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It's sad that Crockford thinks that causing this kind of hassle to diligent users of his software is funny. Ha ha, stupid user, you took the legally binding jo

It's sad that Crockford thinks that causing this kind of hassle to diligent users of his software is funny. Ha ha, stupid user, you took the legally binding joke which I inserted into a legally binding license seriously, hahah you sooo funny. Yeah, a real barrel of laughs. Never mind that licensing law is a lot less flexible than contract law, in which unreasonable terms are readily removed.

iSnow 14y ago
Writing OpenSource software used to be a real of real amateurs, people who do it because they love to do that stuff and derive fun out of it. Now, it seems, the license has become the most important aspect in this. IMHO, this is a most unfortunate development, sadly driven by license fundamentalists like Debian. It is high time that someone like Crockford throws a fistful of sand in those gears and causes butthurt. Maybe this will cause at least some people to start thinking again instead blindly following the perceived neccessities of some special OSS project. And yes, if the Debian folk are this worried, it should be a matter of days to invent "GNU JSON (now with a proper LICENSE so we can kiss more enterprise ass)"
- rwmj 14y ago
  "license fundamentalists" ...? You mean, "people trying to obey the law and not get sued"?
  - iSnow 14y ago
    Wake me when Crockford gets sued for his "license".
archangel_one 14y ago
Well, those diligent users can reimplement the software if they don't like it. It's only the implementation that's got that clause, not the spec. Obviously that's not easy for them to do, but nobody says they have to use his implementation if they don't like the terms it's licensed under.
- andreasvc 14y ago
  You're painting a picture of a way out that doesn't exist for most people (reverse straw man?). When it's about a library on which a lot of software depends then the common non-programmer has had absolutely no choice about this and cannot re-implement either.
  - archangel_one 14y ago
    Right, but that's not the fault of the original author. He licensed his code a particular way, and everyone else has the choice to either use it or not. I don't like the attitude of blaming him simply because lots of other people came to depend on it without realising that it's less free than some of them might have liked.
    - WayneDB 14y ago
      Maybe we don't have to blame him for anything, but we can still have the opinion that he's a childish asshole.
      - TeMPOraL 14y ago
        But why? I personally think that his joke was, in fact, funny.
      - sbuk 14y ago
        Arguably the same can be said for people that feel the urge to do so, doubly so for calling it "evil".
      - irahul 14y ago
        > but we can still have the opinion that he's a childish asshole. We can also have the opinion that people who believe that someone who wrote a free software and gave the implementation for free should play by their rules and only use license which plays nice with their software are childish, entitled assholes.
  - darkarmani 14y ago
michaelt 14y ago
Software licensing is already a joke - he's just being honest about it.
theorique 14y ago
Seems like a real, major user requested a clarification / amendment to their software license in order to use the software. Crockford granted such a clarification / amendment. I don't see the problem here. Software is written and licensed by people, and is susceptible to their quirks and foibles.
- Evbn 14y ago
  The solution for the anti-joke contingent is to organize a mass flood of exemption requests for Crockford to deal with.
  - ygra 14y ago
    He isn't obliged to even answer them :-) That's just a courtesy and if abused he might just as well say “take it under the license as is or don't; I won't make exceptions anymore”.
tptacek 14y ago
It's sad that Crockford wrote a piece of code and gave it away for free in such a way that some people feel they can't use it? How much sadder than all the code every YC company writes and doesn't publish at all?
- monochromatic 14y ago
  If others are encouraged to make similar "jokes," yes.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    So, just to be clear, your take is that the authors of software are not in fact entitled to use whatever license they please?
    - monochromatic 14y ago
      Obviously they are, and I don't think anyone here is arguing otherwise. Are you focusing on that point because it's the only one that makes this seem acceptable? The question is whether it is harmful to free software to put unfunny non-jokes like this into licenses. The answer is "yes, it is."
      - tptacek 14y ago
        No, it isn't. It is harmful for free software projects to blindly incorporate software with incompatible licenses. It is not harmful to write software with incompatible licenses. Most software written is incompatible with Debian. With very few exceptions (for instance, the sole-sourced drivers to popular peripherals), none of it actively harms the project. Debian is not entitled to Douglas Crockford's work and therefore Crockford cannot harm Debian through incompatibility. Someone else can write a replacement JSON library; it's an intern-level project.
    - lucisferre 14y ago
      How is anyone making that argument? From what I can see all people are saying is that making an obtuse licencing clause is a bit of an asshole thing to do. I can't see why anyone would disagree with that either.

iSnow 14y ago

Writing OpenSource software used to be a real of real amateurs, people who do it because they love to do that stuff and derive fun out of it. Now, it seems, the license has become the most important aspect in this. IMHO, this is a most unfortunate development, sadly driven by license fundamentalists like Debian. It is high time that someone like Crockford throws a fistful of sand in those gears and causes butthurt. Maybe this will cause at least some people to start thinking again instead blindly following the perceived neccessities of some special OSS project. And yes, if the Debian folk are this worried, it should be a matter of days to invent "GNU JSON (now with a proper LICENSE so we can kiss more enterprise ass)"

rwmj 14y ago
"license fundamentalists" ...? You mean, "people trying to obey the law and not get sued"?
- iSnow 14y ago
  Wake me when Crockford gets sued for his "license".

archangel_one 14y ago

Well, those diligent users can reimplement the software if they don't like it. It's only the implementation that's got that clause, not the spec. Obviously that's not easy for them to do, but nobody says they have to use his implementation if they don't like the terms it's licensed under.

andreasvc 14y ago
You're painting a picture of a way out that doesn't exist for most people (reverse straw man?). When it's about a library on which a lot of software depends then the common non-programmer has had absolutely no choice about this and cannot re-implement either.
- archangel_one 14y ago
  Right, but that's not the fault of the original author. He licensed his code a particular way, and everyone else has the choice to either use it or not. I don't like the attitude of blaming him simply because lots of other people came to depend on it without realising that it's less free than some of them might have liked.
  - WayneDB 14y ago
    Maybe we don't have to blame him for anything, but we can still have the opinion that he's a childish asshole.
    - TeMPOraL 14y ago
      But why? I personally think that his joke was, in fact, funny.
    - sbuk 14y ago
      Arguably the same can be said for people that feel the urge to do so, doubly so for calling it "evil".
    - irahul 14y ago
      > but we can still have the opinion that he's a childish asshole. We can also have the opinion that people who believe that someone who wrote a free software and gave the implementation for free should play by their rules and only use license which plays nice with their software are childish, entitled assholes.
- darkarmani 14y ago

michaelt 14y ago

Software licensing is already a joke - he's just being honest about it.

theorique 14y ago

Seems like a real, major user requested a clarification / amendment to their software license in order to use the software. Crockford granted such a clarification / amendment. I don't see the problem here. Software is written and licensed by people, and is susceptible to their quirks and foibles.

Evbn 14y ago
The solution for the anti-joke contingent is to organize a mass flood of exemption requests for Crockford to deal with.
- ygra 14y ago
  He isn't obliged to even answer them :-) That's just a courtesy and if abused he might just as well say “take it under the license as is or don't; I won't make exceptions anymore”.

tptacek 14y ago

It's sad that Crockford wrote a piece of code and gave it away for free in such a way that some people feel they can't use it? How much sadder than all the code every YC company writes and doesn't publish at all?

monochromatic 14y ago
If others are encouraged to make similar "jokes," yes.
- tptacek 14y ago
  So, just to be clear, your take is that the authors of software are not in fact entitled to use whatever license they please?
  - monochromatic 14y ago
    Obviously they are, and I don't think anyone here is arguing otherwise. Are you focusing on that point because it's the only one that makes this seem acceptable? The question is whether it is harmful to free software to put unfunny non-jokes like this into licenses. The answer is "yes, it is."
    - tptacek 14y ago
      No, it isn't. It is harmful for free software projects to blindly incorporate software with incompatible licenses. It is not harmful to write software with incompatible licenses. Most software written is incompatible with Debian. With very few exceptions (for instance, the sole-sourced drivers to popular peripherals), none of it actively harms the project. Debian is not entitled to Douglas Crockford's work and therefore Crockford cannot harm Debian through incompatibility. Someone else can write a replacement JSON library; it's an intern-level project.
  - lucisferre 14y ago
    How is anyone making that argument? From what I can see all people are saying is that making an obtuse licencing clause is a bit of an asshole thing to do. I can't see why anyone would disagree with that either.