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Comment by _benedict | Hacker News Reader

Perhaps limit your policing of others' phraseology to cases where it's clearly wrong or harmful?

The Apache Software License and the Apache Software Foundation are not the same thing. The latter is a human organisation and its values are determined by its members - some of these values are not even codified, so it may be hard for an outsider to determine them - but in this case I am inclined to agree with the GP.

The ASF promotes permissive software distribution - this includes the right to remove permissions when relicensing. However, distributing such a modified license under the Apache umbrella potentially harms that goal by muddying the meaning of "Apache licensed"

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> However, distributing such a modified license under the Apache umbrella potentially harms that goal by muddying the meaning of "Apache licensed".

Exactly.

The ASF fosters a permissive ecosystem, characterized by low risk of litigation. If you attribute ALv2-licensed dependencies properly, you should feel confident that you are pretty much in the clear. If you screw up and fail to attribute, it's easy to achieve compliance — just add the attributions. You need not worry about publishing your proprietary code under a copyleft license, stripping out the ALv2 dependencies, or other more involved remedies.

This low risk environment is key to the participation of many users, especially risk-averse corporate contributors. It is a fundamental aspect of the ASF culture and mission.

The "Apache + Commons Clause" license radically undermines that, because if you are a commercial user, you may well get sued. The "Apache" name doesn't belong anywhere near a license which includes the Commons Clause.

I changed the first sentence from "please limit" to "i would reduce" as it is not my intent to "police phraseology" but to state my opinion in reaction to someone else opinion. Maybe there is some other phrase that would be even better to make the rhetoric non-violent.

I think you have still missed the important distinction between the ASF and the ASL.

Your opinion is based around your interpretation of the ASL, whereas the GP was referencing the ASF - an organisation of people, with their own shared values, that created the ASL. You have not referenced the ASF at all, only the ASL and some general concepts around FOSS, which are not particularly relevant to a discussion of the ASF's goals and values.

Either the ASL includes values the ASF does not hold, which would be very strange, or the example of a value enshrined in the ASL speaks for the values of the ASF as well.

Nowhere did the GP say that it was antithetical to all interests of the ASF.

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