Re: TIL: “Open Source Rug Pull”

In comp.misc, Anton Shepelev  <anton.txt@gmail.moc> wrote:

Lawrence D'Oliveiro:

From <https://redmonk.com/jgovernor/2024/09/13/open-source-foundations-considered-helpful/>:
>
    The "rug pull" here refers to companies that have used open source
    as a distribution mechanism, building a community and user base,
    before changing the license to be restricted, rather than truly
    open source.

Isn't it exactly what GNU GPL provides against?

Lots of licenses prevent this: sort-of.

The code up until the license change remains available under the
previous license, but the companies keep developing it and newer code is
not free and older code is not supported.

This is a problem if you rely on using supported products.

But maybe someone else takes the unencumbered version and develops that.
Then you get a fork that may no longer be compatible, an issue if you
use code from a third party to interact with it.

As an example, see Elasticsearch changing their license, AWS forking it
to Opensearch, and the two code bases diverging, while various libraries
kept up with Elastic.

Other variations are possible. Open Source doesn't scale so well when
the code base is bigger than a single human can fully understand. Forks
become the product of some other business or go stale.

Or you get Open Source like Android. Go ahead, compile it yourself. Good
luck using that -- without even modifying it -- as a drop in replacement
on your phone.

A few, very rare, projects do succeed despite breaking the "single human"
barrier. Also a few, very rare, people win the lottery.

Elijah
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fucking Android