3 ms·

IMO we need new terms for that kind of stuff. New licenses such as SSPL, BSL FSL are becoming more and more popular, and for very good reason (the conditions to

by sofixa 3y ago

IMO we need new terms for that kind of stuff. New licenses such as SSPL, BSL FSL are becoming more and more popular, and for very good reason (the conditions today are vastly different than they were 20 years ago when there was no AWS to resell your FOSS to the whole world). They are not "open source" because of the restrictions, but the next closest term that can be applied to them is "source available" which means something different - source code is technically there, eventually, and is not reflective of the reality of those relicensed projects. ElasticSearch, Sentry, etc. are still developed in the open, random people not affiliated with the project can still submit PRs, and anyone not trying to compete publicly with the company behind the project can still do whatever they want.

ShaneCurcuru 3y ago
Apparently marketing people who want to sell stuff under those new licenses think "source available" is uncool. Some folks are working on terminology over here, if you're curious. https://github.com/softwarecommons/softwarecommons.com/issues/4 https://github.com/softwarecommons/softwarecommons.com/issue...
- sofixa 3y ago
  > Apparently marketing people who want to sell stuff under those new licenses think "source available" is uncool. It's not that it's uncool, it's just not true and reflective of reality. There's a world of difference between a .zip on an FTP ("source available because GPL says it must be") and everything still happening in public on GitHub and everyone still being able to contribute if they want to. Both are technically "source available".
  - orthoxerox 3y ago
    And yet a .zip on an FTP might be GPL-compliant whereas a GitHub repo isn't necessarily.
    - sofixa 3y ago
      Exactly! But it's objectively a shit way of sharing code, there is no contributions possible, etc.
      - orthoxerox 3y ago
        GPL or any OSS license doesn't require you to accept contributions. Your users are free to do anything with it except distribute derviative software under a different license, but you, the author, don't owe them anything except buildable and runnable (since v3) source code.
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  “Source available” is uncool, compared to “open source” or “Free Software”, in substance, not uncool as a term. The non-ideological value of open source is exactly the commodification that the retreat to source available licensing seeks to end, along with downstream consequences of that commodification. It is not a problem of terminology.
dragonwriter 3y ago
> the conditions today are vastly different than they were 20 years ago when there was no AWS to resell your FOSS to the whole world No, its not. SaaS has existed for more than 20 years and reselling FOSS has been something it has done as long as there has been FOSS to resell. What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS with initially no clear monetization plan or one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted. That’s the new thing, and why there is so much energy going into trying to figure out how to retain the marketing appeal of FOSS with the new licenses that lack the value proposition of FOSS.
- bluGill 3y ago
  > What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS with initially no clear monetization plan or one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted. That’s the new thing, That isn't new either. What has changed is some have found what looks like a path to monetization that seems like it might actually work. 20 years ago they never found a path to monetization at all. You just forgot about the other failed ones because they never went anywhere (though the source code may still be out there).
- sofixa 3y ago
  > No, its not. SaaS has existed for more than 20 years and reselling FOSS has been something it has done as long as there has been FOSS to resell. Not from a single vendor everyone is already using (AWS, GCP, Azure). > What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS Redis aren't a venture-funded startup. > one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted Many companies tried open core and hosting, like InfluxData, and it still didn't work. It's a hard sell when the big cloud providers' services are right there, a click/tf resource away, with integrated billing just a line item you don't have to haggle over. Honestly the only one I can think of that is kinda working with that business model (but still losing money) is GitLab. > That’s the new thing, and why there is so much energy going into trying to figure out how to retain the marketing appeal of FOSS with the new licenses that lack the value proposition of FOSS. BSL/SSPL don't lack the value proposition of FOSS. You can still see the code, you can still contribute to it, you can still fork if it the company goes under or you disagree with their direction. The only thing you can't really do is compete with the company behind it, which most users actually don't care about and is hardly a part of the value prop.

by sofixa 3y ago

ShaneCurcuru 3y ago

Apparently marketing people who want to sell stuff under those new licenses think "source available" is uncool. Some folks are working on terminology over here, if you're curious. https://github.com/softwarecommons/softwarecommons.com/issues/4 https://github.com/softwarecommons/softwarecommons.com/issue...

sofixa 3y ago
> Apparently marketing people who want to sell stuff under those new licenses think "source available" is uncool. It's not that it's uncool, it's just not true and reflective of reality. There's a world of difference between a .zip on an FTP ("source available because GPL says it must be") and everything still happening in public on GitHub and everyone still being able to contribute if they want to. Both are technically "source available".
- orthoxerox 3y ago
  And yet a .zip on an FTP might be GPL-compliant whereas a GitHub repo isn't necessarily.
  - sofixa 3y ago
    Exactly! But it's objectively a shit way of sharing code, there is no contributions possible, etc.
    - orthoxerox 3y ago
      GPL or any OSS license doesn't require you to accept contributions. Your users are free to do anything with it except distribute derviative software under a different license, but you, the author, don't owe them anything except buildable and runnable (since v3) source code.
dragonwriter 3y ago
“Source available” is uncool, compared to “open source” or “Free Software”, in substance, not uncool as a term. The non-ideological value of open source is exactly the commodification that the retreat to source available licensing seeks to end, along with downstream consequences of that commodification. It is not a problem of terminology.

dragonwriter 3y ago

> the conditions today are vastly different than they were 20 years ago when there was no AWS to resell your FOSS to the whole world No, its not. SaaS has existed for more than 20 years and reselling FOSS has been something it has done as long as there has been FOSS to resell. What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS with initially no clear monetization plan or one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted. That’s the new thing, and why there is so much energy going into trying to figure out how to retain the marketing appeal of FOSS with the new licenses that lack the value proposition of FOSS.

bluGill 3y ago
> What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS with initially no clear monetization plan or one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted. That’s the new thing, That isn't new either. What has changed is some have found what looks like a path to monetization that seems like it might actually work. 20 years ago they never found a path to monetization at all. You just forgot about the other failed ones because they never went anywhere (though the source code may still be out there).
sofixa 3y ago
> No, its not. SaaS has existed for more than 20 years and reselling FOSS has been something it has done as long as there has been FOSS to resell. Not from a single vendor everyone is already using (AWS, GCP, Azure). > What's changed recently is people launching venture-funded startups centered on gaining popularity through the appeal of FOSS Redis aren't a venture-funded startup. > one centered on selling services that were essentially just the FOSS, hosted Many companies tried open core and hosting, like InfluxData, and it still didn't work. It's a hard sell when the big cloud providers' services are right there, a click/tf resource away, with integrated billing just a line item you don't have to haggle over. Honestly the only one I can think of that is kinda working with that business model (but still losing money) is GitLab. > That’s the new thing, and why there is so much energy going into trying to figure out how to retain the marketing appeal of FOSS with the new licenses that lack the value proposition of FOSS. BSL/SSPL don't lack the value proposition of FOSS. You can still see the code, you can still contribute to it, you can still fork if it the company goes under or you disagree with their direction. The only thing you can't really do is compete with the company behind it, which most users actually don't care about and is hardly a part of the value prop.