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I don't expect anyone here arguing for the GPL (in an predominately neoconservative community like hacker news). So anyways, I make the conscious decision to us

by rlx0x 13y ago

I don't expect anyone here arguing for the GPL (in an predominately neoconservative community like hacker news). So anyways, I make the conscious decision to use GPL, because it protects my work from exploitation by others (corporations are people too my friend, right?)

sramsay 13y ago
I am absolutely amazed by the reactions in this thread. I don't know if HN readers are bunch of neo-cons (I'm certainly not), but I wonder if people feel threatened by the GPL, because they are current or aspirational entrepreneurs who think the GPL gets in the way of their making a lot of money.
- profquail 13y ago
  I don't think HN readers in general are neoconservative, mostly quite the opposite. I do, however, think many HN readers have a strong libertarian streak. In this case, when I say "libertarian", I mean true libertarianism (not the "tea party"-ish faction of the Republican party). In this respect, I imagine most HN'ers prefer the BSD/MIT/Apache 2.0 licenses not because they want to make money off of free software in the future, but because they value personal freedom and extend those beliefs to their own software development. In other words, they want to use free/open software to avoid being trampled on by some company, but they're also not OK with being pushed around by any other "free" software developers. Read a bit of this article and you'll see what I mean: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism
  - sramsay 13y ago
    "when I say 'libertarian,' I mean true libertarianism . . ." Talking about "true libertarianism" is no different than talking about "true conservatism," "true feminism," "true Marxism" or anything else -- these terms are all historically fluid, and accusing one another of not being "true" is one of the main activities among communities who unite under the supposed unity of an ideological stance. Richard Stallman, it should be noted, has also been called a libertarian (http://actonline.org/act-blog/archives/1147 http://actonline.org/act-blog/archives/1147). But yes, you're probably right in the main about their not liking to be pushed around by others. Still, that describes a vast cross-section of human society.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
dragonwriter 13y ago
> I don't expect anyone here arguing for the GPL (in an predominately neoconservative community like hacker news) HN may be predominantly politically conservative, but it seems a lot more neoliberal than neoconservative. > So anyways, I make the conscious decision to use GPL, because it protects my work from exploitation by others (corporations are people too my friend, right?) That is the basic difference between GPL and permissive licenses. GPL is for stopping people from doing things with your work, BSD/MIT/etc. is for permitting people to do what they will.

by rlx0x 13y ago

sramsay 13y ago

I am absolutely amazed by the reactions in this thread. I don't know if HN readers are bunch of neo-cons (I'm certainly not), but I wonder if people feel threatened by the GPL, because they are current or aspirational entrepreneurs who think the GPL gets in the way of their making a lot of money.

profquail 13y ago
I don't think HN readers in general are neoconservative, mostly quite the opposite. I do, however, think many HN readers have a strong libertarian streak. In this case, when I say "libertarian", I mean true libertarianism (not the "tea party"-ish faction of the Republican party). In this respect, I imagine most HN'ers prefer the BSD/MIT/Apache 2.0 licenses not because they want to make money off of free software in the future, but because they value personal freedom and extend those beliefs to their own software development. In other words, they want to use free/open software to avoid being trampled on by some company, but they're also not OK with being pushed around by any other "free" software developers. Read a bit of this article and you'll see what I mean: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism
- sramsay 13y ago
  "when I say 'libertarian,' I mean true libertarianism . . ." Talking about "true libertarianism" is no different than talking about "true conservatism," "true feminism," "true Marxism" or anything else -- these terms are all historically fluid, and accusing one another of not being "true" is one of the main activities among communities who unite under the supposed unity of an ideological stance. Richard Stallman, it should be noted, has also been called a libertarian (http://actonline.org/act-blog/archives/1147 http://actonline.org/act-blog/archives/1147). But yes, you're probably right in the main about their not liking to be pushed around by others. Still, that describes a vast cross-section of human society.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]

dragonwriter 13y ago

> I don't expect anyone here arguing for the GPL (in an predominately neoconservative community like hacker news) HN may be predominantly politically conservative, but it seems a lot more neoliberal than neoconservative. > So anyways, I make the conscious decision to use GPL, because it protects my work from exploitation by others (corporations are people too my friend, right?) That is the basic difference between GPL and permissive licenses. GPL is for stopping people from doing things with your work, BSD/MIT/etc. is for permitting people to do what they will.