| ▲ | evanelias 3 days ago |
| > I don't understand what open source purism even is. I believe GP is referring to the behavior of users, not the developer. That is, an increasingly large segment of the industry refuses to touch software using non-OSI-approved licenses. Open source purists view non-OSI "source available" licenses with the same disdain as fully proprietary closed-source software. In turn, this situation makes it extremely hard for independent-minded developers to form businesses for any software that doesn't lend itself well to SaaS. Massive companies can afford to release things as FOSS, but smaller/bootstrapped businesses effectively cannot. Compare this to a few decades ago: the industry used to be less dogmatic regarding licenses, and there were a lot more smaller independent software vendors. |
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| ▲ | tsimionescu 2 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| A good part of why this is is that, with a source-available license, you are almost as much at the mercy of the company developing the software as with proprietary software. Sure, it's nice that you can read the code, maybe workaround certain bugs, or audit it for security. But, crucially, if the company decides to change their terms ask for much more money, or just refuse to do business with you, or goes out of business, you're in just as bad a situation as if you were buying Oracle software. You will have to replace them with new software, you won't have a choice to continue development or find a new vendor to support it for you. |
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| ▲ | evanelias 2 days ago | parent [-] | | How so, specifically? Can you provide examples of why this is the case with common non-OSI licenses such as SSPL, BSL, Functional Source License, or Fair Core License? |
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| ▲ | toast0 3 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| > In turn, this situation makes it extremely hard for independent-minded developers to form businesses for any software that doesn't lend itself well to SaaS. People and companies don't want to pay for software. That's what makes it hard to form a business around selling software. If your software is actually free, then it is easier to get people to use it, but that doesn't help you form a business. A few decades ago, people and businesses also didn't like to pay for software, but saw fewer actually free options available. |
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| ▲ | evanelias 3 days ago | parent [-] | | No, that's tangential to what's being discussed in this subthread. You're talking "free as in beer" (gratis), but open source purists ostensibly care about "free as in freedom" (libre). The key point here is that "source available" software is still gratis, and yet the open source purists shun it -- often quite vocally, even if the software doesn't claim to be "open source". This means if you're launching an independent software business, and you choose licensing terms that protect your own interests (such as Fair Source), the vocal ill-will from open source purists could be very harmful to the viability of your business. But if you choose FOSS instead, then larger companies will eat your lunch. I believe this is what was meant upthread regarding "open source purism only benefits the leeches". And lately some purists have been moving the goalposts even more. Just a few days ago, I saw a comment on here where someone claimed AGPL is "open-washing" if a CLA is required for contributions. That's especially ridiculous, since there's literally no other way to sustainably develop AGPL software directly supported by business revenue. (Without a CLA or CAA on external code contributions, a creator of AGPL software cannot legally host their own SaaS.) This status quo only helps big tech incumbents. And given how ageist tech companies can be, it's depressing to see so many programmers espouse this type of licensing puritanism. This will only serve to prevent them from launching their own businesses in the future, once they're too old to be hired by the big layoff-happy tech companies benefiting from this licensing in the first place. | | |
| ▲ | tsimionescu 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | > Without a CLA or CAA on external code contributions, a creator of AGPL software cannot legally host their own SaaS What do you mean? Anyone can run AGPL software, either the creator, a contributor, or anyone else, as long as they abide by the terms of the license. You are absolutely allowed to ask for money for an AGPL service, the only restriction is that you must make the source code available under the AGPL for anyone who pays to use the software. | | |
| ▲ | evanelias 2 days ago | parent [-] | | In the "paid SaaS" situation, the SaaS version almost always has proprietary changes and enhancements, which are infeasible to open-source without ruining the business. With the code fully available, since anyone else can then launch an identical business on the same codebase, there's little chance for the project creator's own business to succeed, as it can't stand out on feature-set. With a CLA on third-party contributions, the project creator can still operate an enhanced SaaS without that massive problem. And revenue from the business can then support sustainable development of the project as a whole. fwiw, I have recently seen at least two "Show HN" posts where the author was running an enhanced paid SaaS on their AGPL project, which accepted many contributions without a CLA, but did not offer the enhanced SaaS codebase to users. That's a clear copyright violation and any of those contributors can sue the project creator if they wish; this is what I meant by "cannot legally host their own SaaS" although in retrospect I should have clarified the scenario. | | |
| ▲ | tsimionescu a day ago | parent [-] | | > With the code fully available, since anyone else can then launch an identical business on the same codebase, there's little chance for the project creator's own business to succeed, as it can't stand out on feature-set. This is not at all clear on the face of it. For example, RedHat has succeeded as a company for a very long time (ultimately getting themselves bought out by IBM for a very good price) by just selling support for Linux and other open source packages, even though anyone could just run CentOS and get the exact same code for most of this duration. The point of the GPL and AGPL is to not allow any company to have a monopoly on code that users run - including the company that built that code in the first place. Subverting it with a CLA and first party proprietary extensions is a direct strike at its core purpose. I doubt you'll find many people willing to sign a CLA whose explicit goal is to prevent the main purpose of the AGPL. | | |
| ▲ | evanelias 18 hours ago | parent [-] | | RedHat killed off CentOS in its previous form. RedHat also now has a written policy of terminating customers who exercise their GPL rights of republishing RHEL source code. That seems like subverting the GPL far worse than a CLA. If that's the best example here, then that already speaks volumes. Perhaps you can list some other examples of successful businesses who offer their core product under AGPL without a CLA? As far as I've ever seen, when AGPL software is built by a business, a CLA is used. To quote Heather Meeker: "In privately funded business, AGPL is almost always used as part of a dual licensing strategy [...] Vendors almost always use a contribution license (CLA) for contributions from the community." https://heathermeeker.com/2023/10/13/agpl-in-the-light-of-da... |
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| ▲ | toast0 3 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | > but open source purists ostensibly care about "free as in freedom" (libre). Your business is unlikely to get revenue from these customers, so your business shouldn't feel an obligation to satisfy them. | | |
| ▲ | evanelias 3 days ago | parent [-] | | That absolutely isn't true as a blanket statement. It varies a lot in terms of B2B vs B2C, distribution model, etc. With B2B software using the popular model of "paid hosted SaaS + libre self-host", you can definitely get revenue from companies who happen to employ some open source purists. Ditto with the model of "libre self-host with paid technical support". But all of this is much harder with a non-OSI license, since the open source purists will protest, regardless of whether or not the company is even running the self-host version. Software adoption also tends to follow network effects, so having any contingent of vocal people complaining about license choice is bad news for a business. |
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