I kind of agree.
I just struggle with the potential hipocracy of using legal routes to keep things open. Which is more important, the freedom to make decisions, or complete transplancy even if by force?
Eh, I don’t have an answer.
But it feels like a dilemma meant for A Clockwork Orange.
Cmon. That was more Fox News than Sean Hannity.
So… In summary. This is all about protecting the competitive edge of “players with clout”.
You’ll have a hard time trying to get any sympathy for your cause if you continue posting stuff like that. I think a lot of people here believe it’s time to have new ‘players’ with less ‘clout’.
I don’t think @gubatron is looking for sympathy - certainly appears to be a sincere concern of his certainly.
Having no clue about this license stuff until this thread; thanks for sparking this conversation
Thanks to @frabrunelle for enlightening facts also.!
Do you struggle with using legal routines to keep things closed? Would you be making the same argument if we were discussing closed source that could become open? Say there was a liscence where the source code was kept private unless you specifically requested it or unless you paid a fee or something. Or say I wanted to make an open source version of a closed source piece of software, would you then find it ligit that I should go to the coder and complain he should change his liscence and make provisions for open source developers somewhere down the road because they love his code and don’t want to be limited by his closed source liscencing? Frankly I find OB to be completely illigitamate because I don’t see people advocating for closed source to become open, they just complain that open source can’t become closed. The copyleft movement is indeed a political movement. Making maidsafe open source is indeed a political move, it’s a move towards freedom. I don’t like having to use legal routes either but that unfortunately is what we’re stuck with until we get rid of government.
Yes and which begs the question of why we’re having this big debate. But really liscensing is about politics and philosophical belief more than it is about legality. You can pick any number of liscenses or as you say issue multiple liscences based on circumstance so it’s not a matter of limited options but rather about what you’re trying to do with your code. What kind of society is Maidsafe trying to promote by building this internet 2.0?
This thread was the debate around OB moving to MIT from GPL3
“eat cake on this one” “I’m not cool with that”
Sorry @russell, that’s called passion.
People have been fooled into pinning their hopes of Freedom and genuine change in a sellout/setup called Bitcoin…I do not believe in giving that camp a free hit, before SAFE has even launched.
OpenBazaar is an open source project to create a decentralized network for commerce online—using Bitcoin
The exact opposite to what the Bitcoin sellouts are trying to entrap humanity with i.e Windhover Principles as an example.
Privacy, Security and Freedom
I don’t think this is the case @kirkton. If MaidSafe were to issue a non GPL license it would be a commercial license (non-open source license). OB would then have a section of their code that only they have the license to use. Any other company building on OB’s code would then need to seek their own license for that section of their code. This would be off putting for many and is the reason why OB would like SAFE to use a more permissive license.
In the end, I won’t be terribly upset if we switch but I think it’s important to really give those willing to go gpl a head start. Even if there’s a really small chance of getting the dev support to build an entirely new Internet on GPL… it’s worth a shot. If the network can demonstrate utility during the final stages of testing and at launch, maybe just maybe the attraction will be strong enough that we don’t have to budge. 
In the end, do we really care if Dropbox or Soundcloud makes an app on the safe network? I mean, it would be cool if they did but can’t someone else do just as good of a job especially now that things like security, IDs, storage are inherit?
Here’s a simple solution: Launch maidsafe under a “permissive” liscence and then make a quick fork under the GPL. Those that believe in freedom use the GPL version and pretty much vote for freedom via use. corporate sellouts get less worth for their version.
@Blindsite2k The GPL has a passionate following in the respect that software developers that feel they can contribute and belief in freedom will only do so if they agree with the license it will be published under. Then it follows that if a developer gives you his code under the GPL, you can’t go and republish it under a permissive license.
If you want to force developers to give SAFE (or OB) their work and effort under a permissive license, you will lose a lot of passionate free software developers that could contribute.
This is just to say that your proposal looks at the issue from the wrong side 
Again, I’m no licensing lawyer, but I do know somethings about contracts. You should know that its not like the legal systems of the world went out of their way to create special rules for public licenses, the GPL is legally enforceable because its legally enforceable to create a general contract, i.e. if you cross this bridge and do a little dance on camera, you can have a cool little patch that we have left in piles on the far side of the bridge. Because of that contract, you can’t just take the patches, you have to conform to the terms of the contract, whereas if you cross the bridge and do the dance the other party HAS to give you their cool little patch. These types of contracts lower transaction costs and are generally enforceable.
Thats why the GPL and other open-source licenses are enforceable, not because they are “open-source.”
So what that means is that you can craft another license on similarly broad terms, which allows people to use in conformity with the terms of that license. For example, one of the obvious terms would be that people wanting closed source have to restrict themselves to the OB platform, or other discrete platforms with which Maidsafe has made similar arrangements. Maidsafe can (and should) also include terms that allow Maidsafe to retain certain downstream controls, potentially including reasonable licensing schemes, broad prohibitions on secondary monopolistic behavior, and provisions about embarrassing the open-source image of Maidsafe.
So Maidsafe can issue an OB license. In order to qualify for the OB license you have to be using the code in connection with the OB platform (Maidsafe will probably want to exclude OB forks). Therefore obviously OB has the ability to meet this criteria, and so does anyone that they allow on their platform, so long as they conform to the other rules. This kind of set-up happens all the time, and I don’t think that businesses will in any way be turned off by it.
While this is true is a technical legal sense, in a technical legal sense, every time someone forks a GPL project and uses it in an open-source fashion they are applying for (and receiving) a GPL license.
Lets think of this in terms of a house. Maidsafe is building a house, and they’ve decided to make a Green Wing (GPL). The basic rule of the Green Wing, is that if anyone wants to build an addition on to the existing house and live there, they can do so. But in return they must allow others to build any additions to the Green Wing which they desire. Maidsafe does not have to regulate who individually builds on each, but they can still enforce the terms of the Green Wing (i.e. anyone can build additions and live there). Hopefully this makes sense.
The great thing that I think that people are missing is that nothing about having a Green Wing, prevents Maidsafe from building a Red Wing for their friends in OB (or any other group or cause). Now in the Red Wing you do NOT have to let anyone build additions to your house, and if they do, you can prevent them from living there. A basic rule of the Red Wing is that you have to touch the OB House. (This could be extended to as many degrees of separation as was desireable). But Maidsafe can impose certain limitations. For example, Maidsafe can say that folks on the Red Wing can’t build their house above a certain height, or do anything which might impair the downstream folks from using solar power.
Over in the Green Wing, people can build their house as high as they like it, but in the Green Wing if height is an issue, people can literally build their house on top of yours, if they want.
And again, Maidsafe isn’t limited to the Green and the Red Wings, it can make as many as it wants (all colors of the rainbow).
I don’t want to take the metaphor too far, but I hope that people see that this is a classic non-zero sum issue. Using GPL as a default doesn’t lock Maidsafe in to that approach if there is a valid reason to use another approach.
My understanding of the patent issue for Maidsafe is that they were gotten for completely defensive purposes, i.e., so that someone can’t come along and close the code and prevent general use. This is, at least, what I’ve gathered from everything I’ve heard @dirvine say in interviews, etc.
This seems like a worthy purpose. Other parties might wish it otherwise, but that’s the only legitimate use I can see, i.e., defensive. I’m doubting that Maidsafe wants to engage in going around stopping others from using its code, even if they try to close some aspect by changing it. Doesn’t strike me as what Maidesafe as a company, foundation or community is all about.
If GPL3 is a good defensive tool, I imagine that’s enough.
Yes I think ( 
) we are agreeing with each other on this point, the way in which OB and others would be able to use our code (DHT in this case) in any derivatives would be dependant on the terms of that bespoke agreement.
You are correct on all fronts @fergish. The patents are there to protect both MaidSafe and the developers working on the SAFE Network. The last thing we want to do is stop people using the code, 8 years have been spent building the platform, we want people to use it.
Yes, well I think we do agree on this point.
But on this point you made earlier, I think you are overstating the impact. If Maidsafe and OB come to agreement on Red Wing style license, allowing closed source, then “any other company building on OB’s code” would NOT need to seek their own license. They are free to shelter under OB’s license so long as they conform to the terms. This would greatly lower transaction costs in the vast majority of cases, and again if there is someone in particular who is unhappy with a term, then they can elect to go to Maidsafe and try to negotiate a different license if that seems beneficial to them.
The idea is to create terms which are not onerous or oppressive, but simply terms which prevent these companies from creating a closed-source fork and using it in onerous or oppressive ways. This can be done because its limited to the specific venue of the OB platform. Maidsafe could even assign OB the right to enforce the portion of the license if that was desirable.
My point is that I believe that it would be very possible to create a bespoke agreement which would NOT be “off putting for many.”
Yes, I think this is the key point. As OB are anticipating and wanting their platform to be used and extended beyond its current scope, providing them with a license that ultimately restricts how it can be used (with our component) is not that attractive to them, hence the push for MIT.
If they don’t want any restrictions on how to use the component, then the GPL is available. I mean I understand that any rational actor “wants” to get stuff for free and sell stuff for a profit, but if you are dealing with other rational actors, they are not going to give you stuff for free.
But from my perspective I don’t think that it will be that unattractive to them. If OB’s B2B future customers want to use a closed-source pay-to-play model, then they have to accept that they must deal with someone else’s pay-to-play terms. So long as the terms do not interfere with legitimate business objectives and the transactions costs are low, I think its a red herring to say that such a set up would be unattractive to them.
If someone wants to close their source and use it in a trollish fashion, then we don’t want them involved, and neither should OB.
Again, I don’t understand why this is portrayed as such a night and day choice.
If OB or anyone else has valid use-cases, they can negotiate mutually acceptable terms. Businesses do this ALL THE TIME, its how the conventional markets work. But demanding the ability to use without any quid pro quo or safeguards is unrealistic and destroys the ability of Maidsafe to use its IP in a defensive fashion. The default safeguard is the GPL with its continuing open source provisions. If someone doesn’t like that then they must offer MaidSafe something which still allows Maidsafe to meet its defensive goals.
What that might be in specific cases I have no idea, but simply to say well “thats not attractive” and suggest MIT overlooks the incredible variety of contractual options available to Maidsafe and OB.
At the base, what is attractive to market players is functionality. Regardless of licensing the Maidsafe version of OB outperforms the non-maidsafe versions, in terms of security, stability etc. then businesses will gravitate toward it period. If this isn’t there, then business’ will not buy in no matter what licensing scheme is used.
If transaction costs are low, and Maidsafe doesn’t want direct cut of the profits, then why would most businesses care? I mean if you draft a terms of service which basically says that you won’t engage in sharp practices, using your IP to control secondary markets, engaging in price-fixing, or refusing to release reasonable licenses, what business is going to object to that?
If they do, well then when negotiations break down, Maidsafe should drop a line to the U.S. SEC and other equivalent agencies informing them that company X is apparently wanting to engage in trust-like behavior.