[dingaling]

> it's not about the letter of the licensing, it's about the spirit

If it's not in black and white then it's not part of the license. Spirit isn't defined.

To paraphrase Theo de Raadt, if you're not happy for your code to be used in a puppy mulching machine then don't license it under a permissive license.

[benjaminjosephw]

Open source culture is so much more than the licenses. A license dictates what is legally permissible but it doesn't mean that there aren't other cultural expectations that go with that.

Eric Raymond famously wrote about the customs of open source in Homesteading the Noosphere: "I have observed these customs in action for 20 years, going back to the pre-FSF ancient history of open-source software. They have several very interesting features. One of the most interesting is that most hackers have followed them without being fully aware of doing so."[0]

It is possible for us to have norms of mutual respect beyond what is legally required. I think those norms are actually at the heart of open source and have been since the beginning. I hope we never abandon them just because they are "not in black and white".

[0] - http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/homestead...

[pwdisswordfish4]

It's off-the-charts irony to point ESR's observations to try to validate the author's response here, and to frame it in the terms of some monolithic "open source culture". The brogrammer devops culture in 2020 is starkly different from its forebears—the two hacker cultures in focus in CatB. In fact, the entire premise of the book (it's in the name!) is a commentary on the distinction of cultures and the risk of misleading yourself if you're not thinking clearly and make the mistake of conflating them.

[ncmncm]

Eric Raymond is probably the least reliable narrator of a Free Software ethos that one could pick.

[branweb]

Not trying to troll you, just wanna know: why is that?

[ncmncm]

Short answer, ideological extremism.

[GordonS]

In theory, yes.

But Amazon is a member of the OSS community, and AWS relies heavily on developers, many of whom care a great deal about the spirit of OSS and being a good and responsible member of the community.

[nickff]

Other people are saying this, but AWS is taking a reputational risk here. If things get bad enough, we could end up with no-Amazon clauses in OSS.

[SpelingBeeChamp]

So?

[nickff]

Parent was questioning whether 'spirit' mattered, and I am pointing out one good reason.

[melenaboija]

When someone publishes code with permissive licenses has to expect that all kind of users will take advantage of it in different ways.

That does not mean that is probably doing it for the ones that will be graceful of it. Opensource is not just about licenses but a way of creating.