Redis has a CLA so contributors can't use their gifts as leverage to control others.

https://redis.io/legal/redis-software-grant-and-contributor-...

I don't think you should conflate CONTROL with resentment or distaste or feeling betrayed or feeling misled. They aren't the same.

Even without a CLA, Redis was originally licensed BSD. Releasing code under a BSD license is making a promise that you are OK with people using your code for commercial purposes. If you as a developer express personal feelings of dissatisfaction that someone is doing with your gift what you gave them permission to do, in such a way that could be construed as reneging on your promise, then that would make you dishonorable and untrustworthy.

> Releasing code under a BSD license is making a promise that you are OK with people using your code for commercial purposes.

That's just a microcosm of the larger issue, isn't it? Contributors : Redis :: Redis : AWS - Redis gave Amazon the permission to host and make money off of Redis, but Redis was evidently salty about the state of affairs. I think contributors have reason to be salty too.

> in such a way that could be construed as reneging on your promise

Nothing could be construed in such a way, because such a reneging is not possible.

Well in this case, antirez literally promised[1] they wouldn't change the license of the core away from BSD, and then Redis Labs did just that, and now antirez is speaking favorably of that decision.

[1]: https://antirez.com/news/120

Wow, I wasn't aware. @jart, do you have any harsh comments on the actual reneging of an actual promise? @antirez, do you have any kind of comments?

That post was from literally thousands of days ago and seems to be in relation to some confusion at that time.

Honestly to me you can see the tensions that led to the license change in that post. It’s largely consistent with what antirez has said in the post and in this thread.

Hey gavindean90!

You are absolutely right—context! matters, especially when we are talking about something from so long ago. It does seem like the post reflects the confusion and tensions of that time, which may have influenced the eventual license change.

Looking back, it is interesting how the decisions align with what he has shared, both back then and here in this thread. It really gives perspective on how things evolved.

Thanks for pointing that out!

Ok so just because something is in the past it's become irrelevant? So no promises are ever worth trusting? The creator of redis LITERALLY said "Redis will remain BSD licensed". And it's no longer BSD licensed.

Where is there a "promise" in that post? Where is there any wording about it remaining BSD forever?

It's a post from 2018, about a specific license confusion situation that occurred in 2018. Context matters.

In the title: "Redis will remain BSD licensed"

You can try to be a smartass and add random caveats but that's not how language works.

Imagine if everyone thought like you did: "Sure I promise to do X" (not saying that I mean for the next 5 minutes and will then ignore my past promise)

Again, where is the word "promise" in this post?

The post title in its original context is clearly referring to the confusion discussed in the very first sentence: "Today a page about the new Common Clause license in the Redis Labs web site was interpreted as if Redis itself switched license." The title is saying that Redis core's license was not switched to Common Clause at that time in 2018. That's all. It is not titled "I promise that Redis will remain open source forever".

> This is not the case, Redis is, and will remain, BSD licensed.

True, he doesn't explicitly say for how long, but I don't think it is unreasonable to read "will remain" as "will remain indefinitely" and not as "will remain so until we change our minds".

> I don't think it is unreasonable to read "will remain" as "will remain indefinitely"

That's a reasonable interpretation. But it involves an assumption on behalf of the reader, of words that are not there. I think it's a stretch to consider that specific post a "literal promise" by Antirez.

That said, I just did more research and must admit I am completely wrong with regards to the bigger picture there. My genuine apologies. In the HN commentary on that same post [1], the cofounder/CTO of Redis Labs (Yiftach) apparently made a much more direct statement that "Redis remains and always will remain, open source, BSD license". Due to use of the word "always", that I think can unambiguously be called a literal promise that was broken by the Redis company.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17818647

You don't have to use the word promise to make a promise. It's inferred.

People sometimes change their mind about decisions over time. That isn't the same thing as breaking a promise. You can infer a promise from any declarative statement, but that doesn't mean your inference is correct.

I guess there's a blind spot here.

antirez gave

community gave

most people assume that this create a new thing, a group, which has a shared past and value .. and should continue (i would agree to that personally)

"pure" open source advocacy would claim "nothing is ever to be expected in any future" (i can understand that too but find it a bit sad)

I wonder how the oss community will react if the sequence of events were a little different.

1. Redis Inc creates a fork of Redis and names it say RedisNext or anything else(xyz) without a reference to Redis name at all.

2. Announces that, xyz is a fully compatible next gen version of Redis with enterprise features but it is only available under SSPL license.

3. Also announces that original Redis software is feature complete and will be under maintenance with only critical bug fixes.

This will be them playing by the same rules as any other third-party.

Will the community still manage to find fault with Redis Inc?

Will it feel entitled to continued updates or the Redis brand demanding a project handover to a different "group"?

Cannot speak for the community, but I'd assume that the right thing would be to handover Redis brand to a FOSS foundation.

Anything else just complicates things, like we see today, where Valkey and others are referenced as being Redis compatible (at least as far as RESP is concerned), and we either have specific clients (such as valkey-go), or existing Redis clients, that seem to want to maintain compatibility with most (all?) of them.

They're also stealing the name of the community.

I feel like once a software is open sourced the name of that software should also be required to remain open sourced as well, and any closing of the source must come with a requirement of forking the software and changing the name.

It's honestly pretty horrible that a group of people can take centuries of man hours away from the community and tell the community to kick rocks when the software they're stealing would NEVER NEVER NEVER have had the traction it has if it were not OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE TO BEGIN WITH.

There is a rash of thefts going on in broad daylight, and I think people need to start litigating. Its obscene and soulless and doesn't belong as an acceptable thing to do in society.

It is absurd to call this license change stealing when the previous work is still available under the original license. This is more like someone who is giving to the community, still continuing to give, but with a slightly more strict license. Do you expect someone who is doing philantropic work, gets contributions from others, but later becomes less philantropic to change their name?

> NEVER NEVER NEVER have had the traction

There is plenty of even closed source software which has traction in many domains, let alone software released under a license which as anti-rez points out allows the users to freely run their websites on redis, modify and redistribute code etc.(with the exception of running hosting services like Amazon).

For instance, it would be amazing and a great improvement if there was a top-quality CAD program with a similar license to Redis.

You clearly feel very strongly about this topic; out of curiosity, are you a Redis contributor? If so, was your contribution done via your day job (paid time) or was it an outside/independent contribution?

> I feel like once a software is open sourced the name of that software should also be required to remain open sourced as well, and any closing of the source must come with a requirement of forking the software and changing the name.

Who should enforce such a requirement, and under what mechanism?

Open source licenses are copyright licenses, whereas product names are trademarks. These are separate legal concepts. Meanwhile "the community" isn't even a legal entity at all. As I understand it, there's nothing to "start litigating" here, and no one to litigate it.

Are you proposing that the OSI should change the OSD such that open source licenses must include mandatory trademark assignment to an independent nonprofit foundation? That's a rather extreme view if so.