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Its-not-okay-to-pretend-youre-open-source.md (4041B)

    

  1. ---
  2. date: 2018-10-30
  3. title: It's not okay to pretend your software is open source
  4. layout: page
  5. tags: ["philosophy", "free software"]
  6. ---
  8. Unfortunately, I find myself writing about the Commons Clause again. For those
  9. not in the know, the Commons Clause is an addendum designed to be added to free
  10. software licenses. The restrictions it imposes (you cannot sell the software)
  11. makes the resulting franken-license nonfree. I'm not going to link to the
  12. project which brought this subject back into the discussion - they don't deserve
  13. the referral - but the continued proliferation of software using the Commons
  14. Clause gives me reason to speak out against it some more.
  16. One of my largest complaints with the Commons Clause is that it hijacks
  17. language used by open source projects to proliferate nonfree software, and
  18. encourages software using it to do the same. Instead of being a new software
  19. license, it tries to stick itself onto other respected licences - often the
  20. Apache 2.0 license. The name, "Commons Clause", is also disingenuous, hijacking
  21. language used by respected entities like Creative Commons. In truth, the Commons
  22. Clause serves to remove software from the commons[^anti]. Combining these
  23. problems gives you language like "Apache+Commons Clause", which is easily
  24. confused with [Apache Commons][apache-commons].
  26. [^anti]: This is why I often refer to it as the "Anti-Commons Clause", though I felt that was a bit too Stallman-esque for this article.
  27. [apache-commons]: http://commons.apache.org/
  29. Projects using the Commons Clause have also been known to describe their license
  30. as "permissive" or "open", some even calling their software "open source". This
  31. is dishonest. FOSS refers to "free and open source software". The former, free
  32. software, is defined by the [free software definition][fsd], published by
  33. [GNU][gnu]. The latter, open source software, is defined by the [open source
  34. definition][osd], published by the [OSI][osi]. Their definitions are very
  35. similar, and nearly all FOSS licenses qualify under both definitions. These are
  36. unambiguous, basic criteria which protects developers, contributors, and users
  37. of free and open source software. These definitions are so basic, important and
  38. well-respected that dismissing them is akin to dismissing climate change.
  40. [fsd]: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html
  41. [gnu]: https://gnu.org
  42. [osd]: https://opensource.org/osd
  43. [osi]: https://opensource.org
  45. Claiming your software is open source, permissively licensed, free software,
  46. etc, when you use the Commons Clause, is *lying*. These lies are pervasive among
  47. users of the Commons Clause. The page listing [Redis
  48. Modules](https://redis.io/modules), for example, states that only software under
  49. an OSI-approved license is listed. Six of the modules there are using nonfree
  50. licenses, and antirez seems content to [ignore the problem][exhibit-a] until [we
  51. forget about it][exhibit-b]. They're in for a long wait - we're not going to
  52. forget about **shady, dishonest, and unethical companies like Redis Labs**.
  54. [exhibit-a]: https://github.com/antirez/redis-doc/pull/984
  55. [exhibit-b]: https://github.com/RedisLabsModules/RediSearch/issues/518
  57. I don't use nonfree software[^beer], but I'm not going to sit here and tell you
  58. not to make nonfree software. You have every right to license your work in any
  59. way you choose. However, if you choose not to use a FOSS license, you need to
  60. own up to it. Don't pretend that your software is something it's not. There are
  61. many benefits to being a member of the free software community, but you are not
  62. entitled to them if your software isn't. This behavior has to stop.
  64. [^beer]: Free as in freedom, not as in free beer.
  66. Finally, I have some praise to offer. [Dgraph](https://dgraph.io/) was briefly
  67. licensed under Apache plus the Commons Clause, and had the sort of misleading
  68. and false information this article decries on their marketing website, docs, and
  69. so on. However, they've rolled it back, and Dgraph is now using the Apache 2.0
  70. license with no modifications.  Thank you!