free VS free
Seems like my favourite discussion is back. In the ring two guys: Zed Shaw, the developer of lamson and mongrel, on the other side we have Jacob Kaplan-Moss Django's BDFL.
This time the discussion seems to be entitled "Because the only thing better than an arbitrarily restrictive license is an ambiguously restrictive license" [via twitter]. I won't warm up the discussion with new arguments (promised) but what I found most interesting about the discussion is Zed's blog post why he's using the (A/L)GPL. Basically what he's saying is that he does not want to be burned again like he was with Mongrel and uses the GPL to force people to contribute.
I'm not exactly sure how that supports freedom. I might be idealistic here, but what motivates me the most about the open source libraries I work on is how they are used. I got mails from developers in many companies that are using various Pocoo libraries internally and cannot contribute patches due to restrictions in the company structure. Every once in a while I get patches those developers craft in their free time and very often I don't get any. However the point is, that I can see people using my stuff which motivates.
I'm not making money with my libraries, but that's probably because I'm not a friend of selling code. I love to give the stuff away I'm working on, and get payed for support if one needs it. And so far this worked flawlessly for me.
Forcing people to freedom is not exactly my definition of being free.
So dear users: Use my stuff, have fun with it. And letting me know that you're doing is the best reward I can think of. And if you can contribute patches, that's even better.
I'm not coming down on either side of this debate, but I must ask how anyone's being "forced" to do anything? If you could be forced to use someone else's code, then you'd be forced to accept the associated license terms, but you're under no obligation to use anyone else's code.
I agree that forcing freedom doesn't really create freedom, but not clearly stating your terms of freedom doesn't create freedom either.
— Wyatt Baldwin on Tuesday, July 14, 2009 22:48 #
As far as I can tell, it really doesn't much matter if you use a GPL-ish or BSD-ish license if you're after attribution, because "end users" (non-contributors whom use your software) aren't compelled to tell you a damn thing either way. And these folks make up 99.999% of the audience of any popular piece of software. "Building a brand" is more than just releasing software (although releasing obviously helps).
Personally, I expect absolutely nothing from anyone who uses my software; this attitude comes in handy when someone does provide a patch or kudos or whatever, bonus! ;-) I quit a development job more than 10 years ago and doing stuff since then based on Python and open source (releasing lots along the way) has sustained me nicely since then, how could I complain?
BTW, I use your stuff and enjoy using it a lot. That's not even a lie! ;-)
— Chris McDonough on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 0:09 #
Hi,
I've just released pocoo-plus. Which is pocoo plus AWESOME.
The awesome includes binaries, and other AWESOME. Luckily it doesn't include the source code.
I am going to get all of the current pocoo users to use pocoo-plus(AWESOME).
(sorry pocoo-plus users, I will charge lots of $ and then disapear very soon, but you can always ask the pocoo author for updates... which unfortunately because of a lack of AWESOME and source code, he won't be able to give. Unfortunately for the pocoo-plus users, they don't have access to the source anymore.)
Does pocoo-plus sound like any of those companies who are closing up pocoo, and adding their own AWESOME and then selling it on without source?
— Rene Dudfield on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 0:13 #
Armin,
Not sure about the above debate, but very grateful for your time and free code you have put out there for the rest of us to benefit from. Thanks.
— Randy Syring on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 2:59 #
Personally, I license my stuff under permissive licenses because it's my hope that it increases the ratio of good-to-bad code in the world (assuming, of course, that my code is good!). If someone adds AWESOME to it, sells it to users, then disappears, that makes me happy that those users are stuck with code that's at least partially good, rather than all bad.
I haven't done a significant amount of free software writing, so perhaps my opinion will change in time, as Zed's did. shrug
— Xiong Chiamiov on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 3:04 #
Zed's declared beef is that he produced a superior product but sold it at commodity prices (zero). If only he had gone with a GPL license instead of BSD he could have price discriminated between the never-would-pay users and the would-pay users; that if he had gon with GPL he would have got some advertising for free and more customers on the paying end.
I prefer BSD-ish licenses iff I'm releasing an open source product because it means more users which means more contributors and hence more patches and hence a better product. If I thought the product was superior enough that people should be paying cashey money for it I wouldn't make it open source in the first place.
Zed seems to think the sweet spot is to use the GPL to garnish feedback from the people who wouldn't pay anyway and money from those that would. Neat, but he takes a lot of ranting to miss that point.
— Jack Diederich on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 5:19 #
I (and my company too) don't see any difference in using MIT-licensed and LGPL-licensed library code. Sometimes we must integrate free code with proprietary libraries from those big guys like Microsoft and Adobe, but as long as we do not have GPL in license box everything is OK, so I think it's a non-problem from pragmatic POV.
From other side, we report bugs, make patches, translations and sometimes write docs so there's "some return" (for some value of "some"), but the value we add to free code is not proprtional to the value we get.
— zgoda on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 7:23 #
@3: technology does not solve social problems, neither do licenses. If you want to be a jerk, the GPL won't stop you either. Especially not because legal disputes cost a lot of money and time.
— Armin Ronacher on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 8:37 #
@Armin. Technology DOES solve social problems, in the sense that individuals/groups of people need technology to help them in their lives. The promotion of software that helps society out on mass is important. That software has to be free. It has to be secure from becoming unsupported and useless to worthwhile individuals that do not have the time, money to maintain it themselves. It is unlikely that code that gives a company a competitive advantage will be given back to the community at large. If they don't, then I don't want those companies to exist as they give very little long term benefit to humanity (maybe some short term functionality that no-one outside the company learns from). In my experience, such companies contribute very little anyway, especially to software that helps other organizations that are socially responsible (charities, not for prorits etc). It is a big shame there is this split between BSD and GPL only because of the fact that BSD import GPL is not allowed and there are many worthwhile BSD projects out there, like yours. For that reason its pragmatic to help other BSDers to go BSD and I would probably do it myself for some projects. However, pragmatism aside, GPL is morally more correct as in a perfect world every bit of knowledge would be shared, and society itself should promote that. Licences do not solve social problems, you are right, however they do express intentions of how you want society to be.
— david on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 12:39 #
If you don't force freedom, then other people will use your code and steal the freedom of their users/costumers.
It's more like "ensuring" freedom than "forcing" it.
— hasenj on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 13:41 #
Well to be fair, his post isn't for or against "freedom." (Whatever that means...)
I got the impression that many people were complaining to him about his choice of license and he felt an explanation was in order.
It's a pretty thorough and reasonable one I might add, and one that he shouldn't have to justify in the first place.
— j_king on Wednesday, July 15, 2009 14:54 #
If patches are welcome, then what format should they have? A hg bundle seems not to be good enough... ;)
— René L. on Wednesday, July 22, 2009 12:23 #
Ideally you'd have some hg repo one can clone from. You could start one on bitbucket.org for example, work on that and then just file a pull request or ask #pocoo on IRC to pull.
— Christopher Denter on Friday, July 24, 2009 13:50 #