[38]

normally I give "open source" comments like this the label they deserve, which is "troll". however in this case it seems justified:

> You may not move, change, disable, or circumvent the license key functionality in the software, and you may not remove or obscure any functionality in the software that is protected by the license key.

https://elastic.co/licensing/elastic-license

[thayne]

Also

> You may not provide the software to third parties as a hosted or managed service

What exactly is a third party?

Does this prohibit one department/team from managing it and offering it as a service to other departments/teams in the same company? Does it prohibit using it in a homelab I share with my friends and family?

> Any use of the licensor’s trademarks is subject to applicable law.

IANAL, but if any of the protected parts of the code use trademarks, which seems pretty likely, wouldn't any forks risk trademark infringement?

[mindwok]

I also commented this on their previous thread looking for input on licenses. I have no problem with monetising a managed service and preventing others from doing that on software you build, but disallowing ‘third parties’ is too broad. I wouldn’t be comfortable using this under that language.

[pwmtr]

I work on Ubicloud.

It is fair criticism. We don't claim to be "open source" rather we are open and free as in you can see the code and host it yourself if you want. The primary restriction is that license does not allow building a managed service out of it.

BTW, we don't have any license key, so that part of the Elastic License wouldn't apply. It is there, because we wanted to use a known license that fits the bill instead of creating our own obscure license.

[pierat]

Pretty terrible look, given you're lying already with this "We don't claim to be "open source" rather we are open and free as in you can see the code and host it yourself if you want. "

From https://ubicloud.com/

At top: "An open source cloud that can run anywhere."

Near bottom: "Open-source or managed for you"

Image at bottom: https://unicorn-cdn.b-cdn.net/0c2bf736-3f08-4b11-a500-57e4e7...

At least Openstack doesn't lie about its complexity.

[pwmtr]

I replied this in another thread and didn't want to repeat myself here but that was probably oversight on my part.

> Truly sorry that we missed these instances of "open-source" references. We scrubbed the use of open-source in most places, but forgot about our home page, which might sound weird as the home page is... well... home page. The truth is that our web site is not our primary focus at the moment. Rather we are putting almost all our effort for building the product (You can watch all of it in GitHub)

[38]

using "free and open" is going to evoke the idea of FOSS. so you either:

1. did that intentionally, intending to trick people into thinking UbiCloud is FOSS

2. did it unintentionally, somehow missing the obvious connection that people are going to make

either way, its a bad look. this is a solved problem, you can use the correct term for the situation:

https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Source-available_software

[zxwrt]

Agree. Using "free and open" is still rather deceptive.

[veave]

It doesn't even need to evoke the idea of FOSS. Software that includes licence management with keys and such should not be called "free and open"

[furkansahin]

elastic, who is the creator of the licence in the first place, refers to it as Free and Open. https://www.elastic.co/pricing/faq/licensing#