How would an Affero LGPL (a weaker license than the AGPL) help in any way with the reason ES moved to a more restrictive license than the AGPL (as did MongoDB, for example)?

I guess I don't have an answer for that specifically, but I think it shows the need for some innovation or flexibility to protect from Amazonification in order to avoid the situation from getting to that boiling point entirely.

The problem though is that this desire is incompatible with the existing definition of Free Software. The principle that users are free to use the code however they see fit, and distribute it to others as long as they extend this right to others, explicitly allows this type of Amazonification.

That is, Amazon offered their users every right and information about how Elastic Search works. All of their modifications are public. I believe they even offer deployment information if you want to replicate it. The problem is that they are out-competing Elastic's managed offering on price and overall integration, and that they are not contributing to the Elastic Search code base, they are simply offering the existing code. This is all fully within the letter and spirit of any GNU license, and any further restriction would in fact be a violation of the 4 Freedoms described in the GPL. This is/was not a TiVo situation.

A example of a "Affero LGPL" would be the EU license: EUPL

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/sites/default/files/custom-page/...

Edit: This paper also gives a good overview of the license https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/c15...

True! Regarding distribution as a service, the EUPL is like the AGPL, but simply written, short and clear. It is copyleft, but allows combined derivatives to be distributed under 10 compatible licences (including MPL, OSL, GPL2 & 3 and AGPL). The European Union (nobel peace prize 2012) is adopting the Interoperable Europe Act, a regulation that will make the EUPL a default licence proposed for all Member States public bodies software as from 2024. And by the way, this new regulation will be supported by a "Interoperable Europe Community" of users. The purpose is still to define and may not be seen as creating a "European FSF" (Who said bureaucratic?)... However, Sometimes it is better to be supported by solid institutions than by an aging guru...