For the AGPL, you're required to share your changes as soon as you begin serving those changes to users. That includes running a quasi-open beta with your server software, as "TRUTH" appears to have done.
> To "convey" a work means any kind of propagation that enables other parties to make or receive copies. Mere interaction with a user through a computer network, with no transfer of a copy, is not conveying.
I'm sure the Mastadon author has constructed their view based on a more strategic logical parsing of the license, and for now they have succeeded in making the brand story about how it's just another example in a long line of frauds and thefts as was what seemed to be the straightforward intent.
However, litigating software licenses as part of partisan lawfare can have knock-on effects for everyone else. I'm imagining what developing new products will be like in a world with something like the SCO patent litigation but by people with tumblr accounts and backed by superpacs.
The requirements imposed by the AGPL are unambiguous: if you host a server using code from an AGPL codebase, you are required to provide networked access to the source code for your modifications.
There's nothing particularly "partisan" about it: it's a remarkably straightforward, cut-and-dry AGPL violation. Stretching immediately for partisan motivations shows your hand a bit, as does comparing enforcement of a copyleft license to the SCO debacle.
It may very well be an easy GPL violation, but if you want to completely destroy FOSS, hand enforcement mechanisms to partisans. It's only an issue because of the pariah involved. The article also stated this is just a straight forward AGPL violaiton, and surely it only came to the authors attention likely due to the prominence of the user, but I'd warn that FOSS licenses are artifacts of technical collegiality and trust that is no longer a feature of the society the software operates in.
The story is about a social pariah triggering a license enforcement action, and we need to seriously consider the consequences if those two things are related. The SCO debacle hindered the adoption of FOSS in the enterprise for years just by isolating the projects with the legal threat. Those were naive times compared to what goes on today. Whether it's my hand or just an unfamiliar example of principle is left as an exercise.
I welcome you to find a countervailing provision within the AGPL that permits TRUTH to host a service based on their Mastodon fork without distributing their changes. That would be, in legal terms, a "doozy."
> The AGPL can score some points and the company changes its practices and everyone moves on.
This is, as far as I can tell, precisely the intended outcome: the SFC intends to compel TRUTH to comply with the terms of the software they're using. Once they do (i.e., "change their practices"), they are perfectly free to continue using it (i.e., "move on").
As for the rest of your response: it's the same handwringing. The terms of the license are clear; Trump's status as a pariah doesn't entitle him to special relief from the terms of a software license.
Indeed, I don't think anyone would offer them special relief, but if this issue shows we are in an era of political exposure to opportunistic enforcement, that's notable for everyone who develops products.
I'm not asking for litigation, nor has the SFC threatened any. They've told TRUTH to comply with the licensing terms of the software that they're using, and they've given them a month to demonstrate compliance before taking any further steps. They can do precisely what you just said ("distribute their changes"), and everybody would walk away satisfied.
This could signal an interesting future, as it's probably a trivial change for this company to comply with the license terms, but a scenario where an organization like the SFC becomes the new RIAA/MPAA of selective enforcement is something worth considering. Sure, the rules are the same for everyone, but their enforcement, well...