I saw someone refer to that as "The GPL is freedom for users, not developers"

Which doesn't make any sense when the only users are developers.

I feel like you're trivializing a complex issue.

Developers have the right to say how they want their code to be used in the same way that authors have the right to say how their books can be used.

The code in a public repository doesn't have to be "free" for developers any more than publically downloadable piece of software has to be "free" for end-users.

For example, Microsoft offers a freely downloadable windows iso which people are not allowed to use use without a license.

End users' rights.

Developers are users of libraries.

Or they could have respected the license of the code they used.

>Open-source licenses are killing open-source

How? If I put my code on GitHub and I don't put an open source license on it, it's not open source, it's proprietary.

Yeah and my point is that the default and only license for public repositories should be the "do whatever the fuck you want with my code, because if I didn't want that, my repo would be private and I would issue licenses".

And my point is, if you take from a public repository yours is public too.

If you take, you give.

Yeah, feel free to use all the repositories I put in public freely. Build nukes and baby killing machines with them if you want, I don't care. Make billions of dollars. Use it in all your software and keep it private. But you can be sure as hell I'll use whatever repository you made public in the same way.

Taking without giving that's the real way to kill open source.

Have you seen the Ms-PL? It appears to be deliberately GPL incompatible while also having a similar list of conditions as the MIT license. I think it should be the default license for public repositories.

No.

    (C) If you distribute any portion of the software, you must retain all copyright, patent, trademark, and attribution notices that are present in the software.

    (D) If you distribute any portion of the software in source code form, you may do so only under this license by including a complete copy of this license with your distribution. If you distribute any portion of the software in compiled or object code form, you may only do so under a license that complies with this license.

This is already way too demanding. There should not be ANY terms, and similarly there shouldn't be ANY expectation from the user.

Section D is what makes it specifically GPL incompatible. The problem with not having ANY terms is that people can make derivatives of your software under new conditions, due to how copyright law works. You need conditions to impose the lack of conditions.

You're arguing for increasing developer freedom by removing their ability to issue the license of their choice?

There are licenses that provide no restrictions and licenses like GPL that do. Developers should be free to offer whatever licenses they want on their code.

Just because you like a particular kind of license, doesn't mean you should be able to make everyone who publishes a public repository use that license.

Please don't take HN threads further into flamewar. Even if you're right, it's not what this site is for and destroys what it is for. And you can always make your substantive points without it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html