Just saw the discussion around the Haier Home Assistant takedown and thought it would be good to materialize the metaphorical blacklist.
As i understand google and Microsoft don’t really fit here
Probably the definition should look something like: companies that proactively did actions towards harming open source culture/community/movement. Don’t respect foss licensing, etc
I nominate Gitea for this one, for hijacking the project, and making it for profit organization
Also, Ultimate Guitar with their kido musescore, for basically trying to do the same thing that manga company is trying to do right now
And my favorite… Facebook for their oculus privacy and for threatening to sue everyone who tries to jailbreak or modify their devices
Simple tools is probably not considered open source anymore
P.S. oh! Really also think about Proton, Brave, and Telegram
Three companies that are famous for saying they are foss, but in really it’s often not exactly that
Proton’s and telegram’s servers are not foss
Telegram and brave had many instances of delaying publishing the source, even though they already updated the apps
Also, not sure how about now, but telegram is famous for having not reproducible builds, brave probably too
Proton’s server code is not Open Source because it contains filter and anti spam detection which if released, would severely hamper their ability to detect spam and keep their users safe + detect abuse for their service.
Proton has had extensive security audits done and their claims have been backed up by independent third parties.
The definition should be further modified to include legitimate reasons for not open sourcing some code + having audits to back up claims.
Facebook has their reasons to keep stuff as closed as possible, and they don’t claim to be opensource
But proton does, and it’s not about privacy or security, but about using banner of foss just for their own benefit, and don’t contribute what they claim to the foss community
They open source all of their clients (when not in beta). They maintain multiple open source cryptographic libraries, in multiple languages, which a lot of developers and companies go on to use. They have a yearly fundraiser for open source and digital rights groups, which they contribute a $100,000 to each year.
Just because their server code is not open source, doesn’t mean they don’t support open source. It’s not an all or nothing situation. Binary thinking and classification is a very dangerous and naïve way to look at things.
It’s probably a good idea to have a stronger definition and mission. Here are a few scenarios you should consider.
- FSF defines anything that’s not copyleft as hostile. That’s most companies. I personally don’t think I can tell my users what to do with my software other than remove my liability so I vehemently disagree with Stallman.
- Mongo wrote the SSPL and MariaDB wrote the BSL. Both licenses are seen as regressions. I personally respect the MariaDB case and have been harassed by too many Mongo salespeople to say the same about them.
- Platforms like AWS are the reason companies like CockroachDB and Elastic implemented restrictive licenses.
- IBM has been gutting open source through its acquisition of Red Hat. This is a common story; Oracle has been screwing *nix longer.
- Protecting trademarks causes a lot of consternation from users. The Rust Foundation is the most recent example of this I remember blowing up the FOSS community.
I like your idea a lot. I think it needs some definition to be very successful!
FSF defines anything that’s not copyleft as hostile. That’s most companies. I personally don’t think I can tell my users what to do with my software other than remove my liability so I vehemently disagree with Stallman.
Citations please? Using a pushover license instead of copyleft is not hostility but a missed opportunity. Copyleft is about a community safeguarding itself and making sure the software can’t be used in proprietary applications as much as possible.
Are you not familiar with Richard Stallman? Here’s one piece.
We in the free software movement don’t think of the open source camp as an enemy; the enemy is proprietary (nonfree) software. But we want people to know we stand for freedom, so we do not accept being mislabeled as open source supporters. What we advocate is not “open source,” and what we oppose is not “closed source.” To make this clear, we avoid using those terms.
Your own citation disproves the hostility claim. To answer your question, yes I was a student associate member of the FSF. Nowhere did I learn to treat non copyleft licenses as “hostile.” In fact, they are so prevalent that considering it hostile/harmful would be fruitless. They are still free licenses at the end of the day (at least the ones that dont violate the four freedoms)
Edit: actually we are hostile to some open source licenses, like the ones that prohibit commercial use to any group or individual! That’s a huge no-no.
I personally use Apache 2.0 because it’s been upheld in court. I’m not sure if MPL has been directly challenged in court. Either way, I agree with the sentiment. The legal perspective is why I moved away from MIT/ISC.
FSF defines anything that’s not copyleft as hostile. That’s most companies. I personally don’t think I can tell my users what to do with my software other than remove my liability so I vehemently disagree with Stallman.
I’m not planning on counting that as hostile behavior. Organizations can choose a license for their software (and I can choose not to buy/use it). This collection is mostly focused on companies that hurt existing Open Source software. Such as sending a cease and desist to an unofficial plugin/extension or closing down software that was originally open source.
Maybe your could also add organisations (companies, government agencies, NGOs,…) that create standards in such a way that the standard is hard or impossible to implement in open source implementations?
Nice OP! Thank you! I don’t have a codeberg account yet, but you can use this to easily create a TOC https://imthenachoman.github.io/nGitHubTOC.
It would be good to add links/citations as well, instead of just quotes. IE: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/haier-hits-home-assistant-plugin-dev-with-takedown-notice/
It would be good to add links/citations as well, instead of just quotes. IE: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/haier-hits-home-assistant-plugin-dev-with-takedown-notice/
I would suggest creating a documents archive subdirectory and mirroring as well as linking, in case the takedown notices get takedown-notice’d.
Surprised that most hardware companies aren’t on the list. AMD, Intel, Nvidia, Apple, Broadcom all are hostile to reverse engineering or in Nvidias case, not even bothering to do the bare minimum for an ultra lenient Torvalds.
Sure would be a shame if people used this blacklist as a basis for leaving negative reviews on Amazon.
