Every license is a unique snowflake, but if you're going to stay sane and get on with your life you need some categories and lines. Redis is not available under a license that is open-source in any of the usual senses - not OSI-approved, not DFSG-compatible, not FSF-approved. That is a big deal. Matrix remains open source under a license that meets all those criteria. It's not a technical distinction, it's the line in the sand that stops open-source from being whittled away to nothing.
If the new license is so similar to the AGPL, why did they not pick AGPL as one of the license options in order to keep a well known OSI-aproved license?
Yes, picking the same license is at least some security against a backdoor of some crafty IP lawyer.
Re:From where I left
by andrewshadura on Wednesday December 11, 2024 @07:15AM
(#42386994)
It's not truly open source if the most basic freedom, freedom to use code for any purpose, is not fulfilled.
https://blog.tidelift.com/what-i-learned-from-the-server-sid... https://opensource.stackexchange.com/questions/11291/how-to-...
What it isn't close to is the original license, which is a permissive open source license.
The license switch-up is why a fork was needed. Matrix did a similar thing with the AGPL which alas, doesn't have a major fork. https://element.io/blog/element-to-adopt-agplv3/ Although it's technically still open source, they didn't do right by the contributors to it.