Not the OP, but: the GPL is more restrictive, in that you are not free to reduce the software freedom of some other person (say, by turning it into a proprietary product). This is the perspective that considers GPL more 'free': though the software itself is more restricted, the freedom of all of the users of the software is protected.
Not everyone agrees with this position (I also am not interested in arguing about it) but this is my explanation of this point of view.
> Not the OP, but: the GPL is more restrictive, in that you are not free to reduce the software freedom of some other person (say, by turning it into a proprietary product).
No one's software freedom is reduced if I release a closed source derivative of a permissively-licensed open source product. All the rights that existed to the originally permissively-licensed product are intact.
Speaking as a user of commercial software, and speaking as someone who prefers to enforce no copyright whatsoever over the code that he writes: STOP IT.
Stop this condescending, paternalistic treating me like an imbecile who can't make informed decisions about what kind of software to use. Stop acting like you can decide for me what rights I do and do not wish to exercise. Stop acting like the freedoms I want to have, including the freedom to enter into a lawful contract with a provider of proprietary software, don't count because they don't correspond with your values. Stop preaching that my entire system for deciding what software I do and do not want to install on my own computer is wrong because it doesn't match up with your ideology. Just stop being such a @$%^! ideologically-motivated authoritarian. And most of all, stop pretending that your authoritarianism is somehow defending my liberties.
I've got no problem with the GPL. If you want to maintain some sort of legal control over how others are allowed to use intellectual property that you create, you've every right to do so. That goes for releasing the source code with limitations on incorporating it into proprietary software every bit as much as it does for keeping it all proprietary in the first place. What I do have a problem with is you trying to tell me that I'm doing something wrong by choosing to be less controlling about the code I create. And what I have a problem with is you trying to tell me that my choice to place no restrictions whatsoever on what people do with the code I share is somehow stomping on somebody's rights. That includes allowing third parties to incorporate it into proprietary software. If you're uninterested in using that proprietary software, fine, it makes no difference to you whether the software existed or not. OTOH, people who are willing to pay for a proprietary modification might benefit from one existing, and in that case, more power to them - I don't care, and I don't see why 4th parties who don't have any basis for claiming ownership of the software should care.
You made a false claim. Your choice of a closed-source license means no one can make derivatives of your work; if you had chosen a permissive license, your users would have greater software freedom. Hence, someone's software freedom is impeded.
Your ad hominem, however, is misdirected. I too oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour. People have the right to compensation when others enjoy their creative output and if that impedes software freedom, so be it. Software freedom is a good thing but by no means an inalienable right.
I support open source because it's in our collective interests to subsidize the creation of freely available and high-quality platforms/tools with our earnings from proprietary software. I don't think we'd have those earnings without proprietary software, though.
Some people point to the Red Hat model. But most people don't need those kinds of guarantees. Third parties (i.e. every system administrator who's ever been responsible for at least one CentOS box and is not a Red Hat employee) can provide good enough support for drastically cheaper because they don't have the extra costs associated with developing the product.
Without proprietary software, it is in no one's interest to make software. (Well, maybe for personal amusement.) Not even line-of-business software, because you're just handing your competitors the ability to undercut your prices and push you out of the market (similar productivity boost, lower costs than you).
Nobody's freedom is impeded. They didn't have the freedom to modify the code in the first place, since they didn't have the source code. Nothing they could do before has been taken away.
It's really intellectually dishonest to use this freedom and morality rhetoric when you're actually talking about compelling people to give away something they have created.
Not that I think it's conceptually a bad idea. I see nothing wrong with the idea of the GPL as a concept. A contract that says 'if you use this software, you agree to also give away any code you base on it' seems fine.
But I see no reason not to just call it 'permanenrly malleable' software or something like that.
It's the faulty rhetoric around freedom that is presented as a moral crusade that is a problem.
There's no intellectual dishonesty here, just a semantic mismatch. You're using the negative definition of freedom, which is the lack of explicit restrictions on behavior; the logic you expose only holds under that particular school of thought.
The GPL is instead defined on the tradition of positive liberty, which defines freedom as the number of options freely available to each person to choose. There's a very real risk of those being reduced by permissive licenses, as you can no longer ignore network effects, as negative freedom (being defined over individual atomic actions) does.
History shows us that if you allow open source code to be relicensed as proprietary, the competitive advantage of companies building and selling products with enhanced features tend to displace the original project, which gets abandoned. This happened to Unix, to Mac OS X, and is now happening to Android. If this continues for an extended time, the whole ecosystem evolves and the old software becomes unusable, greatly reducing the total options that users can effectively perform - not by an legal or coercive restriction, but because of pragmatic impossibility. There are permissive projects where this doesn't happen (at least for a while) because of the economic incentives of remaining close to the free+open project, but the risk is always there.
What good is the permission to run the original, abandoned version of a software project if all the available hardware has been locked and is uncapable of running it, and it's impossible to modify it to support the modern functions that are available in the proprietary platform and required for any productive usage? Those are very real threaths, and the GPL was designed to combat them (as a reaction to the first time they happened on a large scale). Avoiding this "reduced total available options" scenario is what GPL projects call freedom, not "reducing the number of restrictions" definition that you use. Not a problem of rhetoric, but of chosen vocabulary.
I don't use a 'reducing number of restrictions' definition. That's a straw man that I was responding to.
I also don't accept "history shows us" as establishing some law of nature when the history we're talking about is a couple of decades.
I think the abandoning of ecosystems can just as easily be explained by them being based on inadequate foundations, than by a mythical horde of developers somehow being prevented from working on them. Usually systems are abandoned because of a lack of economic incentive, after all the displacement you describe can only happen if proprietary development produces enhancements more efficiently than open source. Witness the failure of the Linux desktop.
I think 'greatly reducing the total options that users can effectively perform' is a statement that needs much more qualification. To me, that's a function of design, extensibility, and how much leverage a system provides, and is independent of whether the source is available or not. Extending by forking is a last resort.
Nevertheless, I do respect the hypothesis that a GPL style open system provides an important counterbalance to proprietary systems.
What I do not support is the dishonest use of language and morality to further it.
If you are using positive freedom, then there is much more to be gained through improvements in software design - e.g. along the lines of Alan Kay's FONC - to increase leverage - than through ideology.
We are talking of UNIX here. It has not been abandoned as an unsuccessful ecosystem, it has been rewritten away from the legalistic minefield that its permissive licensing allowed it to be; and that ''did'' prevent developers from freely working on it, and business from freely deploying it despite its open source origins. The history we've watched is that of Linux and GNU on the server (UNIX didn't have any strong desktop environment to begin with); and the UNIX wars span nearly 40 years, with Linux being the last half of it.
I still fail to see what is it that you call dishonest use of language. If freely talking of one's perspective and goals is dishonest, then all ideologies are.
Except that FreeBSD is just as freely deployable without the need for the GPL, so it is not the GPL that causes this property to come about.
The dishonest use of language is the misappropriation of the word 'freedom', and the moralizing around what is essentially a business problem. But, if you are claiming to be an ideologue, then fair enough.
In which case, I'd love to hear more about how that ideology translates into a better future economic future for software developers. To me it seems to just translate into greater dependence on powerful corporations.
Someone switches to your product, or a new user chooses your product over the open-source alternative. The proportion of people who can modify their software decreases. That is a decrease in software freedom.
Not necessarily a bad thing (your product might be legitimately better), but it is a decrease in software freedom.
Freedom hasn't decreased at all. Those people have exactly the same choices as before. They can use the open-source alternative if they want to change the code. Merely 'using' a closed source product doesn't prohibit them from doing that.
Lots of people who would otherwise be Linux or BSD users instead use OSX. Consequently, they are not free to modify their operating systems where (had it not been for Apple) they would have been. Their freedom has been reduced voluntarily, but it has been reduced.
Forking FreeBSD is not remotely the same thing as forking OSX and you can't "just use the open-source alternative if they want to change the source code" of OSX.
Their freedom has not been reduced, as they are still free to choose an alternate, FOSS operating system if they prefer. Instead, they have access to more options than they otherwise would have, because it's highly unlikely that Apple would have expended so much effort in improving their OS, which is a competitive advantage for them, if they were forced to turn over all of that work to anyone who wanted it.
I really don't like the idea of licences which compel their users to act in a certain way. Freedom cuts both ways.
Software freedom has a specific meaning which necessarily encompasses freedom to study and modify the software you're running.
OSX users do not have this freedom. Hence, prevalence of OSX reduces software freedom. Ability to choose between OSX and alternatives is something but it is not software freedom.
> OSX users do not have this freedom. Hence, prevalence of OSX reduces software freedom.
This doesn't follow. Like most arguments about proprietary software reducing, rather than not providing, software freedom, it seems to rest on the assumption that if proprietary software did not exist, it would be replaced use-for-use with Free software, that is, that license models have no impact on the creation or distribution of software.
That's why this rhetoric is dishonest. It's the use of this specialist meaning of the word freedom in a way which is opposite to it's conventional meaning.
If you stop using this misleading word, the whole GPL thing looks more reasonable, but also less like a moral crusade.
Not really. Freedom to modify your software is a kind of freedom which cannot exist when you are exercising your freedom to use proprietary software. Like many things in our world, it's a tradeoff.
That seems like a narrow definition of software freedom , but in that case I'd argue that the utility gained from software freedom is not as valuable to users as the incentive gained by developers for being able to distribute their software under a more permissive licence.
If such an amount of software is being produced under the GPL that inability to borrow from that pool of work is significantly hampering proprietary development, I'd say it's plainly false that this is the only way to incentivize software development and quite possibly the case that it's not the best way.
You removed my qualification, attributed the result to me, and called it an absolute position. I would not make, with confidence, the statement "There is never a need to release under a more permissive license." To get there from what I said, you would need "There is never a need to distribute under a less permissive license." I do think this need is exaggerated, but labeling that "absolutist" strikes me as odd.
I have no objection to "paid software" as a business model, because the term is too broad. Paying someone to add a feature I want to a GPL project and release the result is, I think, not something anyone would object to. I have objection to "proprietary software" as a business model, because it collapses the value that the software can provide; I am not convinced that this objection is sufficient to say that proprietary software is always the wrong choice. I have more objection to proprietary software where, having paid, I cannot see the source and make changes (or pay others to make changes).
There are a number of alternatives for funding development of mass-market software that are more compatible with copyleft licenses (donations, threshold pledge models, consulting) and I'm currently working on an innovative project in this space.
Freedom has still not been reduced. This so-called gain in freedom of OSX users to modify the code has come at the expense of a corresponding loss of freedom of Apple to choose whether to release their code or not.
I make software, and I do not want people who use it, share it, or modify it to be under the threat of being sued. Legal violence is to me is near equal to physical violence, and thus a moral issue.
I do also not care if the legal violence happened because of changes an other developer did on my work. Just because they added something does not give them the right to use what I made into a legal weapon.
"I too oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour."
Eliminating the revenue from selling the same work multiple times is probable consequence of the FSF's mission. It is uncharitable to say that it is the FSF's mission. It is also false that this implies an hourly rate of $0.00 - there is a huge amount of programming work for which the first copy is the only copy, and that can be sold just as readily as ever in a world using even the strictest AGPL for everything. And that's not even considering donations, threshold pledge systems, &c.
Stallman advocates for a utopia in which software is developed by the masses for enjoyment and individual utility.
Programmers are expected to work other jobs to subsidize their hobby. IIRC he also suggested that they could sell copies of their software on physical media, but this is irrelevant in the bittorrent era.
He acknowledges that realization of the FSF's goals would most likely end the phenomenon of professional developers and is perfectly okay with this.
It's somewhere on the Philosophy section of the gnu project's website. It's late, but I'll find the specific link later.
I'm both a user and a developer of commercial software, and I would like for you to apologize for speaking as if you represented anyone other than yourself in this ignorant and hateful screed.
And the author of that software doesn't need to use software that is GPL if they want to create a commercial product... they can use more permissive software (MIT etc), license commercial libraries, or write their own.
Yup. . . and as others have pointed out, there are some very good reasons why it makes sense to prefer the GPL over a more permissive license for a product light Light Table. I've got no argument there; if I were in the same circumstances I might have made the same choice.
What I'm bristling at is the line of thinking that says that I would somehow be harmed if Light Table's maintainers had chosen a license that permits proprietary derivatives.
ok, so perhaps you exercise some restraint with copyright. you're making the world an easier place to live in.
however, you are not representative of the commercial world. patents/copyright mean money, and no business with rational business leadership would choose not to shutdown competitors with patent disputes if possible, let alone not licence code in a restrictive fashion (i.e closed source, not free, etc.)
regardless, this isn't just about copyright and patent disputes. it's about trust. i'm using a computer right now, and i don't trust the hardware, or even the software i'm using. i have no way of verifying that it's doing exactly what it says it's doing, and that it's not doing something that i don't want it to.
which is weird, because.. i own it.
i get into my car, and there are (probably) hundreds and thousands of lines of code between me and the wheels. but i don't know what's going on really? maybe there's something wrong with ECU's management of fuel injection. maybe there's a bug in the ABS controller.
i can't trust any of the electronic equipment that i use. that's.. pretty bizarre, given that i am employed to work on these things, don't you think?
so what purpose does the viral clause in the GPL have? it's simple really -
lets say i program.. a home automation system (one that's not just.. terrible). i've got a few raspberry pi's, some arduinos, all talking over wifi/ethernet. control of things like lights, heating, doors, the whole thing. i've got an app i run on my phone, it's looking pretty slick. the source is a bit of a hack, probable buffer over/underflows, no comments, i only have the app on my iphone.. it's not perfect, but it works. and if it doesn't, i can fix it. the literal last thing i'm thinking about (i almost forgot to write about it, in fact), is the code licence. but fuck it, i can't be bothered. MIT looks simple enough, why the hell not.
a few months later, PicoHard (c) release something amazingly similar, but with more functionality. they have android apps, more polish, they have their own custom wall sockets that switch on and off the power.. you get the idea. it's on sale for a few thousand dollars. but hey, i don't care, i can do all that if i want to. i haven't lost anything, and this company hasn't infringed on my rights.
thousands of people have installed this system now, but nobody (except maybe the original author) knows really anything about how it works.
june 2013 happens, and suddenly there is a guy on TV saying that the government have almost certainly got backdoors in my software. now thousands of peoples rights are infringed.
> Your users can't modify (and must pay for) your derivative.
Which doesn't reduce their freedom, since they couldn't modify it -- or have the choice to pay for it and use it -- before I made the proprietary derivative.
The only "reduction in freedom" is based on the assumption that I would have made and shared a Free derivative if I did not have the choice to distribute a proprietary one, rather than either not making a derivative, or making a derivative for my own use and not providing it to others.
If you make a superior, closed-source derivative and users switch to it (or new users choose it instead), the proportion of people in the world who have the ability to modify the software they're using is smaller because of you. That is a reduction in software freedom.
I'm perfectly okay with this. The abysmal UX of desktop linux is proof that profit motive is necessary to drive the development of high-quality end user software when that development is difficult and/or not sexy.
But the only assumption required is that someone uses your product instead of the free alternative. He might have higher quality software, but he does have less software freedom.
> But the only assumption required is that someone uses your product instead of the free alternative. He might have higher quality software, but he does have less software freedom.
No, he has the same software freedom -- he has the freedom to choose to use and/or modify the free version and any free derivatives people have chosen to make, and the freedom to choose to use the non-free derivative, with perhaps less freedom to modify it.
If anything, he has less freedom when the creation of non-free derivatives is prohibited.
Once he becomes locked in to the non-free platform, his is not free to modify the platform he relies on and is instead required to migrate to a completely different platform in order to make (potentially small) modifications.
By this logic, OSX is free software because I have the freedom to choose Windows instead.
I'm not advocating for the prohibition of non-free derivatives, but the position that adoption of propriety software doesn't reduce software freedom is ridiculous.
You "by this logic..." is wrong because the post you are responding to doesn't make any argument about what is a piece of "free software", it discusses what the effects on software freedom are of the exercise of rights under particular free software licenses.
Freedom is the power to make choices rather than suffer external dictates. If a particular piece of free software exists, the existence of non-free derivatives doesn't reduce anyone's freedom, as they are free to choose the free software.
Not everyone agrees with this position (I also am not interested in arguing about it) but this is my explanation of this point of view.