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by oihujyfgthyjuik 5562 days ago
Depend s- is your app commercially viable if you have to re-implement all the GPL stuff I wrote for you yourself?

If you are using my GPL contributions for free then you can't turn around and stop your customers using those contributions.
1 comments
chc 5562 days ago
Yes, but I can do that if I'm using your BSD-licensed contributions. That's why we're saying that, from the perspective of a commercial software vendor, BSD ensures more freedom.
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tptacek 5562 days ago
GPL is moderately less free than BSD/MIT.

GPL is significantly more free than closed-source commercial.

Two groups of people are negatively impacted by the GPL.

First, people who want to ship closed-source versions of code they didn't write in exchange for money, against the will of the package author. Hard to feel sorry for these people.

Second, people with BSD/MIT/Apache licensed open source project who want to make it possible for other people to ship closed-source versions of their code for money. A valid concern, but a pragmatic one, not an ideological one. BSD gives away "too much"; GPL holds back "too much". There's no happy medium.

Let's take the ideological cast off this ("freedom", "commercial", "semantic games"). The issue here is simple and practical.

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oihujyfgthyjuik 5562 days ago
It also ensures you can take my work for free, keep it to yourself and not pass on my contribution to other people.

I can also come around and clean out your gutters for free.

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chc 5562 days ago
I'm not asking you to clean my gutters for free. I'm asking you to stop saying you'll clean my gutters for free, but sticking in the fine print "$5000 fee required for access to free gutter service."

To drop the metaphor: I'm not saying that you can't license your code under GPL. If you don't want me using your software, that's your right. By placing the code under GPL, you are communicating that I am not free to use the software as I please. That is, again, your right — all I ask is that you be honest about the fact that use of the code is very much restricted.

If anybody using your code is effectively barred from commercial endeavors, then for people who make money off their software, it does not grant them any more freedom than closed-source code does. To say a license grants freedom because you're free not to use the code is just weird.

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tptacek 5562 days ago
Are you looking for someone to say "never use the BSD license" so you can argue with them? Because nobody's saying that. GPL is an option when you care if people commercialize your work. BSD is an option when you don't.
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