5 ms·

Your customers, potential competitors, and even hyperscalers are all possibly the same people at different points. AGPL works because corporate lawyers are horr

by jchw 1y ago

Your customers, potential competitors, and even hyperscalers are all possibly the same people at different points. AGPL works because corporate lawyers are horrified by it, not because it actually discriminates against hyperscalers. If you find something that even sane lawyers wouldn't tolerate, then you have greatly limited the benefits of being open source in the first place. If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. If you want to protect your project from being resold by potential competitors, do not release it as open source. I think this problem might solve itself, though. Slowly but surely, companies and power users have become very wary of VC funded companies making big promises and big open source releases, with the knowledge that there is rarely a plan for sustainability and that there is a good chance if they stand on that rug it could be pulled later. Soon, if trends continue, the advantages that you once got from announcing something as open source will start to evaporate and turn into a liability as people start seeing ahead to the eventual "but of course we have to be able to monetize this eventually" stage. The way I see it, a project can always be open sourced later on once there's a way to do it and ensure the company can remain sustainable. For the flagship product of a company, especially a VC-funded company, not starting open source is the ethical thing to do.

resiros 1y ago
> For the flagship product of a company, especially a VC-funded company, not starting open source is the ethical thing to do. I can't even.. Seriously, I don't understand where your argument is coming from. Because, if you look at it from the greater good perspective, commercial open-source is one of the only venues to build high quality software that can be freely self-hosted, modified and built-upon. Yet, you basically push for people building closed source software, due to what I understand is dogmatic believe of what open-source should mean. > If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. Based on a definition, bought and sponsored by the hyperscaler lobbies. Why the hell would discriminating against hyperscaller selling the product makes it non "open-source". 99.9999% users of open-source are not hyperscaler wanting to host and sell the product and will get value from the project.
- jchw 1y ago
  Firstly, no it wasn't. The history of the open source definition and OSI are interesting, including hijacking a term that was already in use, but the hyperscalers had nothing to do with it. I'll avoid restating Wikipedia, it's enough to say that's not right. Secondly, you can call it whatever you want but "open source" licenses that discriminate against user and use case are useless. Even if I just want to use something like a data structure implementation from your "open source" release in some unrelated project, I now have to inherit all of this baggage about your competitors. That just doesn't make any sense. The endgame of that is an ecosystem of open source that ultimately serves absolutely nobody except for maybe startup PR needs.
  - resiros 1y ago
    > The endgame of that is an ecosystem of open source that ultimately serves absolutely nobody except for maybe startup PR needs. We self-host n8n, which by definition not open-source, and love it. It serves us. Not just n8n PR. That is the case for almost all self served products for non-commercial reasons
    - jchw 1y ago
      This is extremely confusing. I'm just talking about how it would harm the open source ecosystem if we allowed things that were not open source to be advertised as open source (and how it's bad when something is unopened after people start relying on it being open). I am not claiming that only open source software is good for society. Like, I don't really think it's a coincidence that GNU, DSFG and OSI all remain in relative agreement for decades over what makes something truly free or open source. They weren't all bought and sold by hyperscalers. There's reasons for the freedoms that are required to meet the definitions. On the other hand, I think you can release shared source and closed source software that is still plenty useful and beneficial. For example, I am a very big fan of how Unreal Engine is licensed. Yes, it isn't "open source" and it isn't marketed as such. You can't take Unreal Engine components and go use them elsewhere even if you're not competing with Epic Games. Still, they provide some extremely powerful and useful software free of charge to basically all independent game developers. I think that's fantastic. But that's all aside from what open source is. Unreal Engine isn't open source and it doesn't do anything for the open source ecosystem. Which is fine, because the entire world doesn't revolve around open source.
nkmnz 1y ago
> If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. No true scotsman.
- jchw 1y ago
  I would love to hear your explanation for why you think that statement is an invocation of "no true Scotsman" of all things. Are you sure you know what that means?
  - nkmnz 1y ago
    Because I anticipate the following: A: If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. B: But here are n open source projects that discriminate on user or use case, e.g. everything GPL, everything with dual license, etc. A: yeeeeeeaaaah, but those aren’t TRUE open source projects!!! A true open source project would never do that!

by jchw 1y ago

resiros 1y ago

> For the flagship product of a company, especially a VC-funded company, not starting open source is the ethical thing to do. I can't even.. Seriously, I don't understand where your argument is coming from. Because, if you look at it from the greater good perspective, commercial open-source is one of the only venues to build high quality software that can be freely self-hosted, modified and built-upon. Yet, you basically push for people building closed source software, due to what I understand is dogmatic believe of what open-source should mean. > If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. Based on a definition, bought and sponsored by the hyperscaler lobbies. Why the hell would discriminating against hyperscaller selling the product makes it non "open-source". 99.9999% users of open-source are not hyperscaler wanting to host and sell the product and will get value from the project.

jchw 1y ago
Firstly, no it wasn't. The history of the open source definition and OSI are interesting, including hijacking a term that was already in use, but the hyperscalers had nothing to do with it. I'll avoid restating Wikipedia, it's enough to say that's not right. Secondly, you can call it whatever you want but "open source" licenses that discriminate against user and use case are useless. Even if I just want to use something like a data structure implementation from your "open source" release in some unrelated project, I now have to inherit all of this baggage about your competitors. That just doesn't make any sense. The endgame of that is an ecosystem of open source that ultimately serves absolutely nobody except for maybe startup PR needs.
- resiros 1y ago
  > The endgame of that is an ecosystem of open source that ultimately serves absolutely nobody except for maybe startup PR needs. We self-host n8n, which by definition not open-source, and love it. It serves us. Not just n8n PR. That is the case for almost all self served products for non-commercial reasons
  - jchw 1y ago
    This is extremely confusing. I'm just talking about how it would harm the open source ecosystem if we allowed things that were not open source to be advertised as open source (and how it's bad when something is unopened after people start relying on it being open). I am not claiming that only open source software is good for society. Like, I don't really think it's a coincidence that GNU, DSFG and OSI all remain in relative agreement for decades over what makes something truly free or open source. They weren't all bought and sold by hyperscalers. There's reasons for the freedoms that are required to meet the definitions. On the other hand, I think you can release shared source and closed source software that is still plenty useful and beneficial. For example, I am a very big fan of how Unreal Engine is licensed. Yes, it isn't "open source" and it isn't marketed as such. You can't take Unreal Engine components and go use them elsewhere even if you're not competing with Epic Games. Still, they provide some extremely powerful and useful software free of charge to basically all independent game developers. I think that's fantastic. But that's all aside from what open source is. Unreal Engine isn't open source and it doesn't do anything for the open source ecosystem. Which is fine, because the entire world doesn't revolve around open source.

nkmnz 1y ago

> If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. No true scotsman.

jchw 1y ago
I would love to hear your explanation for why you think that statement is an invocation of "no true Scotsman" of all things. Are you sure you know what that means?
- nkmnz 1y ago
  Because I anticipate the following: A: If you make a license that actually discriminates on user or use case, then it's not open source. B: But here are n open source projects that discriminate on user or use case, e.g. everything GPL, everything with dual license, etc. A: yeeeeeeaaaah, but those aren’t TRUE open source projects!!! A true open source project would never do that!