[Lockal]

"Oracle’s move seems like a straightforward decision to ensure it is using the most permissive underlying IaC tool without having to worry about downstream license complications, no more and no less."

Hm, with that logic they could dump MySQL in favor of MariaDB as well

[freedomben]

Especially ironic, given that Oracle is one of the nastiest and most aggressive companies at enforcing license terms.

[geodel]

Thats the way world works. Here in this forum so many software people asking for best possible salaries and perks, and when it comes paying a bit to good productivity software same developers are always full of excuses like.

1) Oh, I prefer open source alternative for ideological reason.

2) This software is not really worth that much.

3) Hectoring developers every single time in providing why their software should be preferred over unpaid alternatives.

4) Blaming companies that they are bigger users so they should pay not me.

If these entitled developers who deserve all the money but no one deserve their money just shut the fuck up every once in a while it will be a good thing.

[jayd16]

It's important to remember that a community is not a single minded entity. It's members can hold many contradicting beliefs, while each individual is ideologically consistent.

This shouldn't be unexpected and it's not an excuse to be dismissive to an imagined hypocrite. Not saying there aren't hypocrites in this world, just that we shouldn't treat members of a community as some kind of superset of everything in that community.

[hitekker]

It's the upvote where that opinion falls short. Sure, it may just be one hypocrite, but it sure is funny when a community raises scarcely concealed hypocrisy to the top comments or sub-comments. And then forgets about it 2 weeks later.

[geodel]

Its not unexpected and neither is Oracle's approach unexpected still its worth talking about.

Besides I made observation about people in community and not community itself as I did not say HN thinks software should not be paid for.

[sangnoir]

> Besides I made observation about people in community[...]

Can you link any specific HN user who holds any 3 of those specific beliefs, or was this hypocritical strawman purpose-built to bolster your argument?

[vlovich123]

It's important to remember that a company is not a single minded entity. It's members can hold many contradicting beliefs, while each individual is ideologically consistent.

[jayd16]

They often do have a hierarchical command structure and that should entail some top down consistency and some accountability rolling upwards but you're not wrong.

Believing every employee at Walmart thinks the same is silly and while someone is to blame for policy its important to not blame retail clerks for store policy, for example.

[talldayo]

I mean, sometimes the entitled developers are right and predict that the monetization of a software product will lead to it's inevitable demise. More often than not that's how these sorts of projects end up.

Linux as a whole exists because developers said "fuck AT&T, we're taking this train off the rails" and nobody ever looked back since.

[scarface_74]

And the majority of code in Linux is created by corporate employees getting paid to make changes. Those companies are merely helping to “commoditize their complements”

[talldayo]

That's not really a problem as long as the source license stays the same. If Amazon or Microsoft need a feature in the kernel, nobody tends to care as long as it's GPL.

> Those companies are merely helping to “commoditize their complements”

That's how they justify it internally, yeah. From an administrative standpoint it's pretty obvious that they all choose Linux because it's easier than retrofitting proprietary UNIX for modern software. But indeed, they market it as goodwill and complimentary development.

[wcedmisten]

I think you may have misinterpreted the parent comment. "Complement" as in a complementary good in economics terms. Not "complimentary", as in free. There's a good article on this by Joel Spolsky

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/

[Timshel]

In a way they know the worst that can happen :D

[SteveNuts]

Yeah this is absolutely projection on Oracle's part

[globular-toast]

There is no contradiction here. It's exceedingly simple: companies will take as much as they can and give as little as they can. That's why it's important to raise the bar on what they have to give and reject all permissive (non-copyleft) free software licences.

[sneak]

Copyleft is not required, free software is a gift freely given. Even public domain is ok (weird places like Germany that don’t have public domain notwithstanding).

What must be rejected is nonfree licenses like the BSL.

[Pet_Ant]

BSL is preferrable to completely closed because at least researchers can look at it now and it will eventually transition to open source. If Windows XP was BSL licensed then Wine would have a lot less trouble now.

[kees99]

Citation is sorely needed for both "transition" and "BSL XP be good for wine" claims above.

Specifically, supposed inevitability of BSL->OSI transition is dubious. If anything, there are examples of the opposite - terraform itself being prime one.

[Pet_Ant]

> Citation is sorely needed for both "transition"

Sure! [1]

> The Business Source License requires the work to be relicensed to a "Change License" at the "Change Date". The "Change License" must be a "license which is compatible with GPL version 2.0 or later". The Change Date must be four years or sooner from the publication date of the work being licensed

So the business source license is less "non-OSI" and more "not currently non-OSI, but eventually and irrevocable at future date".

In the case of Terraform it says [2]:

>Change Date: Four years from the date the Licensed Work is published.

>Change License: MPL 2.0

So is this ideal? No. But it's better than OpenVMS screwing over historians and hobbyists [3] decades after it's relevancy has expired.[6]

It's also better than SSPL [4] which has no such transition and stays permanently non-OSI [5].

> "BSL XP be good for wine" claims above.

Well Wine uses the LGPL, and Windows XP was released in 2001 so even if they set the expiry 20 years after release, it'd be GPL'd by now.

---

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Source_License#Terms

[2] https://github.com/hashicorp/terraform/blob/main/LICENSE

[3] https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/09/vsi_prunes_hobbyist_p...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Side_Public_License

[5] https://web.archive.org/web/20230411163802/https://lists.ope...

[6] https://www.theregister.com/2013/06/10/openvms_death_notice/

[kstrauser]

I disagree. I don’t face any copyright issues from writing code that resembles something in Windows. I never had access to its source code, so any similarities have to be purely coincidental.

A BSL project could say, hey, look at this guy stealing our code!, even if I’ve never seen it. I could have, and that opens a plausible risk I wish I didn’t have.

[skissane]

> I don’t face any copyright issues from writing code that resembles something in Windows. I never had access to its source code, so any similarities have to be purely coincidental.

> A BSL project could say, hey, look at this guy stealing our code!, even if I’ve never seen it. I could have, and that opens a plausible risk I wish I didn’t have.

By that argument, you could have looked at Windows code too, since Windows source code has leaked multiple times, and 5 minutes of searching will find it.

[globular-toast]

> Copyleft is not required

Yes it is. Because companies (like Oracle) will take as much as they can and give as little as they can.

> free software is a gift freely given

It's a gift to the public, not to individuals and companies (like Oracle).

> Even public domain is ok

Even worse because that expressly allows companies (like Oracle) to take everything and give nothing.

[therealpygon]

All of which is well understood by anyone who release permissively licensed software?

If they didn’t accept that, they could have used a non-commercial license. If they expected contributions they could have sold a paid product.

I’d suggest not using others hard work as the basis for your argument. If it was your work and you regret it, say that. If you don’t like oracle, say that. Otherwise, people who contribute to FOSS software do so knowingly, yet you are trying to inject your own opinions of “public” vs whomever, as though you know better than those contributors own feelings and intentions.

[lolinder]

> Because companies (like Oracle) will take as much as they can and give as little as they can.

Which in the case of free software is a completely neutral fact that causes exactly zero negative impact to the project. You're trying to apply principles of scarcity to a product category that has no scarcity—replicating the bits to serve Oracle doesn't cost a maintainer anything at all.

They can prefer not to let Oracle use their otherwise-freely-provided software, but that's not a position that's as easy to get sympathy for as pretending there's harm done.

[bigstrat2003]

> Yes it is. Because companies (like Oracle) will take as much as they can and give as little as they can.

Yes, they will. So? Nobody is actually harmed by this. The software is still perfectly available for the public to make use of.

> It's a gift to the public, not to individuals and companies (like Oracle).

The public is not some separate entity from individuals or companies. It's simply the collective of all individuals and companies. So yes, when you gift something to the public it's a gift to Oracle as well. It's not exclusively to them, but they are a part.

[totaldude87]

At oracle-

Hey, what if they do - what we do to other companies ... to us ...

presses a red button

[matt_heimer]

Funny that you mention MariaDB.

Oracle bought MySQL which was forked into MariaDB. MariaDB created the Business Source License (BSL). Hashicorp switches Terraform to BSL which then leads to Terraform being forked into OpenTofu. OpenTofu seems to be getting adopted by Oracle.

[oschvr]

Full circle of corporate facepalm

[skywhopper]

Oracle owns the most permissive possible license to MySQL.

[Lockal]

Ah, that flexible "COST license" - "contact our sales team" license

[croes]

Oracle owns MySQL but not Terraform

[ethbr1]

Ah, so they meant avoiding 'downstream license complications' they don't cause.

[baobun]

I wouldn't expect Oracle to have a license complication with itself...

[dijit]

it's mostly just hypocritical.

If everyone acted like Oracle; there would be no mysql users. Which is the point being made.

[snapcaster]

I don't understand your comment. Oracle is hypocritical because like every company they take everything they can and give the minimum they have to? which part is hypocritical?

[dijit]

I'm incredulous that you don't understand, but I'll humour you.

Let's see;

If I giving away a product because I think it's for the betterment of mankind, and definitely not an attempt to rug-pull or anything like that: no, just for developer good will.

Then I am offered a free service, and I do not use it for fear that there could potentially be some rugpulling, despite having a reputation for that myself: and the project I'm considering having no reputation for that.

Then the pretense in which I "give away" my software, is morally dubious. I would never permit myself to be in the same situation as I need others to be in order for my product to be successful.

MySQL/Virtualbox/Java etc;

[disintegore]

This is a slam dunk for free software. Even Oracle can't deny the benefits.