Underfunding or why I am not interested

[anatoly techtonik]

On Sun, Feb 23, 2014 at 12:10 PM, Aaron Wolf <wolftune at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Sun, Feb 23, 2014 at 12:47 AM, anatoly techtonik <techtonik at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>>
>> On Sat, Feb 22, 2014 at 8:45 PM, Aaron Wolf <wolftune at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> What are you protecting from with AGPL?
>> >
>> > The purpose of AGPL is to block software from becoming proprietary.
>>
>> I believe it is far-fetched argument. Nobody can turn what is already
>> written
>> under non-restrictive license to become proprietary. They can build
>> something
>> on top of it - yes - is it what AGPL supporters afraid of? But they
>> can not force
>> people to use their paid and proprietary versions and these people are
>> free to
>> develop their own branch as before.
>
> Sorry, I did not mean to imply that the software would be subsumed in
> proprietary versions. All I meant was, the purpose of AGPL is to hamper the
> development of any proprietary software.
>
> It only works, of course, if enough people in the community embrace it. A
> large community embracing AGPL can do as well as a large community embracing
> a permissive license. In that case, AGPL will hamper any proprietary forks
> and thus the net freedom will be higher since the creation of proprietary
> forks is a negative for freedom.
>
> If the community will not embrace the AGPL and will only embrace permissive
> licenses, then using a permissive license may be better for freedom. So
> while the best thing for overall freedom is for everyone to together embrace
> the AGPL, if that is not possible, then the balance of compromises must be
> weighed. Hence, it is a tactical question.

Aside from the need to have more strict freedom definition, that's a really
constructive argument. I like it.

As for the problem of software survival, I think that in practice (not
research -
just an observation) the license choice can not guarantee the survival of
software regardless of people expectations. I believe that the primary
contributors to "success" of open source projects is the openness and
inclusiveness of the process.

I believe that major disrupting point in open collaboration is commercial
interests and not that fork turned proprietary. There are many forks out there
that open source, but are not given any proper reviews and are never merged
back. I believe that the point of conflict is that somebody is earning money,
and others do contribution (for him) for free. That's discouraging. And to avoid
the discouragement people invented GPL and (later) AGPL.

Now the landscape changed. Some people are actually getting paid on
working with GPL and AGPL software. Vendors need to implement patches
back into Linux kernel, foundations hiring developers to support known titles
are grant organizations also often choose (A)GPL for their projects. So, the
conflict is back.

With software licensing tool alone the conflict can not be solved.
It can only balanced to some degree with open discussion and consensus,
but for that people need to be really open. Another problem here is that by
opening their true motives, people may lose the motivation at all - a kind of
Heisenberg's problem.

>> I have a good understanding of licensing issues and can even explain some
>> of them. I just want to clarify the exact position of NPO accounting
>> project members to ensure that I got it right that people are afraid of.
>>
>
> I cannot speak for others here, but it is inappropriate to assume a position
> of fear. License choice may be one made from other thoughtful, pragmatic,
> idealogical, dogmatic, tactical, or other reasons.

Skip below to read why I think that it is fear.

>> > It is also consistent to say that you care about freedom and believe
>> > that
>> > AGPL is less free than CC0, but only if you also recognize that
>> > proprietary
>> > software is obviously much less free. If you're ok with proprietary, you
>> > should be ok with AGPL, which is clearly much much more free than
>> > proprietary.
>>
>> Let's talk without "only if".
>>
>> For my accounting purposes I am not ok with limiting my personal freedom
>> and the freedom of others in either way.
>>
>
> Sure, and as I said, that is the consistent respectable position. Just be
> aware of the need to distance yourself then from those who oppose copyleft
> in order to advocate for proprietary interests.

I believe there is a fear of proprietary interests. Fear, because it
is not described
what are those "proprietary interests". If this term is well defined,
and to me the
definition can encompass multiple points, we can go point by point and see if
these points are still harmful. The problem is even more interesting
in the context
of this project, which is an accounting software for NGO, subject to commercial
interests not only from potential developers, but also from its users. As I
demonstrated above not all interests can be ruled out by a license,
which will be
harmful for open source software evolution.

>> > But you seem to be arguing not that AGPL is bad for freedom but merely
>> > that
>> > it isn't a good tactic for making the software successful. That's a fine
>> > argument. Not everyone may agree. It's complex how to choose the right
>> > compromises.
>>
>> Right. But the project had goal, and didn't reach it. The AGPL tactic
>> already
>> failed, before the battle began. I don't really care that the project
>> chooses to
>> continue slaughter soldiers anyway, but just want people to know the
>> opinion.
>>
>
> If the AGPL has failed to get support from the community and the battle is
> truly lost, that is an important thing to recognize. I am not convinced this
> is the case, but I agree that many aspects of the situation do not look
> good. I think it is more important here to bring up concerns than to be
> simplistically conclusive in your claims. It's an important concern to be
> addressed. Maybe you're right. I just don't think it's as simple as you make
> it out to be.

I hope that you will the way to prove or disprove it. In spirit of "make
everything as simple as possible, but not simpler" I'd be interested to
evaluate alternative more complex explanations.

But if you ask me what would I do - I'd say - repeat the fundraising
campaign, but this time state the main goal of it to gather funding for
non-restrictive MIT, zlib or CC0/Public Domain version of software.

>> > Either way, please don't conflate the words "commercial" and
>> > "proprietary"
>> > though. It is perfectly fine for Free Software to be commercial and stay
>> > free-as-in-freedom.
>>
>> I don't care about both of those. I care about limiting the freedom of
>> people
>> to maintaining and even selling their own modification that may not be
>> useful
>> for the main line at all.
>
>
> AGPL does not restrict selling of software in principle. Yes, in practice,
> it is harder to sell software if you don't use your government-enforced
> monopoly control to do it.

You skipped the part about "freedom to maintain your branch private".
This should be discussed first. After this branch is private I don't even care
about anybody selling this.