4 ms·

Automattic and Matt have been good stewards of WordPress and it's hard for me to fault him for trying to get some money from people who've built their whole bus

Automattic and Matt have been good stewards of WordPress and it's hard for me to fault him for trying to get some money from people who've built their whole business on the back of his team & free software contributors' generosity. The free software world still has no good answer to the free rider problem. This is the same problem with AWS/ElasticSearch

SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
The answer is an unambiguous “no”, people just don’t want to hear it. The right for anyone to resell your software is part of Stallman’s fundamental freedoms and item 1 of the Open Source definition. I’m sympathetic to the guy, getting your lunch eaten by a competitor is no fun, but I don’t think he’s in a different position than any other proprietary software dev who wants to get paid according to the value of what he wrote.
- ForHackernews 2y ago
  Maybe RMS is wrong, though. Why is it a fundamental right that I should be able to take something you create and resell it without giving anything back? Does that benefit users?
  - SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
    I don’t agree with the fundamental freedoms angle myself, but I do think it’s vital to the health of the ecosystem. React is the example I always use - would it be better if social media companies had a permanent disadvantage in the market because anti-competition clauses prohibit them from using the biggest interface library?
    - ForHackernews 2y ago
      That's an interesting example because I find React to be an absolute disaster every time I've tried to use it. I feel like anyone using not-React would have a competitive advantage, and yet we're all stuck with Facebook's droppings because they're the 800lb gorilla.
- bad_user 2y ago
  The source code is not under dispute. Trademarks or the use of WP.org do not fall under the FOSS license.
  - SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
    People should, don’t get me wrong, respect the marks of open source projects. If I were reselling a commercial fork of an open source project Foobar, I would not be comfortable putting “FB” or “Foobar” in the name. I’m honestly on board with the Apache Foundation guidelines, where you’re not even supposed to say that Foobar is what you’re selling - it’s a proprietary service with a proprietary name which happens to be powered by Foobar. But the idea of an enforceable trademark right to stop people from accurately describing their derivative services is another thing where people often don’t want to hear the clear answer. Companies typically go much further than what’s actually required to avoid infringement, because frustrating the open source community you depend on isn’t worth the relatively modest benefits. The Wordpress dynamic is different, because their mark is already licensed to a commercial vendor and already causes routine confusion in that context.

SpicyLemonZest 2y ago

The answer is an unambiguous “no”, people just don’t want to hear it. The right for anyone to resell your software is part of Stallman’s fundamental freedoms and item 1 of the Open Source definition. I’m sympathetic to the guy, getting your lunch eaten by a competitor is no fun, but I don’t think he’s in a different position than any other proprietary software dev who wants to get paid according to the value of what he wrote.

ForHackernews 2y ago
Maybe RMS is wrong, though. Why is it a fundamental right that I should be able to take something you create and resell it without giving anything back? Does that benefit users?
- SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
  I don’t agree with the fundamental freedoms angle myself, but I do think it’s vital to the health of the ecosystem. React is the example I always use - would it be better if social media companies had a permanent disadvantage in the market because anti-competition clauses prohibit them from using the biggest interface library?
  - ForHackernews 2y ago
    That's an interesting example because I find React to be an absolute disaster every time I've tried to use it. I feel like anyone using not-React would have a competitive advantage, and yet we're all stuck with Facebook's droppings because they're the 800lb gorilla.
bad_user 2y ago
The source code is not under dispute. Trademarks or the use of WP.org do not fall under the FOSS license.
- SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
  People should, don’t get me wrong, respect the marks of open source projects. If I were reselling a commercial fork of an open source project Foobar, I would not be comfortable putting “FB” or “Foobar” in the name. I’m honestly on board with the Apache Foundation guidelines, where you’re not even supposed to say that Foobar is what you’re selling - it’s a proprietary service with a proprietary name which happens to be powered by Foobar. But the idea of an enforceable trademark right to stop people from accurately describing their derivative services is another thing where people often don’t want to hear the clear answer. Companies typically go much further than what’s actually required to avoid infringement, because frustrating the open source community you depend on isn’t worth the relatively modest benefits. The Wordpress dynamic is different, because their mark is already licensed to a commercial vendor and already causes routine confusion in that context.