22 ms·

Permissive licenses give mega-corps (AWS,GCP,Azure) the ability to use software projects without contributing to it. This mechanic in the market is going to dra

by mu53 2y ago

Permissive licenses give mega-corps (AWS,GCP,Azure) the ability to use software projects without contributing to it. This mechanic in the market is going to dramatically shorten the runway for open source projects turning into mature companies like redis and elasticsearch. Once they hit a certain marketshare, cloud companies can take away one of the primary revenue streams large enough to support teams of developers improving the project. I know big corps contribute developer time to projects, but it doesn't hurt to have more competition. This will lead to more market consolidation and less innovation in the cloud space. Taking advantage of licensing to stifle companies has turned out great for the mobile phone landscape. I love having essentially two choices for a phone. Open source is amazing, but this is one of the weaknesses that have been exploited in recent years that medium sized and newer companies are combating with server-side public license. Linux is not just kernel, but its backed by a foundation that can protect it's revenue streams with GPL licensing.

cmeacham98 2y ago
> Permissive licenses give mega-corps (AWS,GCP,Azure) the ability to use software projects without contributing to it. Use a copyleft license like (A)GPL then? Look, if you want to license your software as "fair source" or whatever other non-free license that's your right, I just won't use your software. But don't pretend about the reasons for doing so - companies licensing their software this way are doing so to prevent competition, not because they want contributions.
- mu53 2y ago
  Copyleft licensing doesn't protect against cloud hosting competition. It mostly applies to modifications to the source code, but not hosting for revenue. As long as their contributions are also open source, the license is satisfied. Young companies protecting their revenue against established competitors is an entirely valid use of open source license. These licenses won't affect you unless you are an exec level employee at a unicorn

by mu53 2y ago

cmeacham98 2y ago

> Permissive licenses give mega-corps (AWS,GCP,Azure) the ability to use software projects without contributing to it. Use a copyleft license like (A)GPL then? Look, if you want to license your software as "fair source" or whatever other non-free license that's your right, I just won't use your software. But don't pretend about the reasons for doing so - companies licensing their software this way are doing so to prevent competition, not because they want contributions.

mu53 2y ago
Copyleft licensing doesn't protect against cloud hosting competition. It mostly applies to modifications to the source code, but not hosting for revenue. As long as their contributions are also open source, the license is satisfied. Young companies protecting their revenue against established competitors is an entirely valid use of open source license. These licenses won't affect you unless you are an exec level employee at a unicorn