacement” for Neo4j EE were material." What the court did affirm is that the upstream licence was a modified AGPL with additional restrictions. The defendant has stripped those restrictions (claiming the AGPL "you may remove" clause allowed them to) and distributed the product as "free and open source". This was false advertising as they were not capable of stripping the Commons Clause and the copyright identification. Notably, this does not mean that it's false advertising to claim your software is "open source" when it is not OSI-approved, it means that if you offer a modified version of a piece of software, you can't advertise it as "free and open source" when the forked version is still bound by the Commons Clause prohibiting selling it in any way.

seanclayton 3y ago

It's certainly better than "you can't look at the source code." I encourage the developer to not call it open source and use other terms such as "source available" or say the the source is public, etc. Open Source is an ecosystem that this project admits it does not support (meaning, open source projects is not what this aims to be "compatible" with) or is a part of. When projects misuse the term "open source," it can dilute the meaning and value of the open source model and ecosystem, making it harder for users and developers to understand and trust open source initiatives.

RicardoLuis0 3y ago
that's the altered part -- those more restrictive terms of the VVVVVV license only apply to the _assets_, and the license for the source code itself is far more liberal: https://github.com/analgesicproductions/Even-The-Ocean-Open-Source/blob/main/License.md#part-2-game-source-code https://github.com/analgesicproductions/Even-The-Ocean-Open-...