Releasing my tools under the MIT License was probably a mistake | Hacker News Reader

Releasing my tools under the MIT License was probably a mistake

donatstudios.com

7 pointsdonatj7 comments

> I want you to use my code in your proprietary software.

> Against my well meaning intentions however, websites re-hosting my tools have been popping up like weeds... Most irksome of all, in a fair number of cases they sit centrally on pages covered in ads and SEO keywords. My tools are being associated with a genuinely bad user experience.

This feels like a disconnect between these two. The author wants people to make money off of their work, but is upset when they do it in a less than desirable way.

It seems like a lot of people make this mistake. They publish things of value with very permissive licenses, then are upset when others (out) monetize them.

The point I was trying to make was that I chose the wrong license for my tools, not my libraries.

MIT suits my libraries well and your first quote is about them. I know for a fact people are making a lot of money using them and that is amazing.

I didn't really intend or foresee people reusing my tools though. I didn't put enough thought into my choice of license on when I published them. The crux of my post is that it's something of a personal failing.

The author is sharing his experience as a warning to others, not asking for sympathy. We should thank him.

> I am considering relicensing my tools under some sort of Attribution-ShareAlike license similar to the BY-SA the content on this site is licensed under. […] This would still promote community contributions, but would also require that any modifications be shared alike meaning that the modified source would have to be provided and I would have to be credited as the original author.

Wouldn’t the GPL be a better match, this being software, than BY-SA? https://choosealicense.com/

I don't trust the GPL anymore after the RedHat debacle revealed the GPL allows you to charge for access to the source.

The GPL doesn't allow you to charge for access to the source code. Redhat will remove your right to future updates of the code if you exercise your GPL rights and share the source code from a release. The code you share will still be GPL'd, but you get kicked out of the club. Inb4 that is functionally the same as charging for code. No, it is holding future code hostage based on not exercising your rights. This goes against the spirit of the GPL, and we should fork it and just do something else after getting kicked out of corporate propaganda network, aka Redhat. Corporatists, all of em. They aren't doing GPL really. They will end up pulling out of the GPL in a future release anyway. Might as well cut our losses. Too much hand wringing about it, just say the truth about them.

As author already found: relicensing future versions is the only option.

Pick license for next releases more carefully, and move on.

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