Source-Available Is Meaningless | Hacker News Reader

Source-Available Is Meaningless

keygen.sh

47 pointsthunderbong73 comments

Could not disagree more.

"Source Available" sounds like what it should.

It communicates that the code is public, so you can see it's high quality, actively worked on, and nothing nefarious. However, it's not meant to be a community project or used commercially for free.

"Fair Source" is abundantly less clear. It implies some sense of "fairness" which can mean drastically different things to people.

> "Fair Source" is abundantly less clear. It implies some sense of "fairness" which can mean drastically different things to people.

Fair source has a very clear definition:

    Fair Source is an alternative to closed source, allowing you to safely
    share access to your core products. Fair Source Software (FSS):

    - is publicly available to read;
    - allows use, modification, and redistribution with minimal
      restrictions to protect the producer’s business model; and
    - undergoes delayed Open Source publication (DOSP).

The key here is delayed open source publication and limited restrictions up to that point.

Words mean things, unfortunately.

And a definition is for creating new meaning, luckily. Just as the definition of "open source".

Which one?

I like the Obsidian one: Obsidian is open-source, because it is based on Electron, and therefore you can read its source.

https://forum.obsidian.md/t/is-it-true-that-obsidian-is-alre...

Yeah, there's a reason we keep having trouble with that one.

Meaning things is not the problem. The issue is word overloading.

“Free software” curtails certain freedoms of downstream users. “Open source” means more than just the source being open to view.

And this is fine! But people have gotten so used to their definitions they forget to apply the same criteria to “fair source”.

From a "free" perspective, it's better then source available, and worse then open source.

But the critique was that "fair source software" doesn't communicate what that license is about whatsoever.

It keeps AWS from gobbling up your business for free. In that sense, it's strictly better.

> Fair source has a very clear definition:

Just because some people decide to define a term doesn't mean that the words making up that term aren't confusing and misleading. Defining "fair source" without regard to common understandings of what's "fair" is guaranteed to leave a good chunk of the world disliking your terminology.

Until I read your definition I assumed what the parent comment mentioned i.e. there's some inherent fairness in the project/code, which made little sense.

It seems that it doesn’t so much “have a very clear definition” as a small faction are attempting to create a definition.

What is clear about “with minimal restrictions to protect the producer’s business model”? Don’t business models change over time? Doesn’t this suggest that if I were to stake my venture on such a “fair” element of software, it would be fine unless I turned out to succeed, in which case the producer could rightfully box me out (or, more likely, extort a ransom)?

Which, I suppose, is a roundabout way of saying: “fair” to whom? Such an “author-first source-available” license may well prevent the specific unfairness of AWS-style snarfage, but would seem to open the door to different kinds of unfairness years down the line. The absolutism of the OSS “zealots” seems much clearer, even with all its tradeoffs.

agreed.

I do want to see a proper definition which could be explained better legally.

But the idea is pretty good in my opinion (unless you are one of those people who want open source to be free labour for your company)

Agreed on that aspect, too: the basic idea seems more than reasonable (use my work, just be a good neighbor, remember your roots and give a bit back if our work helps you succeed). And I agree with the author that this is something that’s both coherent and distinct from source-available and OSS.

My discomfort—setting aside whether such an idea is workable in license form—is mainly with the choice of a moralizing descriptor for such a license.

> It seems that it doesn’t so much “have a very clear definition” as a small faction are attempting to create a definition.

We are indeed trying to define it but this was a response to "implies some sense of 'fairness' which can mean drastically different things to people". It has a clear definition, but the interpretation and the consequence on that definition are in relation to a business. I don't think however that is any different to how the consequences of an Open Source license are specific to the license or the company that runs it. A GPL software with a CLA is very different than a GPL software without a CLA.

> Which, I suppose, is a roundabout way of saying: “fair” to whom?

The goal of the FSL is to ensure that you have aligned incentives as a company with all the users that you have, and you protect yourself against free loaders.

I wrote down my thoughts on a longer version a while back here: https://lucumr.pocoo.org/2024/9/23/fsl-agpl-open-source-busi...

> allows use, modification, and redistribution with minimal restrictions to protect the producer’s business model

That part is not something that a lot of folks running "source-available" want. It may have nothing to do with competition.

I license most of my stuff as MIT. It allows folks to reuse the source in any way they want (few people do, which is fine by me). Just don't come crying to me, if you mess things up.

I can easily envision authors of open-source projects being hit, if their stuff gets caught up in things like breaches, malware, or scamming. In many cases (in the US), the suits may not have merit, but they are still a major distraction. Just the suit can be crippling, and many suits can't be anti-SLAPPed.

There's a few reasons that I like to open my source:

- It allows folks to ensure that my stuff doesn't violate anyone else's IP.

- I would like to hear if I have made any big mistakes. Sometimes, someone may see that I'm doing something in a boneheaded way, and offer a correction (sometimes, in a nasty way, but I still appreciate the help).

- If there are problems with things like App Store reviews, or SDK bugs, the ability to point to the entire project, is helpful.

- I am sincerely interested in "giving back," and genuinely hope that folks (even if they are a bit "rough around the edges"), can learn from it.

On another note, I suspect that the use of "zealots" throughout the post, may be to encourage passionate response. Many folks like all the clicks that outrage brings.

It's fair as in fair beer.

I have no idea what fair beer means.

> I have no idea what fair beer means.

I think it's deep fried.

https://www.wikihow.life/Cook-Deep-Fried-Beer

I suspect you're conflating meaning with clarity. The article discusses what is meant by "source-available" in terms of the rights it implies. Whether those rights are ambiguous or subjective feels like a different question.

By the same (linguistic) logic, "open source" should really refer to cases when the source is accessible, because it is just that - the opposite of "closed", and "libre source" to the cases when there are additional freedoms of use allowed. Alas, that ship has sailed.

That said, "fair source" is a very confusing term. Not really much better.

Open-source just means you can see the source, as opposed to closed-source, which means you can't see the the source.

The visibility of the source has no bearing if the source can be used, modified, distributed, or if the application is gratuitous or not.

>> Open-source just means you can see the source

No. "Open Source" has a precise definition that includes terms of use:

https://opensource.org/osd

> Open-source just means you can see the source

This is false.

Or do you mean in the specific context of the new usage of the term by AI companies, which totally contradicts the original usage?

OK, and I say it's true. Now what?

Actually I think the definitions work (in practice) like this:

Open source means you can see the source, with a hint of other implications (which vary).

Source available means you can see the source, and is probably being used to exclude the extra implications of open source, but might not be.

Other terms exist and have unknown meanings and always will.

> OK, and I say it's true. Now what?

Now you're incorrect, just like before? :)

More seriously though, the word has a historically well-defined meaning, that lots of people put lots of time into defining really clearly, as others have linked to. It has precedence in courtrooms, lawyers have defined it, serious institutions have corrobated the existence of the meaning, etc etc.

You can choose to ignore that if you like, of course. You can argue for the word to be polysemic and have a new, second meaning, and you can even argue that the old meaning should be totally dropped and we just use this new meaning you're proposing.

But retroactively claiming that the word only ever had the meaning you say it has now is... odd, to put it politely.

There needs to be a way to prevent AWS from taking your code, setting up a competing business, taking the entire market, and leaving you with nothing.

Existing open source licenses leave you vulnerable to this.

"Source available" / "fair source" is one nice solution, but the open source purists hate it.

Another solution would be an even more viral open source license. Require that any users of your code make their entire company codebase also open source under the same licensing terms.

If the AGPL is "viral", we need a "pandemic": "Use this code and all of your company code, company docs and memos, manufacturing instructions, etc. must also be open and publicly available. Or contact us about an enterprise licensing fee."

This pretty much sums up the main point of contention on the term "open source", yeah.

"Fair source" in this case means "not Open Source". Author complains about binary classification, but we get antsy about this kind of thing for a reason.

There's nothing wrong with going source-available, and it's quite useful - but only if you can see the source of the version you're running! I have in the past experience with the weird partly available source of Windows CE, which was also very much not Open Source (no redistribution, subject to Microsoft product licensing etc).

This also seems downstream of the Wordpress fiasco in some way.

"Fair source" means more than just "not open source" - see https://fair.io/about/

IMO the most interesting part of the fair source definition is the commitment to "delayed Open Source publication" https://opensource.org/delayed-open-source-publication

Agreed.

Source available is also useful in high end environments to ensure security and reduce loopholes.

This is very helpful for software used by security agencies, for example.

After reading the article , here's what I would argue Fair source actually means that a project is source available except it doesn't intend on hurting the end user in the sense that most people wouldn't find the difference , generally the difference is that the parent company of the project is the only one able to provide its services of hosting it for other people etc.

this is its 2nd points in a gest (though fair source doesn't necessarily implicate that its only for hosting , the 2nd point is somewhat vague but decent enough because they want more companies under the umbrella)

this and delayed open source

I kind of agree with this sentiment. Primarily because there is time spent in making something , and I would like to see returns on it as well but I do feel like "open source" is good thing

this is the thing where my morales can somewhat agree is that though it doesn't fit osi definition , I am somewhat Ok with it . It's a compromise that I see myself , a somewhat hard core foss guy to agree to .

so I am probably going to use it in any of my projects

either this or massive agpl / sspl

or if I am feeling generous and its not a business then MIT license

How do you know, that any application you run is actually the source you read?

How do you know, that the application is actually working if you cannot build it properly (because i see cases of buildrecipes missing)

> However, it's not meant to be a community project or used commercially for free.

But they can?

Source available can mean everything from "proprietary, you can look but you can't touch" to "this source code is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0".

Creative Commons projects can be used in commercial projects, for free, provided you adhere to the license terms - but they do not meet the open source definition.

This is exactly the problem. "Source available" refers to such a massively wide gamut of possible licensing scenarios that it may as well be meaningless.

You have to read quite far down this article (past some IMO unnecessary language about "zealots") to get to the key point: it's promoting the use of the term "fair source", as described here: https://fair.io/about/

     Fair Source is an alternative to closed
     source, allowing you to safely share
     access to your core products. Fair
     Source Software (FSS):

     1. is publicly available to read;
     2. allows use, modification, and
        redistribution with minimal
        restrictions to protect the
        producer’s business model; and
     3. undergoes delayed Open Source
        publication (DOSP).

Minor style point: this is clearly an opinion piece, and uses the term "I" a lot - "If you asked me a year ago how I felt about open washing..." - as such, it would be great to have an author name on this rather than leaving it anonymously credited to "Keygen LLC".

Author here. Good point. I'll adjust these types of essays to include author info.

Edit: added!

I find it ironic that all of the confusion and controversy around both the terms "open source" (and "free software") have highlighted the importance and justification of trade marks. What these movements could really benefit from are legally-protected trade descriptors that mean exactly what the originator means, and nothing different. But instead the internet is full of endless arguments about what these words mean, because FSF/OSI didn't have the foresight (or desire?) to advocate for unique trademarkable names.

OSI made a mistake when they borrowed the term "Open Source" from the intelligence community and RMS made a mistake when he presumed that everyone on the planet would understand that "free as in beer" wasn't what he meant. Ultimately, while these groups were had great thought about software licensing, they weren't great with communication, branding, or marketing.

I think we'd all be better off if we just started using "OSI Open Source" where that was what was actually meant. Trying to redefine words or phrases with existing connotations is a futile exercise.

It's some chutzpah to blabber about openwashing and then choose your self-description to simply embed the value judgment directly.

It's not meaningless, the author just doesn't like it. Open-source and source available were always meant to be watered-down versions of the FSF's free software specifically to be more palatable to businesses. That's not a bug and it's not even a feature. It's the freaking mission statement.

When I read "Open source alternative to ..." I always assume self-hosting is easily possible.

However, lately most open source alternatives taking a very literal approach to open source which isn't always in the spirit of the term.

When I see something that says it's Open Source I assume it means https://opensource.org/osd - if it doesn't, I'm one of the "zealots" (to quote the linked article) who noisily complains about it.

Agreed. Frustrates me to no end that some of the most loved OSS projects don't have quality helm/Kube guides and basically say "here's a docker compose, you're on your own." The "it's open source, but our operator is closed" makes my head steam sometimes.

I wish they would just go source available so they can provide a higher quality product.

Show me the incentive and I'll tell you the outcome.

FOSS doesn't give any provision to the original author, so why would they maintain it to a high quality standard?

I've noticed this a lot lately too. Convoluted install process for a non-production setup (without a guide for production quality), outdated docs; but only from open-source software that has a paid for SaaS variant (looking at you Supabase). Not that these companies owe me anything, but I do feel that these strategies diminish the open-source scene.

Fair source sounds like a really bad idea. The problem is if you let someone else define what reasonable limits to competition are, you end up in court and learn that it can be anything. Say a company sells me fair source, but I don’t like the company so I fire them and take over for myself? Well, now I get to try to convince a court that I’m not competing, despite clearly having cost them one customer. Just study the history of the constitutions commerce clause, where everything can and has been construed to affect interstate commerce.

The "Fair Source Software" is an interesting idea, but it's just a variant of software with a proprietary license to me.

I like the built-in commitment to open source the software after a period of time. That's the interesting part to me. (I'd drop the term "fair source software" -- whether it's fair or not depends on perspective and details -- and just call it delayed open source publication software.)

But let's be clear here: the idea is for the author to benefit from the popularity and acceptance of OSS while protecting their own financial interests. I think that's inherently a dodge. It's an effort to make it seem as free and open as possible, but if you figure out a way to make nice money off it, the author will come after you for payment, which means it's not free and open.

BTW, I'm not much of an OSS zealot. As a software developer, I heartily approve of software developers being paid for their efforts. I just think it should be done in an up-front manner.

Source Available means exactly what it says, and I don't need to look up a definition somewhere. From what I understand, I can view the source code and verify that a software does what it claims and does not have some hidden nastiness.

What the hell does "Fair Source" even imply? Fair to whom, the author or the users? Stop with the bullshit already.

Agreed, and "fair source" in regards to modification is too vague. I know the author intentionally left it vague, but say the conditions for modification are a non-compete.

What if the producer moves into a field that I'm in and is now a competitor - have I suddenly run afoul of the license, even though I wasn't before?

There's very little protections there.

Source Available vs. Open Source is already clear. Can I modify & redistribute or not.

As always, read the actual license? It's not ppssible to define everything in just 2 words.

> What if the producer moves into a field that I'm in and is now a competitor - have I suddenly run afoul of the license, even though I wasn't before?

If a user moves into the producer's field and becomes a 'competitor', or the producer moves into a user's field, the user simply cannot upgrade to the latest version of the software. But they're access to previous versions would remain unaffected, as far as I understand.

Here's more explicit language from the FSL:

> A Competing Use means making the Software available to others in a commercial product or service that: ... substitutes for any other product or service we offer using the Software that exists as of the date we make the Software available; or

As you can see, terms are "as of the date we make the Software available", so nobody can retroactively be in violation of the license, but they can be restricted i.r.t. upgrading to newer fair source versions. Since they now compete, they will need to use the open source version released under DOSP moving forward, typically 2 years out of date.

I'll be honest and say that I think that's totally fair.

Yes, "source available" does mean exactly what it says. There is a class of projects, however, which are still looking for a term. They are all "source available", but that's not all there is to it (you could call all FOSS projects that too, but nobody does). The main difference is that they allow you to modify the code and even share the modifications ("source available" projects generally don't).

Arguably, "open source" is the correct term to use, and FOSS should be called "free source", but OSI made a mess there.

"Fair source" is as good a term as any. "Cloud protected source" (as in "cloud protection licenses") also.

Current situation is not good for anyone except BigTech, but sure, let's burn anyone trying to avoid unfair competition by actually using a "fair source" license.

There's some useful context around the https://fair.io/ initiative in this GitHub issue from May: https://github.com/fairsource/fair.io/issues/14

> 2. allows use, modification, and redistribution with minimal restrictions to protect the producer's business model

As my three year old is rather fond of saying when he disagrees with my opinion: "no, try again." I think the intention is good, but the approach is fraught with risk.

> (You may think point 2 is vague — and it is — intentionally. Since business models vary, this invites exploration in new licenses outside of the current suite of fair source licenses.)

Right. And when your business model changes, bringing it into conflict with mine? "Exploration" sounds like another word for "pay money or fight lawsuit". The point of a license is to set expectations between parties. When those aren't clear, then a license isn't doing its primary job.

We open sourced our air quality monitor (firmware & hardware) under CC-BY-SA.

The SA (share-a-like) gives quite a lot of protection in regards to the concerns that the author rises as most companies that would take our source code would not be willing to keep it open and also probably not so keen to attribute us as originators.

I think what also many people forget is that the source-code is actually only a small part of business success. In my opinion the network, reputation and community that a company builds has much more value than the actual code.

We went fully open source hardware more than 2 years ago and it was probably one of our best decisions as a company.

Making up a new name really? I have an open source project that I am thinking about monetizing. In the end as an author you actually have to choose a sensible license set-up for that project.

If this then counts as open-source or not really only matters for marketing purposes. And a new term will not have the same effect for that. If I put fair-source on my landing page it just means I have to explain more.

People that really care about the license will read the license. People that don't really care will be fine with generic terms imo and don't need the classification.

> So why is "source-available" recommended?

Based on how and when it's usually used it's a derogatory term employed to intentionally denigrate the choice of license.

I've honestly never considered "source available" as a derogatory term. If you release your source code so people can look at it but you're not using an Open Source license I think it's a perfectly respectful (and often self-selected) way to describe something.

An OSI license with the Commons Clause merely prohibits for-profit use, which is a reasonable restriction in very many cases.

It's clearly more than just "source available", yet it's still being stuffed into the same bucket, because the freedom to repackage and resell under a different name is withdrawn.

An OSI license with the Commons Clause no longer fits the Open Source definition.

I'm not saying it's not a reasonable restriction, but it's not "Open Source" any more.

I care because I want to know exactly what it means when something is described to me "Open Source". The OSI definition has been around since 2006.

Using the term "open source" for every project published in source code form might not be ideal — not just because of the "zealots", but also because it may not serve the author’s best interests.

The term "open source" has a well-established reputation as "free as in beer", whether we like it or not. So why attach such a label to a commercial product?

Commercial software isn't inherently a bad thing. In fact, it's even better if the author or business can afford to publish it in source code form, making their services more transparent to end users.

As for the term "source available", it isn't as well-established as "open source". Its meaning may not be clear to the audience, and there's a certain lack of trust associated with it. However, this could change over time if more projects identify as "source available" and maintain clear and honest distribution and usage policies.

Source Available is a great term. It's not about Freedom - it's about security and trust.

With "source available" I understand that I am very likely buying a product. Unless it is something like "freeware". I probably don't need the source, but at least I might have option to check how something works or verify something. Or even use it to report a bug, which I then have to hope they fix.

At least it is a step up from close source software. Which I am fine with. Most of the time I don't really need to know how something works anyway.

I'm fine with the idea of "fair source", but not the name. It should be named for what it is, "ajar source".

So Fair use means "open source but only if you don't compete with me because I want to retain exclusive benefits for 2 years". I don't see how the goal couldn't be achieved by using AGPL and then going to another, less viral license after the 2 years. This has the advantage that at no point is the software not Free/Libre

I personally believe using AGPL in that way is dishonest, because it foregoes the spirit of open source and instead adopts AGPL as a thinly-veiled non-compete propped up on ambiguity and FUD, which is exactly what this essay delves into i.r.t. dishonesty in commercial open source.

If its not in debian and fedora main repo proper, its not open source as far as I am concerned. We can argue about the semantics but this filter is great at removing a bulk of the projects that will tip over the moment the company championing it pivots or fails.

If the projects are on freebsd / openbsd that goes even further with me.

So we've moved on from open washing to full on source laundering lmao.

I'd like to buy a beer for the 'zealot' that buried themselves so far underneath the author's skin that they were compelled to write this useless article.

This is currently the top post, feeling pretty disappointed in you hn.

It’s another open washing term, just like open weights with LLMs.

Is "open weights" open washing?

I thought calling LLM weights that are openly available but not OSI-compatible open source "open source" was open washing, but I didn't think there were any problems at all with the term "open weights".

Open Source has already been open washed. It used to mean you get the source code. Now it comes with all extra "freedom" stipulations.

Eventually, large language models will be the end of open source. That's ok, just accept it.

Large language models are used to aggregate and interpolate intellectual property.

This is performed with no acknowledgement of authorship or lineage, with no attribution or citation.

In effect, the intellectual property used to train such models becomes anonymous common property.

The social rewards (e.g., credit, respect) that often motivate open source work are undermined.

That's how it ends.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com