Comment by dataflow
8 months ago
That certainly wasn't the intention. Was there really a need to turn this into a personal swipe? This is a common outcome many smart and talented developers have historically come to regret. You can find their stories all over the web, including right here on HN. I didn't want to see the same thing happen here, is all.
There are very simple game theoretic-esque arguments that many fans of BSD/MIT dogmatically refuse to acknowledge, I've never gotten a straight answer from them, zero actual data when asked for any against my argument and just try to weasel out of the debate somehow.
I don’t maintain any particularly important software, but I would be extremely happy to know that code I wrote is used in major products everyone uses; so, I prefer to use licenses that minimize the burdens on users.
Also, I don’t think intellectual property is real and so I don’t think I can make demands on the users of my code: it seems to me that there’s an implicit contradiction in the GPL between the FSF’s anti-IP stances and their attempt to control how their software is used using IP constructs.
And indeed GPL/AGPL minimizes burdens greatly on me as a user of a product, I can easily download to debug and if wanted modify the source code of the project of the company I want without involving anyone else.
Whereas if the company had forked a BSD project, there is no such legal recourse for me if the company chooses not to share the sources, at best you can hope to talk to them/pressurize them but of course that is most cases futile. As a user its much more inconvenient for me, I need to use advanced debuggers, disassemblers, etc to debug or modify. Sometimes even that does not work.
As a user, GPL/AGPL provides me far more convenience by default than "permissive" licenses do. It gives me an assurance I can just as easily see and modify the sources of any forks of the project, and if in any case such fails, its only because it wasn't strong enough, for example using GPL software in SaaS, due to which stronger licenses like AGPL were invented.
I believe in the simple golden rule, you give back to society what society has given back to you. Just like all others who gave back their changes, I trust any corporation should have no difficulty, since they are using the product of thousands of man hours for free. Not a single dollar is required, only the source code of any new changes made.
Secondly, my game theoretic argument. Lets say a powerful corpo takes your code and makes something that turns out very useful and popular. If it was BSD, they have no obligation to share anything back and your original project is left to dry and rot. If it was (A)GPL they are obliged to return the changes, and then you can absorb their changes and beat them to the punch. Its more competitive and creates a stronger capitalist environment. BSD's end state is feudalistic, GPL is capitalistic.
Also, I trust you'd be happy to have your code MINIXed, to have your code end up in closed source bootloaders locking down your new ARM laptop, and so on. At least with GPLs you get some code dumps. At least with Androids we end up with a begrudgingly shat out Linux source dump, that helps a little at least. With iPhone you got, absolutely fucking nothing, nil, nada. I am just suggesting please do not complain if BSD works ever end up creating such a world.
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Its a religious thing unfortunately for some developers. They don't seem to understand the concept of all entities esp large companies acting in their self interest unless forced to. They are building the noose by which themselves will be hanged, and I think it'd be hilarious to see once we finally see the current crop of MIT/BSD being used to completely lock down hardware and software. And these developers unable to use their own hobby oses anymore. I don't know if they will still see what their error was, they probably won't, as I said its a religious matter. And religious dogmatism is a strong bulwark against logic and sense.