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11 sats \ 1 reply \ @nerd2ninja 1 Sep \ parent \ on: Bear is now source-available (due to code theft and livelihood snatching) tech
I disagree with Satoshi Nakamoto. "We" aren't working on the bear code base. 15 people had contributed. 15 people put in the effort. Those 15 people should decide how their work gets to be treated.
I of course believe they should have went with AGPL, because at least they could have benefited from their competitors code contributions that way, and then you could say "they" (but still not "we") were working on the same library together.
You disagree philosophically, and that’s ok. Everyone deserves to get paid for their work. I will remark however that marginal cost of a line of code has dropped considerably in the last year…
I do think that SN hints at a general core idea that software trends towards more permissive or free licenses over time.
AGPL from the beginning is noble, but ultimately limits reach. Delegation to the commons of “deciding how their work gets treated” that permissive licenses grant is exactly how software products get popular. Changing the rules when you get successful (competitors reselling your product and you not getting a cut) is of course an option, but so is taking the last known free and open version and building something new from it.
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