28 ms·

Doesn't the AGPL cover this problem?

• blasdel 17y ago
  No, because exceedingly few people are wanky enough to consider it. It's basically a shrinkwrap EULA -- and about as legally enforceable -- the restrictions it adds on top of the GPL have no basis in copyright law. On top of that nobody's going to notice if you break it's rules, and there's no enforcement mechanism anyway. The only logical reason for its existence is so that you could open-source an end-of-life product in a form that noone else could legitimately pick it up and take your place. Poisoning the well.
  • jrockway 17y ago
    I don't think this is entirely accurate. I am AGPL-ing a lot of new open-source software. The intention is not to poison the well, but rather to ensure that all users of the software have the same freedom to modify it, even if they are users of a modified copy. It also ensures that contributers' contributions won't become proprietary. If you send me a patch, you know that the software has to stay free forever; you can fork the project and have all the rights you did as a contributer to the original. As for enforceability, that might be tough. The point of the license is to help keep honest people honest. If someone wants to steal your code, they are going to do it whether or not they think the license is enforceable. (Look at all the piracy of closed-source software, and all the blatant violations of the GPL. Nobody cares what the license says, they just do what they want.)