Unpopular opinion: this is the natural consequence of squatting self-descriptive phrases. Open source is self-descriptive.. the source is open. The phrase was hijacked (by the OSI) and is being squatted on by people who want to enforce a very specific meaning of the phrase, even though it is self-descriptive and broad. If there is any ambiguity as to the phrase, it should be added to with modifiers, and not just claimed. For example, what does open refer to in OSS? Lots of different things. Thats why you should specify when addressing your interpretation. OSS should be an umbrella phrase that covers the multitude of interpretations like source available, FOSS, FLOSS, etc.
I've thought about making a nonprofit called the Grape Initiative which would release a definition of "Grape" that only includes purple grapes. If people want to refer to green grapes well then I guess they will just have to say green grapes! When I think about grapes I always think about purple ones, makes sense to me!
>> The phrase was hijacked (by the OSI) and is being squatted on by people who want to enforce a very specific meaning of the phrase, even though it is self-descriptive and broad
I'm not sure that's a very generous interpretation.
In our industry these terms have very specific meanings. Just like other words in Physics, Law, or Medicine have very specific meanings to those in the field, but not to outsiders.
When we say Open Source, we use a two-word description to describe a much broader idea. Likewise when we say Free/Libre Software, we describe software licensed under specific conditions. Its obvious for us in this field why Google Chrome is not Free Software, but not so much for the average person.
>> OSS should be an umbrella phrase that covers the multitude of interpretations like source available, FOSS, FLOSS, etc.
I understand where you're coming from, but unfortunately OSS already has a strict definition. I agree there is a need for a more correct categorization, but it should be strictly and nomenclaturally separate from Open Source, to show that it is a much more restrictive license.
The other industries you mention have gone through similar changes though haven't they? Not long ago, "idiot", "imbecile" and "moron" were all terms with strict definitions in the field of medicine. Languages, terms that are strictly defined, even terms that are particular to a science or industry, evolve over time.
That is absolute nonsense. The people behind OSI worked long and hard to find a term that could be instead instead of Free Software, which they considered to have unfortunate connotations. This is something some disagree with, but that was their cause regardless. Their due diligence of the term took great trouble to make sure it had not any undocumented previous use.
Of course the words had occasionally been used together, but not as a term. That would have undermined their legal strategy altogether. They then failed to secure the trademarks they wanted, but not because the term had any documented previous use.
You may disagree with the outcome, you may disagree with the OSI altogether, but it is wrong to misrepresent history.
> Their due diligence of the term took great trouble to make sure it had not any undocumented previous use.
Doesn't mean an organization should be able to just take a self-descriptive phrase, say purple icicle, and assign a very specific meaning to it. Every self-descriptive phrase has an existing usage. Because one day you'll see an icicle that is purple and say "hey, purple icicle" only to have a horde of people rush and say "thats not a purple icicle!" (literally what happened in this thread).
> They then failed to secure the trademarks they wanted, but not because the term had any documented previous use.
No, of course they didn't have any documented previous use. "Documented previous use" being reserved uses before. You know why? Because it is a self-descriptive phrase that is too broad, ie descriptive mark which aren't granted. They chose a very basic self-descriptive phrase (frequency of previous use doesn't matter) and literally could not get it trademarked because it is self-descriptive and broad, but YET CONTINUED ON even after being swatted down by trademark offices around the world. Absolutely bonkers.
Was the phrase open-source actually used in the generic way you describe within the industry, prior to OSI coming on the scene? Im not sure that it was, but i could be wrong. Regardless, the definition is pretty fixed now.
Nonetheless, you're right, words are hard, and this isn't a new argument about the suitability of the term "open source". RMS makes a similar point about the term in this rather old essay: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....
I've got to agree here. We - as an industry, not a cult of naysayers - need to evolve our views of what is 'in the spirit of open source'. BSL fits that definition from my eyes.
Certainly a fair critique, and one we can admit we saw coming.
We currently use the BSL license, created by MariaDB and used by companies like Sentry. We do think Osso is open source by common understanding and view the BSL as a fair model that places no restrictions on good actors - the license is intended to protect us from copycats profiting off our work, while allowing anyone that needs to integrate SAML into an app they’re building free reign. You’re free to use Osso as a widget, but you can’t use it to start a widget factory.
"Source available" seems like a fair compromise, thanks for the suggestion.
> "We do think Osso is open source by common understanding and view the BSL as a fair model that places no restrictions on good actors - the license is intended to protect us from copycats profiting off our work, while allowing anyone that needs to integrate SAML into an app they’re building free reign."
The common understanding of open source is that source code is available, redistribution free, and derivative works are allowed.
MariaDB specifically states that BSL isn't open source:
> "We have not certified BSL as complying to the Open Source Definition by the Open Source Initiative (OSI). However, all source code is available from the start and most of the OSI criteria are met. As long as the software is used within the usage limitations, it’s free to use at no cost."
As I've mentioned or alluded to in other comments, I think "open source" as you describe it is broken and unsustainable, and we're happy to have a constructive conversation about commercially viable open source. But if we can't agree that the definition of "open source", like any word or phrase, can change over time, then I don't think there's much of a constructive conversation to be had. Would you suggest we remove any mention of "open source" from our documentation etc.?
> I think "open source" as you describe it is broken and unsustainable,
Then dont claim to use an open source license. Its just recently people have felt foss is commercially viable. For most of its history people believed that foss was not commercially viable. That's why it was considered a radical view.
You want to have the cake and eat it too. You're trying to ride the wave of goodwill that open source provides without paying your dues. Yes open source makes it harder to be commercially viable. If it didn't, if it only provided benefits, everything would be open source.
> But if we can't agree that the definition of "open source", like any word or phrase, can change over time
If i sold nut free chocolate bars, and then someone died of alergic reaction, to which i responded by saying, definitions change over time peanuts arent included in nut-free, would you accept that?
Yes, words can in principle change over time - but you can't just change meanings unilateral, especially not as part of a false advertising campaign to mislead users into thinking you are something that you are not.
I don't think I've changed the meaning unilaterally, others here seem to agree that the meaning is evolving.
I can concede that we are guilty of wanting the wave of goodwill, but I have a hard time agreeing that this is a bait and switch. And I certainly hope nobody is going to die because we use "open source" instead of "source available".
The part of this conversation that leaves me wanting is that it all seems so positive rather than normative, and doesn't consider the benefits of choosing this license over a closed source product.
Our goals here are to make SAML SSO more accessible and run a business that helps some good customers use the software we've created. There's a lot of net positives in that IMO, and this whole "but it's not ACTUALLY open source" is a distraction borne of inflexibility and a lack of creativity.
So how do we as an industry move forward in a way that allows individual use of source available software, but prevents companies from unfairly profiting off of that? Is that desirable? What do we call that? Maybe business source, maybe source available is fine. That's a lot more interesting of a conversation to me. If you won't have that conversation until we strike open source from our website I understand.
> There's a lot of net positives in that IMO, and this whole "but it's not ACTUALLY open source" is a distraction borne of inflexibility and a lack of creativity.
Being "flexible" and "creative" with the truth is just a fancy way of saying lying.
Are you seriously arguing the ends justify the means, where the end is some cloud saml business and the means is misrepresenting the licensing terms of your product? That's probably the lowest stakes ends justify the means argument i have ever heard and is pretty rediculous.
At the end of the day, if you can't operate your business ethically and with integrity, then no, its not a net positive. This is true for pretty much any business venture, but its especially true for some random cloud offering competiting in a market with many other competitors doing roughly the same thing. The way you talk about this stuff you would think you were trying to solve world hunger.
> If you won't have that conversation until we strike open source from our website I understand.
Why do you think i'm interested in that conversation at all? I have no stake in your company, i don't care how you structure your IP, if you succeed as a company or if you fail. I do however have a stake in the open source movement and care deeply when parasites try to profit off it without fulfilling their obligations to the movement.
> Certainly a fair critique, and one we can admit we saw coming.
So you intentionally made false statements about your product, which you knew ahead of time were false and if believed might conceivably make people more likely to buy it? That's normally called fraud.
The long winded justification doesn't matter. You're under no moral obligation to make your product open source. You are under a moral (and probably legal but ianal) not to do bait and switches.
I don't think we've intentionally made false statements nor committed any fraud. But we appreciate the feedback, we'll review as a team and see what sort of decision we can make that will maintain source availability without upsetting folks who allow OSI to define "open source". We made some mistakes, we're very early, and we were hoping to have a (constructive) conversation around licensing and sustainable open source.
Right on. This kind of thing keeps happening. Fortunately, HN and other communities have a surprisingly sharp eye for these lies and can generally be relied upon to call them out, but people still try it on.
You are absolutely free to use Osso's source to onboard and authenticate your own customers without paying us! The goal of the license is to prevent someone from creating their own SAAS offering that competes with ours. Using Osso for your own app is within rights granted by the license.
But to your point, we also offer a demo instance that you can use in order to build out your integration, and then when a customer comes along, start paying us and swap out some ENV variables and you're ready to go!
It's not. At the bottom of the README you then state:
"While not technically an open source license..."
It's flat out not an open source license. And I think its disingenuous to have "open source" right in the first paragraph of the README.
I think you should change any mention of Open Source to "Source Available", to avoid this confusion.
The fact that the acronym OSS is in the company name is probably not helping.
EDIT: I went ahead and created a PR :)
https://github.com/enterprise-oss/osso/pull/706