Why the term "open source" is important

https://danb.me/blog/posts/why-open-source-term-is-important/

by longrod • 4 years ago

54 97 4 years ago

MonkeyClub2• 4 years ago

Must confess, I get a bit irritated when people try to explain "open source", but then very carefully steer away from "free software" in the explanation. It is like trying to explain what makes water flow, but trying very hard to avoid using "fluid" or its cognates.

My irritation aside, though, I can't decide whether the author is passively ignorant of the rest of the iceberg, or actively chooses to ignore it.

mixologic• 4 years ago

Its also noteworthy that the definition of "Open Source" is not something that any organization or entity has ownership over. OSI wants the definition to mean specific things. The FSF wants it to mean similar, yet different things (or that they never wanted "open source" to pollute the vernacular at all, and continue to use the "Free" software terminology.)

But the definition itself is fluid, contextual, and subject to change over time.

bitwize2• 4 years ago

"Open source" was a service mark of OSI, an attempt to defend the term against people who use it inconsistently with its definition. I don't know if this is still the case, but OSI still advocates for use of "open source" consistent with the definition below.

Both open source and free software are defined as software that allows you to:

* use the software for any purpose

* examine the source

* distribute the software under the same license terms as you received it

* modify the software in any way

* distribute the software in modified form under the same license terms as you received the original

Stallman's quibble with "open source" is that open source messaging focuses on the business benefits of this kind of software rather than the inherent virtues of free software (and the inherent vices of non-free software). Note also that even to Stallman and the FSF, even BSD- or MIT-licensed works are "free software"; software licenses that forbid redistribution under a different license are called copyleft licenses under the FSF.

MonkeyClub2• 4 years ago

Yeah I think the FSF sees significant differences between Free Software and Open Source, in terms of the essential liberties that are not present in Open Source (different things missing in different understandings, but the FSF focuses on the fact that they are missing).

Although I’m no fanatical Stallmanite (Stallmanist? :), I do see the categorical distinctions clear as day; can’t understand why Open Source people play the willful ignorance card.

Free Software is good for people primarily, while Open Source is good for corporations primarily.

If people ignore FS and promote OS, what does that tell us about their intentions?

judge20204• 4 years ago

I'll be honest, the use of 'free' in your comment is vague on the same level of 'open source', ie. do you mean "free (freedom) software" or "free (as in beer) software".

edgyquant3• 4 years ago

For me F/LOSS is a perfect example of how anarchist philosophy let’s perfect be the enemy of good; practical solutions become as bad as no solution.

Most end users are just happy there’s a ton of free, quality code to run and study. Admittedly that’s only the case because of the FSF, but I think they should just accept that “open source” is a perfectly good term to describe software that is free and you can download the source.

Everything else is licensing nuances e.g, politics

Ar-Curunir• 4 years ago

FLOSS is not an anarchist philosophy, since it relies on the state for enforcement.

jrm42• 4 years ago

I think you have it exactly wrong.

The idea of Free Software, at its most extreme, exists as a useful endpoint of an "Overton Window" for software. Which is to say, all software benefits from its existence even if they don't e.g. sign on to the GPL. You're forced to consider it as a possibility.

Without it, we'd probably think of "Open Source" as the most "open" software can be -- which, as OP proves, is quite wrong and nebulous.

charcircuit2• 4 years ago

Free software is associated with the belief that unfree software is unethical. If someone is making an explanation, but is not trying to tell everyone who makes propitiatory software is evil they should not mention free software.

mistrial92• 4 years ago

I will try -- free is not the right word in English, it has ambiguity and also, unproductive aspects of meaning.

Richard Stallman and GPL discussions certainly do mention ethics as part of the considerations. I agree that no person is completely disjoint from ethical considerations, with intelligence. But as this thread explores, there are multiple points of view, unclear and untested aspects legally within multiple legal jurisdictions.

But you make a large leap when you say "they should not mention" .. It is a dramatic statement, not a logical one, it is more in common with persuasive, political speech than logic there.

As noted by others, a useful simplification is to focus on one particular LICENSE at a time. Is this license ... x y z. As Google did long ago and as Github started to do and as the OSI does and as FSF does... like that.. not debate on the entire concept, but instead focus on the implementation, as software does.

skybrian5• 4 years ago

Yes, "free software" is a competing term used by Free Software Foundation, but they don't certify licenses in the same way. They have a page commenting on different licenses [1] but it's less useful than what OSI does, in terms of defining a term clearly and attempting to be neutral about what licenses it includes.

Perhaps this is because their goal is to promote the GNU licenses, not to be objective about it.

OSI was created in part in reaction to ambiguity and confusion around "free software."

[1] https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html

ssddanbrown6• 4 years ago

Article author here, I admit this is fairly specifically targeted at the term "Open Source" as that's specifically the term I believe to see misapplied most often. I wanted to write an article that I could share to provide some context when raising issues regarding licensing. While I could have gone a lot deeper into also describing "free software" and the history of the terms, I wanted something rather direct that won't serve more confusion (Since often this could be the first introduction to the meanings of "Open Source" and "free software").

Maybe I could add a "Further Reading" section at the end though with links to such topics.

TAForObvReasons3• 4 years ago

As long as there is money to be made by blurring the line, people will continue to do it.

But there is no consensus on what is "open source". Is AGPL open source? Despite the FSF and OSI approving AGPL, many would argue that it is a EULA.

The inevitable result is the erosion of the generic branding "open source" and the rise of specific licenses. "MIT" or "Apache" or "BSD" evoke one set of reactions, while "GPL" or "MPL" evoke another.

jefftk• 4 years ago

there is no consensus on what is "open source"

It's not "consensus" in the sense of "unanimity" (is anything ever, when it comes to widely used terms?) but there's a "consensus" in the sense of widespread agreement to use the OSI's definition.

Is AGPL open source?

Yes. Why wouldn't it be? It meets all the standard requirements (https://opensource.org/osd) and the OSI has approved it.

TAForObvReasons3• 4 years ago

Many have argued the AGPL is a EULA, not a proper software license. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31190064 for example:

If I were to run a modified AGPL'd SSH server on my own hardware, the question of whether I'm violating the AGPL depends on whether I'm allowing others to access it remotely. If the AGPL can be violated without copyright infringement, it's clearly in a different legal category than the GPL.

That "[AGPL] meets all the standard requirements" and "OSI has approved it" is really an indictment of OSI judgment, not a sound argument with basis in copyright law.

naniwaduni• 4 years ago

There's nothing magical or divinely inspired about the OSI open source definition; it's an elaboration on the DSFG. The DSFG has the hoops it does to facilitate the mental gymnastics of reconciling the appealing concept of free software with the ugly reality that the GPL was a poorly-implemented singleton that formed the bedrock of their enterprise.

TrevorFSmith3• 4 years ago

No organization can strictly define "open source" except to say which definition they use. A more valid way to approach the issue is to point out that a license is or is not not approved by the OSI, the FSF, or some other person or group. "Open source" has always been and will always be as fuzzy a term as "the Metaverse" and "handsome".

YmiYugy• 4 years ago

For most developers and even a fair number of users open source isn't a fuzzy concept but a very concrete technical term describing a very particular kind of license. Being under an open source license can provide a huge boost to a project or product. As such it is a powerful marketing tool and companies try to exploit that by systematically undermining the the most widespread definition of open source. The danger of course being that we end up with a term as nebulous as Metaverse. I would even go further and argue that we should cement that definition into law, i.e. you can't call a product open source if it hasn't an approved open source license. The EU has created precedent for that by protecting the names of certain foods and beverages with regard to their origin, manufacturing and characteristics, because it's an area that faces many of the same issues.

TrevorFSmith3• 4 years ago

I am aware of the history of the term and how it was taken up and popularized by the OSI. It has served an important and useful purpose. That said, they can't camp on a general purpose term. It isn't like "Champagne", which is a region with ~clear boundaries.

stoolpigeon3• 4 years ago

"For most developers and even a fair number of users open source isn't a fuzzy concept but a very concrete technical term describing a very particular kind of license. "

A particular kind, yes. The OSI definition? I'd want to see something that showed objectively that this is what people think. I saw some projects I support come under fire for not being open source recently- I've been. a user and supporter of FOSS software for a long time. I didn't realize that making exclusions on who can use your software wasn't open source. If a developer doesn't want their code used in a weapons system, it doesn't meet the OSI definition.

I know it now, but then I think that leaves the software to use a term that's much less accurate. I don't think that happens because they have a profit motive and want to exploit the term open source. In fact I've seen licenses that are essentially open source except they try to stop people from making a bunch of money off of community work, including those currently controlling the project.

indymike• 4 years ago

The closest thing to an authority on what is open source is OSI. Open Source doesn't have a fuzzy definition, except where people would like the definition widened to fit their marketing needs.

judge20204• 4 years ago

Why do we need an authority? When I first heard 'open source' I thought it meant that the source code was open access, I would imagine most people don't put much more thought into it until they see one of these debates on use of the term.

pessimizer6• 4 years ago

Why is this "more valid"?

I have no problem with talking about Tesla cars; nobody argues that we should be talking about Nikolai Tesla's personal car, or a car down the street that somebody spraypainted the word "Tesla" on.

longrod• 4 years ago

The author posted this in a recent discussion on GitHub [0]. Thought I'd share it to get more opinions on the matter.

Personally speaking it irks me a little when different terms are made ownership by someone. OSI is doing great work but is it considered an authority when it comes to defining what open source is? In other words, can open source exist without OSI? I certainly think so.

For example, what does it mean when Sentry says their licensing scheme is not acceptable by OSI [1]? Does it change the meaning of open source?

It's really confusing.

[0] https://github.com/streetwriters/notesnook/discussions/747#d...

[1] https://open.sentry.io/licensing/

mistrial92• 4 years ago

you answered your own question -- OSI activity exists exactly to publicize LICENSE and reduce confusion.

skybrian5• 4 years ago

Yes, OSI is considered the authority on this. Who else? They invented and popularized the term, after all, back in the early dot-com era.

Of course, they can't do it alone. The question is whether you should support OSI's efforts or not. Do you want "open source" to have a clear meaning or do you want to drift into meaningless like "agile" or just "open?"

It's the same as any other standard. If everyone stops following the standard then it will fail, but is that really want you want?

Jasper_• 4 years ago

Open source was not invented by the OSI; they claim that, but you can easily find press releases going back to the 80s using the term.

But yes, on the popularity bend, you're correct -- the OSI basically was a giant PR campaign, started by Netscape to publicize their going-out-of-business sale as a good thing, actually. Most importantly, they specifically wanted to separate themselves from the FSF project's four freedoms, which they viewed as antithetical to business -- or rather, antithetical to any business who wanted to buy the charred remains of Netscape, like AOL. So they started with Debian's DFSG, and whittled it down until they had something they could sell.

In my opinion, people argue about terminology too much rather than the freedoms and the society we want to build, but that's just the internet, sometimes.

TrevorFSmith3• 4 years ago

An additional question might be, "Do we want to allow a tiny group of people to declare that they, and only they, can pick a generic term like open source and then dictate that their definition is the only definition?" This is not "Kleenex" or "Champagne". This is a generic term.

bitwize2• 4 years ago

Coraline Ada Ehmke's stated reason for attempting to join the OSI board was to try to change the definition of open source to permit restrictions on fields of endeavor (specifically, getting her "ethical source" license vetted as open source). The OSI still has emotional if not legal authority over the definition, even among people who aren't satisfied with that definition.

judge20204• 4 years ago

if not legal authority

According to this press release they did not win the trademark for ‘Open Source’, only ‘OSI Certified’ (which would be a wholly better definition for people to use, however, it’s a term that might need explanation or further context when used, so it’s not often said).

https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.p...

hardwaresofton2• 4 years ago

A bit of context for HNers before/after reading -- This is from the personal blog of the creator of Bookstack[0], which is licensed under MIT.

I agree with the post and also other posters here that in that the post skips over the free/open software debate which is also quite relevant.

[0] https://github.com/BookStackApp/BookStack

ssddanbrown6• 4 years ago

Author here. Thanks for adding some context, I touch on the lack of of mention of "free software" in my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32301331

hardwaresofton2• 4 years ago

No worries, love your work on Bookstack - it's awesome, and shows your commitment to open source.

sys_64738• 4 years ago

Open source is all about the license. The code can all be available for anybody to look at but there might be a restrictive license preventing you from compiling it. A senior exec at my former company once said "Open source doesn't mean it's free".

TAForObvReasons3• 4 years ago

"Open source doesn't mean it's free" is typically used to refer to implementation and support costs compared to commercial solutions, not to licensing shenanigans within self-styled open source projects.

dahart13• 4 years ago

Parent’s point is a good one: the specific terms of OSI’s definition of open source does hinge on licensing. Furthermore, “open source” is not mutually exclusive with “commercial” software like you imply. The US government specifically refers to OSI-style open source software as “commercial” precisely because of the licensing that comes with it. https://www.acquisition.gov/far/part-2#FAR_2_101

Gigachad• 4 years ago

Open source software can not restrict you from compiling it. You may have to pay to see it but then you are free to redistribute it.

What you are talking about is source available software.

dblock• 4 years ago

As someone who works on an open-source fork of the open-source software mentioned in the post, I am now exclusively referring to the open-source version of it as Apache (APLv2) -licensed. Maybe that's how we fix this confusion?

greyface-• 4 years ago

The term "Open Source" is not a trademark and the USPTO will not allow it to become a trademark. The OSI themselves acknowledge this. https://opensource.org/pressreleases/certified-open-source.p...

dahart13• 4 years ago

Maybe it would be better to promote and rally around a term that’s more specific? The best terms are the ones that naturally lead someone to the right conclusion, and are hard to make incorrect assumptions about. The main problem with trying to gate keep a generic term like “open source” is that it legitimately has multiple meanings, and the obvious and literal interpretation is the very one the author is complaining about. This is going to forever remain a fight against the tide, or a pee into the wind, or any number of other colorful well known phrases. It doesn’t take anything away from OSI to acknowledge their great work and also refer to OSI’s definition of open source specifically, when that is the one you mean.

risho3• 4 years ago

this might make sense if you were talking about free software. free software is very unclear and it makes people believe things that are not true about the software. free software doesn't need to be 0 cost.

this is not the case with open source. for close to 2 decades it was very obvious what open source meant and there was no confusion about it. it wasn't until the source available movement started to take off and they started to cash in on open source's reputation and identity for the sake of promoting themselves and cheapening the meaning that it became confusing.

the problem is that since this is a cultural movement and not a piece of intellectual property like a trademark there is no way to prevent people from contorting open source into whatever best suits their self serving interests.

dahart13• 4 years ago

It makes sense with “open source” too, and the author already acknowledged that explicitly. I don’t think this point is even up for debate. The obvious & literal interpretation of the term is, is the source available to inspect? That is precisely what the author said is not the definition of “open source”, he wants the definition to come with more than that, specifically that “open source” needs to come with limitations on what you’re allowed to do with it once acquired; the argument is that it must not be public domain.

I think it’s hyperbolic of you to suggest that when people use “open source” to mean “source that is open”, that implies they’re being selfish or contorting anything. You’re failing to acknowledge the very real problem that “open source” taken literally doesn’t mean what some people want it to mean.

ssddanbrown6• 4 years ago

Article author here. My concern would be that you could use any term but, as soon as that term gains value, it would start to be abused and blurred and we'd be in the same situation. It would be a shame to effectively throw away the value of "Open Source" that has been built up by the OSI and the community around Open Source software. I don't think the term is past being useful, the vast majority of its use i still see it applied as per the OSI definition, but there's always going to be a little maintenance needed.

dahart13• 4 years ago

“OSI open source” would not have the problem you speculate on. I’m sure there are other alternatives that could also work to solve this problem.

At this point, the counter problem is growing: the legitimate alternative meanings of the term “open source” are getting more used as time goes, not less, and speaking personally I don’t think maintenance or blog posts is going to fix it. Creative Commons licenses got pretty good at this by adding more words to each variant of their license titles. What about that? There’s an inherent problem with hoping to keep a term as short and generic as “open source”, when the issues you care about are separate from whether you’re allowed to look at the source.

thayne2• 4 years ago

You are asking a large group of people to start using a different term, because a minority want a term that has had specific meaning for decades to have a more broad definition.

dahart13• 4 years ago

Oh I think you have it completely backwards. The number of people who understand “open source” to mean OSI’s specific version is a tiny, tiny fraction of the number of people who assume “open source” means nothing more than what those two words clearly express: source available. This includes all new programmers (who outnumber us experienced programmers at all times), all lawmakers and law enforcement, all journalism, all business people, and the general public.

I’m only offering ideas on how to solve an existing problem of unclear words and unreasonable expectations, not asking anyone to do anything. We can continue to use “open source”, and suffer the consequences and continue to complain. I think the problem the author called out will continue to get worse. Plus, as pointed out elsewhere in this thread, OSI co-opted this term from others who had already been using it differently before them.

It would be way better if the term was clearly a name, rather than something that tries to gate-keep the meaning of general words. That would make it so you assume you need to look it up, and not assume what it means. It would be better if “open source” didn’t have other, easier to assume and understand meanings that came both before and after OSI’s ideas. If we don’t want to use a name, then it would be better if the phrase used a word or two to capture the ideas in OSI’s version. Using “open source” to mean something with restriction is a desire to have your cake and eat it too. This is in essence a marketing slogan that wants to rest multiple license limitations on the positive-sounding word “open”, without having to admit there are parts of the license that limit some kinds of openness and freedom in certain ways (under the possibly true belief that such limitations are the maximum balance of openness for everyone). Both term “open source” and “free software” suffer from this problem, hoping to establish a slogan out of two words that most clearly imply a meaning that is unfortunately antithetical to the movement. This is just a choice, and we could choose to be clear, or choose to fight the tide.

raggi2• 4 years ago

I have always had to treat different licenses differently. BSD, MIT, LGPL, GPL, AGPL, Apache, etc. They all mean different things which have impact on how and where I might place them.

Subdividing "source available" as implied but not well defined in this article, into its own group does not substantially help me. When someone describes a useful "open source" thing to me, one of my first questions is which license it is under, and that would be the same whether someone said "source available" or "open source".

Perhaps there's something more behind "punch in the gut", but I don't really know what that is. There's a link to a tweet about these projects being boosted under the open source term, but the tweet has little engagement: 20 project logos, 43 likes. Did it actually reach beyond direct customers? Did the term open source have any impact at all here?

zozbot234• 4 years ago

Source-available has been called "Shared Source" as far back as the early 2000s. Open Source was specifically intended to include the usual "freedoms" of free software, using a less ambiguous term than "Free".

raggi2• 4 years ago

https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=Shared%2...

often depends who you ask, istr stallmans take on "open source" is that the term came into existence explicitly to dilute the free software movement and make space for evil companies to do evil things. if you were to buy this then it may continue from that logic that everything covered in the article is well labelled open source.

i don't really condone stallmans biased and divisive position on this, but it is exemplary of the kind of conversation we're wading into with opinions about what it means historically.

e.g. https://www.cmpod.net/all-transcripts/history-open-source-fr... under "A Surreal Situation"

ddevault2• 4 years ago

Thanks for writing this up, Dan.

Whenever this discussion is rolled out again, it's useful to address a few key points. First, open source is defined by the open source definition. This is not contingent on the OSI receiving a trademark for the term. The common usage of the term is defined by the OSD, and much in the same way that selling "cakes" and fulfilling orders with used car tires is dishonest, so too is pushing non-free software under the brand of open source.

And note that open source is defined by the OSD -- not by the OSI. Should the OSI attempt to re-define "open source" without careful consultation with the community or in service of a conflict of interest, the community will withdraw its support for the new definition.

Painting the term as having always been loosely defined is historical revisionism. What we have always seen, and what we are seeing now, is a minority view that seeks to forward an unorthodox definition of open source in the service of their private financial interests. I am not prepared to accept a novel interpretation of open source because you feel that it would be more profitable for your business if I did.

The open source brand has been wildly successful and it's a lucrative target for bad actors to exploit with non-conformant software licenses. Don't be a sucker. These interpretations are not in your best interest.

ssddanbrown6• 4 years ago

Thanks for your input here Drew, your actions and writings have been what has inspired me to call out such scenarios (Of non-OSD "Open Source" usage) when I see them.

ddevault2• 4 years ago

Cheers :)

Why the term "open source" is important

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