Give Up GitHub | Hacker News Reader

Give Up GitHub

sfconservancy.org

36 pointsd12bb11 comments

This was already posted 4 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31932250

A Go library moving to SourceHut was also discussed 2 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31961402

It seems a bit soon to be reposting it. Has there been further developments? The page is still very light on resource (use CodeBerg, sign up for SourceHut, or self-host; with no more than links to each option's repo), the mailing-list has had very little traffic (5 threads). At least the duplicate URL https://giveupgithub.org/ has been turned into a redirection.

Interested in the complaints about GitHub being anti-copyleft, I followed a chain of links to a 2001 post where RMS endorses a more permissive license for Ogg Vorbis, the old MP3 competitor: https://lwn.net/2001/0301/a/rms-ov-license.php3

RMS endorsed a more permissive license in Ogg's case because otherwise it risked becoming irrelevant as the patented MP3 format took over.

It's interesting that he saw this as a special case rather than the #1 issue that will always crop up with copyleft.

Dupe. This was posted ~4 days ago, 599pts, 562 comments:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31932250

The article it links to, links the the page this new post links to.

In terms of online activism, I've done my fair share before. I've avoided and boycotted products that infringe on privacy sometimes at my own detriment. The most recent example that comes to mind is switching to Android because of Apple's file scanning controversy.

But giving up GitHub would be considerably more detrimental. I'm not a notable developer and not many people rely on my code but somebody would notice if my stuff went missing. My identity as a developer would disappear and then I might lose out on collaboration and job opportunties.

Sadly, as much as I love FOSS and dislike code laundering, it's a step I can't take.

> The most recent example that comes to mind is switching to Android because of Apple's file scanning controversy.

Nice job switching to Google over something Google has been doing for years, in a worse way (https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/1033093...)

As far as I know (and the linked article doesn't state otherwise), they only scan files that you upload to their servers (as they should). Apple was scanning local files.

> Apple was scanning local files.

they only scan local files if you use icloud. because those files get sent automatically to their cloud.

And, unlike Android, iOS doesn't give you the APIs to use your own personal server in place of iCloud with the same functionality.

The link doesn't mention doing scans on device and my phone doesn't run stock Google Android.

For profit and proprietary are not inherently wrong. People want software that just works. Usually that requires lucrative contracts or mass commercial/consumer adoption to fund.

I know some folks talk about putting code in escrow.

What is the current state of the art for this ?

If the escrowed product source code requires auxiliary code like a compiler or other linked code, can you escrow all of that software legally ?

How about hardware issues ? Operating Systems ?

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