commit: 14b760a28b775ddcae43f3ad3c471b630d724d1b
parent 8d1a330e27840324d254ac1c051fe3edd19e14e9
Author: Drew DeVault <sir@cmpwn.com>
Date: Sat, 18 Dec 2021 12:22:45 +0100
Commercial FOSS forks
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diff --git a/content/blog/Commercial-forks-of-FOSS-projects.md b/content/blog/Commercial-forks-of-FOSS-projects.md
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+---
+title: On commercial forks FOSS projects
+date: 2021-12-18
+---
+
+The gaming and live streaming industry is a lucrative and rapidly growing
+commercial sector with a unique understanding of copyright and intellectual
+property, and many parties with conflicting interests and access to different
+economic resources.
+
+The understanding of intellectual property among gamers and the companies which
+serve them differs substantailly from that of free software, and literacy in the
+values and philosophy of free software among this community is very low. It is
+then of little surprise that we see abuse of free software from this community,
+namely in the recent (and illegal) commercial forks of a popular FOSS streaming
+platform called [OBS Studio] by companies like TikTok, StreamLabs, and
+StreamElements.
+
+[OBS Studio]: https://obsproject.com
+
+These forks are in violation of the software license of OBS Studio, which is
+both illegal and unethical. But the "why" behind this is interesting for a
+number of reasons. For one, there *is* a legitimate means through which
+commercial entities can repurpose free software projects, up to and including
+reskinning and rebranding and selling them. The gaming community also has an
+unusual perspective on copyright which colors their understanding of the
+situation. Consider, for instance, the modding community.
+
+Game modifications (mods) exist in a grey area with respect to copyright.
+Modding in general is entirely legal, though some game companies do not
+understand this (or choose not to understand this) and take action against them.
+Modders also often use assets of dubious provenance in their work. Many people
+believe that, because this is all given away for free, the use is legitimate,
+and though they are morally correct, they are not legally correct. Additionally,
+since most mods are free (as in beer),[^1] the currency their authors receive
+for their work is credit and renown. Authors of these mods tend to defend their
+work fiercely against its "theft". Modders also tend to be younger, and grew up
+after the internet revolution and the commoditization of software.
+
+[^1]: I think that this is likely the case specifically to dis-incentivize legal action by the gaming companies (who would likely be wrong, but have a lot of money) or from the owners of dubiously repurposed assets (who would likely be right, and also have a lot of money). One notable exception is the Black Mesa mod, which received an explicit blessing from Valve for its sale.
+
+On the other hand, the conditions under which free software can be "stolen" are
+quite different, because the redistribution, reuse, and modification of free
+software, including for commercial purposes, is an explicit part of the social
+and legal contract of FOSS. This freedom comes, however, with some conditions.
+The nature of these conditions varies from liberal to strict. For instance,
+software distributed with the MIT license requires little more than crediting
+the original authors in any derivative works. On the other end of this spectrum,
+copyleft licenses like the GPL family require that any derivative works of the
+original project are *also* released under the GPL license. OBS Studio uses the
+GPL license, and it is in this respect that all of these forks have made a legal
+misstep.
+
+If a company like TikTok wants to use OBS Studio to develop its own streaming
+software, they are *allowed to do this*, though the degree to which they are
+*encouraged* to do this is the subject of some debate.[^2] However, they must
+release the source code for their modifications under the same GPL license. They
+can repurpose and rebrand OBS Studio only if their repurposed and rebranded
+version is made available to the free software community under the same terms.
+Then OBS Studio can take any improvements they like from the TikTok version and
+incorporate them into the original OBS Studio software, so that everyone shares
+the benefit — TikTok, OBS users, StreamLabs, and StreamElements alike, as
+well as anyone else who wants in on the game.
+
+[^2]: For my part, I'm in the "this is encouraged" camp.
+
+This happens fairly often with free software and often forms a healthy
+relationship by establishing an incentive and a pool of economic resources to
+provide for the upkeep and development of that software. Many developers of a
+project like this are often hired by such companies to do their work. Sometimes,
+this relationship is viewed more negatively, but that's a subject for another
+post. It works best when all of the players view each other as collaborators,
+not competitors.
+
+That's not what happening here, though. What we're seeing instead is the brazen
+theft of free software by corporations who believe that, because their legal
+budget exceeds the resources available to the maintainers, might makes right.
+
+Free software is designed to be used commercially, but you have to do it
+correctly. This is a resource which is made available to companies who want to
+exploit it, but they must do so according to the terms of the licenses. It's not
+a free lunch.
