An Ethical License for Open Source Projects

> Consider the GPS software that tells you how to get to a restaurant; it’s also used to direct military drones to their targets.

> You can’t build systems that can be weaponized against marginalized people and take no responsibility for them.

Perhaps they should use a different example. GPS was developed for the military, then made available to the public sector. Sounds like this license is meant for folks who don't want their open-source used by the icky governments.

Whether a militant regime will give a damn about your licensing is another matter.

Regardless, this is an interesting question: how far does culpability go? If you murder someone you're culpable, if you assist that murderer you're culpable, if you assist the person who assisted the murder... how far removed do we go? The getaway car salesman? The man who does his taxes?

This is a legal nightmare. Whether you agree with the goals or not, this is just about the worst-written license I've ever seen.

In legal terms, you want to avoid ambiguity. Otherwise, you have litigation (which the party with the deepest pockets wins). This license has incredible ambiguity.

A (non-legally binding) declaration is fine with ambiguity -- it's even desired. It's a starting point for a conversation and interpretation. That's not true for a license or a contract.

Lawyers often do leave ambiguity, but that's usually when the ambiguity is removed otherwise (e.g. by law). This is just an incompetent mess.

This is not an open source license and completely incompatible with many licenses and projects.

Any existing project attempting to transition to such would get forked. New projects using it will get ignored.

This license is worse than WTFPL or the Json license (note the legal hassles that IBM had to go trough to use it). If that’s what the author wants... um... ok. But I can’t use any software using that license in personal or work projects for compatibility or fear of litigation.

With all due respect, this seems nice in theory but useless in practice.

Would you expect an entity (government, corporation, doesn't matter) who does not mind exploiting or torturing people (only as two examples) to worry about using software outside of what its license allows?. I can't be the only one who thinks this is naive. If you write open source software, you should assume anybody will use it for whatever needs they have that your software suits, regardless of the license.

I think there's enough Activism Lite on the world these days. If you don't like some of the awful things that are going on in the world, a license (or a twitter protest, etc) is not the way to go. It's not like The Internet suddenly made it impossible for people to do things like vote, or go protest. You know, real-life things that may have real-life impact on some of the awfulness in the world.

Mh. I doubt this could work.

First, it is unclear if the Declaration is "the way to go", i.e. if its violation is the only way of violating the license (how do I interpret the commas, the verbs, the and/or in the 2nd bulleted point)?

Second, the scope is too broad. Any software (or business!) will harm somebody or some group. Are you creating a new software for making underdeveloped countries better? You're threatening the well-being of employers relying on cheap labor!

We shouldn't bind our software to ethics more than what we do with other things. We don't stop selling food because criminals could eat it; should we?

Ethical proprietary license is an oxymoron. This is nothing more than a waiver of responsibility to make a product not only worth using but to encourage its use. This crippling license can only serve to rig the market competition. Imagine if the FSF could suddenly ban all routers from running GPL software, to promote its own line of approved LAN and WiFi cards.

Speaking of FSF, how uncanny is it this license released so quickly after Dr. Richard Stallman's resignation? If nothing more, to catapult the walls when the gate is already lowered.

Let's cut to the chase: How will you prove an allegedly amoral actor is utilising your code when you have no access to the codebase? So banning top secret government projects is an unrealistic pursuit, which leaves only one part of the 'open source' community to destabilise another part, or to make crooked the already fading concept of software freedom.

When can we expect Coraline to nominate xirself(/herself/himself) as the new ethical leader of 'open source' software, and in term the FSF?

There was what I thought an insightful twitter thread on this license at https://twitter.com/chimeracoder/status/1175896685505056769?....

See also Crockford's "no evil" license: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=764024

This is going to get rammed through a bunch of projects that are either sympathetic or apathetic, the same way all this code of conduct business infiltrated through everything.

Can I use the software to kill Hitler?

Can an anti-vaccer developer sue a vaccine production company? What about use in vaccine research?

What about a hospital with a clear pro-fife/pro-choice policy? Can the other half of the developer sue them?

Can I use the software to run a 5G network? [I think they are safe.]

In a Juul factory? [There are some interesting cases reports.]

Can I use it in a coal mine? A nuclear plant? A solar panel installation company?

Who are going to judge on ethicity?

Why this and not something like WTFPL that is more honest about the nature of code as mere data?