- cross-posted to:
- foss@beehaw.org
- cross-posted to:
- foss@beehaw.org
TLDR: Companies should be required to pay developers for any open source software they use.
He imagines a simple yearly compliance process that gets companies all the rights they need to use Post-Open software. And they’d fund developers who would be encouraged to write software that’s usable by the common person, as opposed to technical experts.
It’s an interesting concept, but I don’t really see any feasible means to get this to kick off.
What are your thoughts on it?
I agree. Either use a business source license like Elastic and others, or fight for the installation of a third party that audits proprietary code for license use and sues if the rules haven’t been followed. It’s why I like the creative commons. They are quite realistic. Most of their licenses say: if you use this commercially, you have to pay. If not, then it’s free.
People who claim business source licenses are “not opensource” sound like such capitalist shills to me. It’s as if they’re shouting from the rooftops “it’s OK to fuck over opensource developers because principles matter more than reality”.
CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
This is nonsense, Business source is not a free license. It is useless to try to invent new and clever licenses if they don’t even follow the basic standards for Free software. The solution to helping hackers/devs in their work is not to suddenly reinvent proprietary licenses.
You might be discouraged to know that CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 is a non-free/proprietary license since it restricts commercial use.
There is no crude “fucking over.” Creating software is a difficult task, and creating software that respects the user’s freedom means giving up the temptation to use your abilities for harm and personal benefit.