[fetzu]

To be fair, I think that what we are seeing happening to Chromium has little to do with it being open source and more with the fact that it has essentially become the de facto web browser. If google released an entirely rewritten and closed-source version of Chrome tomorrow, 95% of the people would not bat an eye and keep using it.

Corporations contributing to FOSS have agenda, but so have individuals. Being open source isn’t everything, but it is a damn good start.

[hunterb123]

So GP would be justified in preferring the FOSS solution if it meets their technical requirements vs the commercial OSS solution because at one point they could be the only option and abuse that network effect / monopoly.

My point was it's who is developing the software because it takes effort for another maintainer to step up and it doesn't always happen. Also if a commercial company digs a big enough moat with the open source product they could abuse it, so do you trust them now?

Similar to Google abusing Chromium, Castopod could one day be in that position if you don't support FOSS alternatives today. That would be the mindset to put yourself in.

That being said, I don't think it matters as much as the browser space, but I'm not in the podcast community. I could see though that it could potentially be very costly to have a monopoly for podcast hosting, but currently that's Spotify right?

Note: I have no preference here, just assuming what motivates GP's preference.

[fetzu]

I think the first paragraph captures the core of the issue: which solution best meets their requirements. I don’t have a podcast (yet!), but it seems like the two projects don’t have the exact same feature set.

Isn’t it the beauty of open source that you and I are able to take that project and make it “better”? That we are able to maintain it with our time and energy?

The mindset of “FOSS or nothing” (FOSS in the sense of “not supported by corporate interests”) is noble but also a little bit naive. Nothing is free, and even the greatest FOSS projects rely on corporate and individual contributions (monetary or otherwise). I think that wholesale dismissing an (F)OSS product because it is backed by a commercial company is just showing them that the alternative (closed source software) is the more sensible choice.

Chrome-imium did not become the default because it was open-source and no other better “FOSS” alternatives were available, it did because it has relentlessly been pushed to users on the single most visited webpage in the world for years. If you and I did not use Chrome (which we probably both don’t, I’ll allow to infer from your stance), Chrome would still be the de facto browser today. Is this better than another “strictly” FOSS browser being the de facto default? No. Is it better than a closed source browser (Netscape or IE) being the de facto browser? Definitely, at least we could/can fork it.

[2Gkashmiri]

>Castopod could one day be in that position if you don't support FOSS alternatives today. That would be the mindset to put yourself in.

they can't turn an AGPL license code into proprietary one. Open source and FOSS are similar but ideologically different beasts. One gives the downstream developer to decide the license of their work, including the ability of allowing them to turn it into proprietary code while FOSS forces all code to be foss and never proprietary

>Similar to Google abusing Chromium

chromium is under BSD while this is under AGPL. there is a world of difference between these two licenses. One allows proprietary forks while another forbids it.

[Tomte]

You have idiosyncratic definitions. BSD licenses are FOSS licenses. Open Source is a proper subset of FOSS (Free and Open Source Software).

[tpush]

> Open Source is a proper subset of FOSS (Free and Open Source Software).

Other way around.

[Tomte]

You all are confusing Free Software with FOSS.

FOSS is "Open Source" and "Free Software", where "and" means union, not intersection.

Obviously OSS cannot be a superset (more than) FOSS.

[tpush]

Huh, I always took it to mean intersection, but it does make more sense the other way around!

[_emacsomancer_]

What is an example of something which is Free but not Open Source?