[aragilar]

What would you change then? Practically only the 4th criteria would be one I'd change (but presumably it's there for a reason): "Integrity of the author's source code: The license may restrict source-code from being distributed in modified form only if the license allows the distribution of "patch files" with the source code for the purpose of modifying the program at build time. The license must explicitly permit distribution of software built from modified source code. The license may require derived works to carry a different name or version number from the original software."

As for the commons, you are aware that the OSD comes from the Debian Free Software Guidelines (it's the same thing but for some minor working changes)? That is the commons that's been talked about, and it's deployed on far more systems than any BSL code is. So moving to completely propriety (note that this doesn't mean it's not Source Available) means that everyone is upfront about what the state is, whereas something like the BSL is leaning into the halo effect under the justification that the code will be open source at some future point.

[sanderjd]

Yes, I don't think it makes sense that the definition of "open source" requires that people can arbitrarily re-sell it. Like, just the words themselves, in my view, clearly don't imply that. I'm happy to stipulate that this is what was meant when the term was invented and that there is a single gatekeeper of the official definition in order to keep it this way. I'm just telling you that I (and I think many people) find this to fall outside what the words directly evoke. So to me "source available" just sounds like a slightly more awkward synonym. But I don't mind using the official language, because I know people care a lot about this (to me) extra ideology, and I think they're entitled to advocate for that.

But this second part of the argument I just don't grok at all. These licenses like BSL provide significantly more of what I want in software I use than proprietary software does. (Namely, the ability to read, modify, and self-host the software of I choose to.)

I think what must be going on is that when you see a license like this you think "there is no point to something like that besides a PR stunt trying to imply proprietary software is open source", and I think "oh this seems like a really useful compromise that allows commercial enterprises to create software with code that I can read, modify, run myself, and contribute to if I want to, without a different company that did none of the work on the software making all the money from it". Just totally different perspectives.

[aragilar]

So if you got the rights from the BSL but the part about the code becoming Open Source you'd be happy with right? I think that's a completely fine attitude to take, and sure, all other things being equal, code licensed under the BSL is better than not having access to the source at all. But, given (at least) the majority of BSL projects were under an open source license, with external contributions, the spectre of "I have changed the deal, pray I do not alter it further" is raised. Additionally, if you read the actual post by Hashicorp, they do sail quite close to the wind in terms of implying the BSL is open source, so had they been more careful in their language (or even in their CLA), then people would be less annoyed.

The reason I'm personally annoyed at the attempt to drop the requirement for no restrictions on use is because it is something some academic software does (things like "if you use this code, any results must be shown to me before publishing and require my approval", which as you can imagine isn't great), or with rules around benchmarking (which some DB companies have been known to do), and it's significantly harder to draw the line between something that would allow the BSL, or the above two cases, than it is to require no restrictions on use.

[sanderjd]

I agree with pretty much all of this! Certainly, I would have a lot more respect for projects to start with this kind of license.

But this part:

> had they been more careful in their language (or even in their CLA), then people would be less annoyed.

I just don't agree. I think they were very careful in their language, and I keep wondering whether everyone here who is pissed at them even actually read it, because I feel like a lot of people keep saying they said things that they clearly worked hard to not say.