[tbranyen]

Do you think Douglass Crockford didn't know that? He was being cheeky and doesn't care. This was also a huge pain point for JSHint and a lot of work went into undoing that by finding a single commit that didn't have the clause iirc.

[msdrigg]

I looked it up and found this interesting read: https://jshint.com/relicensing-2020/

[gabagool]

I read this and it is interesting. I get why asking JS Hint contributors to re-submit/approve their changes is clear of the Do No Evil clause.

But, I don't understand why all changes before that (from JS Lint Day 1 until it was forked into JS Hint) aren't subject to that same clause. Why is the Eclipse Foundation not subject to it?

[azornathogron]

The Eclipse Foundation received their copy of JSLint under the MIT Expat license, not the default no-evil license.

> Meanwhile, the author of JSLint permitted the Eclipse Foundation to relicense a version of JSLint using the MIT Expat license so that it could be included in their project named Orion

[Uehreka]

I guess some people might find it cheeky or funny to build an entire software product that does something people want, and then make it impossible for most people to use by adding a silly licensing clause. I’d consider it a huge waste of time, but hey, it’s not my project.

[dspillett]

> but hey, it’s not my project.

The correct attitude to have.

If the licence is not compatible with our desired use we have the choice to move on our try negotiate different terms (or both: try for different terms and move on if compromise cannot be achieved).

No creator is under any obligation to make their stuff useful to us.

[MaxBarraclough]

Right. It's probably the second worse place to put jokes, next to an employment contract.

[zarzavat]

Not really. Nobody actually pays attention to open source software licences whatever you write in them. They're just window dressing. Who isn't violating the attribution requirements of 1000-odd npm dependencies?

[MaxBarraclough]

> Nobody actually pays attention to open source software licences whatever you write in them. They're just window dressing.

Plainly untrue. Various companies (including Google and Apple) have strong opinions on the GPL licences, especially the GPLv3.

Many of us see it as a red flag when a seemingly Free and Open Source project turns out to use a licence approved by neither the FSF nor the OSI.

> Who isn't violating the attribution requirements of 1000-odd npm dependencies?

You may be right that much web frontend development is a sloppy free-for-all with no regard for compliance and no contact with the legal department, but not all software is developed on this basis.

[skissane]

That’s why attribution requirements are stupid. Of course, as a matter of politeness and ethics, one ought to acknowledge the work of others you build upon. But elevating it from an informal principle to a formal legal requirement puts people in the unpleasant position of having either to deal with endless and ever-changing attribution bureaucracy, or just ignore it all and hope nobody ever complains (or sues). Zero attribution licenses don’t do that to people.

[the_pwner224]

It makes it impossible for most organizations to use, not for most people to use.

[JoshTriplett]

It also makes it impossible for Open Source projects to use and depend on. This isn't a companies-vs-people thing; people and projects who care about their users should not go "meh, whatever" about software licensing.

[pessimizer]

Does Crockford care about Open Source?

People who aren't doing evil can use it. It's not compatible with FOSS. It's a linter, it doesn't require being incorporated into people's projects.

Making it proprietary would be more limiting, making it Free would also be limiting (in a good way imo.) He chose to make it his way.

[JoshTriplett]

And many people chose not to use it as a result, despite having no desire to do "evil". People can certainly license software however they like, and other people can complain about that and build replacements, as JSHint did.

> It's a linter, it doesn't require being incorporated into people's projects.

Many things do want to depend on tools that process source code, such as bundlers, IDEs, transpilers, and similar.

[jdmichal]

You're free to contact the owner(s) to negotiate a different license.