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Free Software Nonsense.


Rokosun reshared this.

in reply to Tio

I am quite annoyed by this "free software" as in "freedom" but not "free beer", whatever the bullshit.
Freedom is a very broad concept, that includes free from currency exchange, but is not at all limited to it. In general a freedom is a freedom from one constraint. Free software has a very precise definition in terms of four "fondamental" freedoms. This is an absolutely correct use of the word "free".

Just because it is not free in the one meaning you have in mind doesn't mean it is not free in any sense. Using the word in another meaning than your favorite one is not abusing it.
I can "fork" the code, ok, but can I use it with their VPN servers?
It makes sense to call a software free and to sell a paid service based on it, as long as you don't call the service itself "free". Is Nextcloud free?
The only reason they care about it today, is because they can lose their trade advantage.
How are the free CC0, CC-BY, CC-BY-SA about keeping a trade advantage though? How about the GPL, the MIT, the Apache, ... ?
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

Yes Open Source Software, or Public Source Software
I don't really agree : those words really carry the meaning that the code is publicly available, not that you are legally free to use it in various ways.
Why not labels, and not licenses?
I fail to see the difference between what you call a label and a very permissive license.
Since these licenses imply a lot of restrictions of use.
Depends on the license. Except maybe for the GPL, none of the licenses I cited seem that restrictive.

Personally, I mostly use free licenses for those reasons. I think it is legitimate that I get cited as the author of my work. There might also be some ego component to that, but not necessarily about money earning potential.

While it might not be the main raisons people use licenses or labels, I think it is enough to not call them nonsensical.
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

From what I know licenses are a "legal" reinforcement of some ideals, such as for software you cannot do this or that with it.
Note that it is the opposite : licenses don't tell you what you can't do, but what you can do.
The default situation is that you cannot do anything, and the licence allows you to do things you would not have the right to otherwise.
For example, if there are two licenses with no additional information,it means that one can use either of them, rather than both.
in reply to Liwott

Note that it is the opposite : licenses don't tell you what you can't do, but what you can do.

And by telling you what you can do, they tell you what you can't. It is the same. "You can share the code ONLY if you mention the original author". "You can modify and redistribute ONLY if you use the same license." And so on. No sane society can make use of these.

Software licenses are, in my view and under my arguments, useless and primitive. A sign of a traumatized species. And I am not even exaggerating. Think about it, if you make a software, why in the right mind you want to restrict its use? Unless you are traumatized by this society and you want to "own" that software for your own gain or out of fear. Mind you, a reminder: a piece of software is digital so it can be copied endlessly. Put these together....to me this attitude of software licenses are a sad outcome of traumatized humans.
in reply to Tio

And by telling you what you can do, they tell you what you can't. It is the same.
It is not the same, in the sense that if there is no license, you cannot do anything.
You cannot publish a modified version of any text you find in a book or online, that is called plagiarism and is due to existing laws.
By licensing your projects, you allow for things that would otherwise be forbidden.
The license does not have to have associated conditions, see the WTFPL.

Whether plagiarism should be a thing is a legitimate question.
But in this world where plagiarism exists, licensing is a way to guarantee your users that you won't sue them for plagiarism.
If you publish your books without any license, the publishers of a modified version need to trust that you won't change your mind and sue them for plagiarism.

In this world, the trading advantage offered by licensing your work is actually smaller than the one of not licensing it.
Licensing your work is giving up some of your trading advantage in favor of your user.
in reply to Liwott

It is not the same, in the sense that if there is no license, you cannot do anything.
To put it simply, when a license allows to do something under certain conditions, it does not establish that you cannot do it otherwise, it reminds it.

If we are in someone's home and I remind you that you cannot take anything, I am not the one forbidding you.
in reply to Liwott

To put it simply, when a license allows to do something under certain conditions, it does not establish that you cannot do it otherwise, it reminds it.
Licenses are about restrictions. Take the less restrictive of licenses, MIT:
The MIT License is a permissive free software license originating at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)[6] in the late 1980s.[7] As a permissive license, it puts only very limited restriction on reuse and has, therefore, high license compatibility.[8][9]

Notice the word "restriction". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License#License_terms

And that's an extreme example of a less restrictive license there is.
If we are in someone's home and I remind you that you cannot take anything, I am not the one forbidding you.
:facepalm what? 😁
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

If I attach no license it means anyone can do whatever they want with my books. It means I do not care about these things. If I license it it means I restrict it.
This is how you would want it to work, but it is not how author's right law works. From Wikipedia :
Both systems provide for a monopoly right granted to the author for a limited term which can be transferred to another person, which was initially the right to copy or otherwise reproduce the work (hence “copyright”) but has since been expanded to take account of technological developments.
.
Exactly as I was saying, humans apply these licenses and such because of trade reasons primarily.
That's an opinion of yours. Author's rights include moral rights, of which I gave examples earlier, which have little to do with trading.
This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Liwott

This is how you would want it to work, but it is not how author's right law works.
You want to force me to be an author or follow certain rules. But I am not. I am not an author. I am a human. I created some things and I put them on the web. Digitally. That's all. Whatever one does with them is up to them. As simple as that. That's how a sane society should work.
That's an opinion of yours.
It is not. It is a direct result of trade. Authors need to own their work in order to trade it. Else they would not bother with licenses.
Author's rights include moral rights, of which I gave examples earlier, which have little to do with trading.
These are a tiny minority of reasons of course. Most authors trade their books, if all they cared was the "moral right" whatever that is, then they should not trade them and sue others who use them for educational purposes and such.
in reply to Tio

You want to force me
I am not forcing you to anything, I am explaining to you the legal status of unlicensed work.
I am a human. I created some things
Isn't that precisely what "author" means?
These are a tiny minority of reasons of course.
But they are part of the reason. My point is not that they are as proeminent as trade-based reasons in today's society. As pointed by @Rokosun , trade is indeed the reason copyright and author's right came into existence, themselves causing the existence of licenses.

My point is that the existence of those reasons could justify the existence of some form of author's right, and hence of licenses, even in a trade-free society.
While it is not that incorrect to call them products of trade, they are not nonsensical in the absence of it.
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

in reply to Liwott

Look, you can create any world of imagination that you desire, but you cannot force that on anyone else. I write many things, books is just a word to describe these text-based things that I put under a different link. Are all people who write online, authors? No. We can stop at that, because this is becoming repetitive and non-fruitful.
The right to be recognized as the author of your work exists independently of trade, see the examples I mentioned above.
Sure, that can be important for some. But in a saner society you do not have to enforce it. What would be my reason not to mention the author of a scientific paper for instance? Unless I copy that paper and try to sell it under my name. Yes there are other minor motives but they fade away quickly if the ones based on trade are taken into account.
in reply to Tio

What I called an author in this conversation is exculisively the definition 1 on Wiktionary :
The originator or creator of a work, especially of a literary composition.
In this sense, yes, a person writing an online publication is called its author. I am not forcing anything onto anyone, I am only using words to talk about them.

This is also what the law considers as an author, which is how the term "author" appeared in this conversation. Please understand that and stop complaining about me (and the law) not using your favorite definition of the word.
in reply to Liwott

You refuse to understand that a label vs a job are different. I write many things in many places. That's what I do, for fun. If you call me a bluba-duba or autheur or whatever, is your problem. This is different from someone who specifically writes for a magazine or books and it is paid for that, and his/her job description is that of an author. Also someone who studied to become one and has a "diploma".

Anyway what is the point here? Are you saying that if I, the human Tio, write stuff and put them online in various forms and in various places, then if I do not add a license to these things I create (videos, photos, text, etc.) then I legally restrict them from being used because I want it or not, the law says that?

If that's what you say, fine, you may be wrong or right, it does not matter. Anyone can still use my stuff without giving me anything in return. 99% of the internet is like that. Get used to it.
in reply to Tio

You refuse to understand that a label vs a job are different.
I understand that very well, but I never said anything about a job here. When I said author, I always meant it in the sense of creator.
Are you saying that if I, the human Tio, write stuff and put them online in various forms and in various places, then if I do not add a license to these things I create (videos, photos, text, etc.) then I legally restrict them from being used because I want it or not, the law says that?
Yes. If you sue someone for distributing copies of your work without permission, you will win. If you do the same for a licensed work (and they respected the terms), you will lose.

You think that releasing a work without license makes the user free to copy it, but it is not true : they are free to copy it only under the condition that they trust you for not suing them in the future. Licensing your work frees them from the need to trust you.
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Liwott

in reply to Rokosun

Maybe you should reply instead of me from now on. These days I have 0 patience and am a bit frustrated with the documentary so I can't handle these discussions that well haha. Pisses me off when I see this waste of time that people engage in, that doesn't work anyway. If anyone "violates" your "license" you better have good lawyers and a lot of money to do something about it....so they are bullshit even for trade purposes, unless as I said you are a big company and can enforce them....

Anyway, thank you so much for keeping calm and reasonable and explaining things so well and so nice. I wish I was more calm but well...sometimes I lose my patience 😁
in reply to Tio

in reply to Rokosun

Yeah it mostly depends on my mood to be honest...these days I was in a very bad mood. A mix of the freacking heat and feeling physically uncomfortable and then my inability to do the work I wanted for TROM II and so on...

I am really nice generally and I do not think I've been the opposite in this discussion, but I do have to admit that I feel like these days I have little patience. It is always good to understand your moods and even broadcast them to others so that they can understand you better.

I spent years and years on fb comments for 2-3 pages, thousands a month probably...having so much patience everyone was telling me they were amazed by that. But this kinda consumed me over the years.

Anyway, trying to be more calm...it is also that this post was a rant more than anything, so I wanted to just write that take it off my chest and move on, but so it happens that in the digital world people can comment haha. This is not a bad thing in general but at times I wish I can disable all comments on some posts. Hm...that can be a great Friendica feature....
in reply to Rokosun

Tbh, I am quite pissed by the way you and @Tio repeatedly reduced the whole thing to his ability to remain patient when explaining things. This is a conversation, not a sermon that he is giving me. If he had had the same conversation several times over the last decade, I wouldn't have to explain what copyright regime applies by default, or even what an author is.
@Tio
in reply to Liwott

@Liwott
Just to be clear, I wasn't talking about this discussion in particular, so this wasn't directed at you. I'd say this is actually one of the better conversations we've had, because you were also explaining some good points without loosing patience, and at least for me (who's relatively new to this project) this wasn't a repeated conversation. But when Tio brought up this thing about patience I just wanted to say this, because I don't know how many people know it but discussions like these are very common around TROM. So even though I don't wanna discourage people from having these conversations, its good to have an understanding of the situation. So when Tio is frustrated with TROM II and because of the heat, he can't have a conversation like he normally would.

Also I wouldn't say we reduced the whole thing to his ability to remain patient, we just went off-topic that's all 🤷
@Tio
in reply to Liwott

@Tio
in reply to Tio

That being said, the conversation is not about what is "legal"
Isn't the conversation about software licenses? A software license is defined as a legal tool. Of course it only makes sense in a legal context.
in reply to Liwott

The conversation is about these words losing all meaning and the practice of trade being so hidden behind these concepts. Did I ever mentioned laws in the post? I hope I did not.
in reply to Tio

If anyone "violates" your "license" you better have good lawyers and a lot of money to do something about it....
Yes, in this world, you have to trade just to ensure that your rights are being respected.
This does not make the rights in question nonsensical, but on the opposite it strengthen the need to fight for them.
in reply to Liwott

It does make them nonsensical as explained over and over again:
  • Because the wording of ideals like "free software" is entirely confusing.
  • Because licenses overall are inefficient in enforcing anything in a society in which everyone is incentivized to make a profit.
To me, from this reasons, they are nonsensical, meaning they make no sense.
in reply to Rokosun

We can't say with 100% certainty how a trade-free society would look like
I agree. That is precisely why I wouldn't call something "nonsensical" just because we think it may be useless in a trade-free society.
in reply to Liwott

I agree. That is precisely why I wouldn't call something "nonsensical" just because we think it may be useless in a trade-free society.
And yet I do call them nonsensical for the reasons I explained in detail in these comments. I see no sense in licensing.
in reply to Tio

Dr. Percy reshared this.

in reply to Rokosun

if someone doesn't apply a copyright to their works then it'll automatically become restricted. This is actually true
Where is that true? And if it is then it is purely retardation. Won't be surprised and won't accept it anyway. People should do stuff and move on. Anything else is a reaction due to this trade based society or their ugly upbringing.

And great job at explaining what I was also trying to explain. You have more patience 😁
in reply to Tio

@Tio @Liwott
Where is that true?
I linked to this video on my above post, and it explains this change in law - https://creativecommons.org/about/videos/get-creative/
Won't be surprised and won't accept it anyway.
I know you don't care about any of these BS copyright laws, you don't have any issue with others sharing your works. But whether you like it or not, according to our current legal system you are considered as an author and you reserve all rights to your works, whatever you wanna do with those rights 🤷

I actually don't know what we could do to make our work public domain these days, most people go with creative commons licenses because it can be used to enforce certain things, say if you wanna prevent people from trading your works then you can do that too. Copyright law was initially invented to restrict and trade information, but copyleft licenses like creative commons, GPL, etc are like a hack we can use to do the opposite, to permit sharing and prevent trading.
in reply to Rokosun

That video is 20 years old. Do you have anything more recent?
But whether you like it or not, according to our current legal system you are considered as an author and you reserve all rights to your works, whatever you wanna do with those rights 🤷
I am "considered" haha. Ok. Not going to care about what am I considered. I am not an "author", I just write stuff. Are you an author for writing these big posts? Do you own the right to your posts now or how does that go? These things are such a waste of time I swear...
in reply to Tio

@Tio
That video is where I learned this from, and its an official video explaining why they started the creative commons license. But if you want more recent info then I'm sure you can easily find that, I think @Liwott shared a Wikipedia link before that had more info on the legal status of unlicensed work.

And BTW, I do agree that these are a waste of time, its stupid for us to argue about who "owns" certain information, these things are only relevant in a trade based society. In a sane society people would consider these things unnecessary.
in reply to Rokosun

I also linked the Belgian government (as I am Belgian), in general one can scrape each government's website to see what applies in each country.

In the meantime I also found a more specific Wikipedia page, which clearly states that it is the case in all countries that ratified the Berne convention, that is most countries.
in reply to Tio

A label is not an enforcer.
I think you may have understood now that a licence is not an enforcer but rather a legal protection against copyright's enforcers. Most of them offer that protection only in limited cases.

Let me ask you : is there a difference in content between your trade-free label and the Unlicense? Formally, the unlicense has the advantage of being explicit. If one is unfamiliar with your website and sees the trade-free logo on another page, they won't get what the label means.
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Tio

This entry was edited (1 year ago)
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Liwott

You saying that any digital work that is created and no one puts a label on it, it becomes restrictive, is the most nonsensical thing I've ever heard. And if it is true it solidifies that stupidity. In a trade-based society this does not surprise me at all. But I do not care. Our stuff is trade-free anyway so anyone can use them as they wish to. End of the story. 😀
in reply to Liwott

in reply to Rokosun

My point was that if Mozilla VPN had been free in the FSF sense (both client-side and server-side), then Mozilla VPN would have been as trade-free as NextCloud. This was in reply to @Tio 's point that Mozilla VPN is free in the FSF sense and yet is not trade-free. Since then, we understood that the server-side software is indeed not free in the FSF sense.
@Tio
in reply to Liwott

Something can be Free Software and yet Trade-Based. Can be open source and you can have the freedom to fork it, but it itself can collect data, insert ads, hide features. The fact that you can fork and remove those trades is another thing, beyond the original software that is trade-based.

Nextcloud doesn't come stacked with their enterprise edition and all sorts of BS that you have to remove. At least not much at all. But making something Free Software does not guarantee it will be trade-free.
in reply to Tio

in reply to Tio

in reply to Liwott