2 ms·

Of course the topic of spirit-vs-letter of Open Source is worth discussing. (I've personally meditated quite a lot on "open governance" vs. "open source", which

Of course the topic of spirit-vs-letter of Open Source is worth discussing. (I've personally meditated quite a lot on "open governance" vs. "open source", which is tangential but related). But I think your portrayal of FOSS advocates at large as unconcerned about the spirit vs. letter of open source compliance is wildly inaccurate. If anything FOSS communities discuss such topics obsessively. (How many bits have been spilled onto the internet about TiVo-isation?) Also, see pxc's excellent analysis elsethread for an illustration of the utility of the OSD: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41693457 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41693457

Pannoniae 2y ago
Thank you for your insight, I really appreciate it! >If anything FOSS communities discuss such topics obsessively. I don't see this the same way. Whenever topics like these come up, "quoting the OSI definition word-by-word" is a fairly a common moral argument. (See every Mongo/SSPL or ElasticSearch thread on this site and you'll see) While there is definitely discussion of this, you are entirely right, there's a substantial proportion of people (I'm not claiming that it's necessarily the majority or anything - but influential enough to derail or block things) who do not take the spirit of the Free Software movement into account at all. At a glance, many arguments against these licenses don't come from a viewpoint that these licenses violate the spirit of Free Software - they just mechanically quote the OSI freedoms without any critical evaluation or moral reasoning. pxc's analysis is great and morally I definitely agree with it. I don't think that most people agree with it though - which legitimises the VSCode "open-source" approach.