Re:Why we’re changing to the AGPL license
by kelnos on Tuesday October 13, 2020 @07:29PM
(#24771522)
> I generally default to MIT/Apache2 unless I have a reason to do otherwise, out of consideration for employees at Google or other corps who may want to participate in my project.
That's kinda a sad state of affairs that you're allowing corporate policy (of companies that you don't work for) to effectively dictate your licensing strategy. Not saying you're wrong to do so (it's your project; you know best), but the overall gist of it feels a little dystopian.
Ultimately Google is applying pressure -- even if unintentionally -- to the community at large: "use a license we're happy with, or you'll have a smaller pool of contributors"[0].
If AGPL was a majority license for projects like these, then Google would likely have no choice but to allow contributions to AGPL projects.
[0] Note that that's different from an individual deciding (for whatever reason) that they don't want to contribute to projects that use certain licenses (which is fine!). Google's policy forces an unreasonable restriction on their employees that their employees may not agree with, but can't argue with because of the employer-employee power imbalance.
That's kinda a sad state of affairs that you're allowing corporate policy (of companies that you don't work for) to effectively dictate your licensing strategy. Not saying you're wrong to do so (it's your project; you know best), but the overall gist of it feels a little dystopian.
Ultimately Google is applying pressure -- even if unintentionally -- to the community at large: "use a license we're happy with, or you'll have a smaller pool of contributors"[0].
If AGPL was a majority license for projects like these, then Google would likely have no choice but to allow contributions to AGPL projects.
[0] Note that that's different from an individual deciding (for whatever reason) that they don't want to contribute to projects that use certain licenses (which is fine!). Google's policy forces an unreasonable restriction on their employees that their employees may not agree with, but can't argue with because of the employer-employee power imbalance.