Open Source

31560 readers

804 users here now

All about open source! Feel free to ask questions, and share news, and interesting stuff!

Useful Links

Rules

Posts must be relevant to the open source ideology
No NSFW content
No hate speech, bigotry, etc

Related Communities

Community icon from opensource.org, but we are not affiliated with them.

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

315

SF ads call out tech firms for not paying for open source (www.theregister.com)

submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

24 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Drivers passing through San Francisco have a new roadside distraction to consider: billboards calling out businesses that don't cough up for the open source code that they use.

The signs are the work of the Open Source Pledge – a group that launched earlier this month. It asks businesses that make use of open source code to pledge $2,000 per developer to support projects that develop the code. So far, 25 companies have signed up – but project co-founder Chad Whitacre wants bigger firms to pay their dues, too.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Which licence is open source but demands payment from companies if they use it?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

There are licenses that allow for free non-commercial/personal use but paid business use.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Do you have an example? I am pretty sure that a FOSS license which requires companies to pay is impossible.

Open Source guarantees that anyone can give the software to a company for free:

"The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different sources. The license shall not require a royalty or other fee for such sale."

And it guarantees that the company can then use it freely:

"The license must not restrict anyone from making use of the program in a specific field of endeavor. For example, it may not restrict the program from being used in a business [...]"

Quotes from the Open Source Definition.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

Sorry, you may be right; I was just thinking of licensing in general.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

None. Those things are incompatible with each other.