{"id":82,"date":"2019-03-06T00:03:05","date_gmt":"2019-03-06T00:03:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/?p=82"},"modified":"2019-05-26T23:38:52","modified_gmt":"2019-05-26T23:38:52","slug":"why-cant-i-open-source-this","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/?p=82","title":{"rendered":"Why can’t I open source this?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In my last job, I wanted to open source some code. \u00a0What I wanted to open source was a collection of integration examples, so it used many JS frameworks from many sources, all of which were \u201cFree\u201d and\/or \u201cOpen Source\u201d. \u00a0I followed the normal process, contacted the legal team, and sent them information on the code and the licenses of all of my JS dependencies.<\/span><\/p>\n

It turns out, I had to remove large pieces of my code so that I was no longer using any <\/span>copyleft<\/span><\/a> licenses. \u00a0This basically means that some stuff was <\/span>GPL<\/span><\/a> \/ <\/span>LGPL<\/span><\/a>, and we as a company couldn\u2019t be associated with that code. \u00a0\u00a0At the time I didn\u2019t realize there was a difference between \u201cFree Software\u201d and \u201cOpen Source\u201d, and I was caught off guard by the fact some licenses were different than others, even though I had access to all of the source code. \u00a0<\/span>Why can\u2019t I use \u201cfree software\u201d however I want?<\/b> \u00a0If I want to give away a t-shirt I got for free, nobody is stopping me. \u00a0That\u2019s not illegal. It\u2019s not even exploitative. So why can\u2019t I give away free code however I want?<\/span><\/p>\n

So I started reading up on copyleft, GPL, the <\/span>FSF<\/span><\/a>, and the <\/span>philosophy<\/span><\/a> over at GNU. \u00a0The legalese isn\u2019t entirely clear, but my interpretation is if you want to release your code, and you have a GPL dependency, you also need to release your code under the GPL. \u00a0GPL spreads by attaching to other software, it\u2019s a parasite, a \u201c<\/span>virus<\/span><\/a>\u201d<\/span>.<\/span> \u00a0The intent is that nobody can charge for something that is \u201cderivative\u201d of free software, and because of that the amount and capabilities of free software will grow.<\/span><\/p>\n

It does not accomplish that<\/b>. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, it forces people not to distribute code they may want to because they, <\/span>or their company<\/b>, do not want to be tied down to the restrictive nature of GPL. \u00a0Practically every engineer works at some company and develops for their job, so they have to respect the legal terms of their company. \u00a0\u00a0The GPLs rules and requirements are shooting it in the foot, and are actively discouraging engineers from open sourcing software.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you actually care about giving people the most powerful, free to use software, don\u2019t use the GPL. \u00a0Use <\/span>MIT<\/span><\/a>, or some other permissive license. \u00a0Those let people do whatever they would like with the open source code, like something that is actually free.<\/span><\/p>\n

References<\/b><\/p>\n

https:\/\/github.com\/github\/choosealicense.com\/blob\/gh-pages\/LICENSE.md<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/github.blog\/2015-03-09-open-source-license-usage-on-github-com\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Viral_license<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/programming\/comments\/6jamm7\/ballmer_linux_is_a_cancer_2001\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/opensource.google.com\/docs\/using\/agpl-policy\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my last job, I wanted to open source some code. \u00a0What I wanted to open source was a collection of integration examples, so it used many JS frameworks from many sources, all of which were \u201cFree\u201d and\/or \u201cOpen Source\u201d. \u00a0I followed the normal process, contacted the legal team, and sent them information on the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-82","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":174,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions\/174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwonsever.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}