An Open Letter to Intel Andrew S. Tanenbaum

cs.vu.nl

1 point·gengear··3 comments

The biggest advantage of the GPL license is also its biggest disadvantage: you have to give as freely as you have received. Everybody gets the benefit of everybody's work. Or, put a different way, nobody gets a proprietary advantage over somebody else.

The biggest advantage of the MIT license is also its biggest disadvantage: you do not have to give as freely as you receive. Everybody can have a proprietary advantage. Or, put a different way, somebody can take your work, and give you nothing in return, no money, no recognition, nothing.

It is useless to complain about somebody using your product in the manner you licensed it.

(2017) Discussion at the time (996 points, 363 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642116

One thing we have now that we didn't have in 2017 is the knowledge of what happened next.

Suppose Intel would have released its modifications and enhancements to Minix, for all to use, including its competitors. It's really difficult to think that Intel would be any worse off for doing so than they are now. I don't think they got any competitive advantage for using the MIT license.

I also wonder how effective it was at actually preventing the work done by Intel to benefit their competitors. How many Intel engineers were obliged to seek employment with one of Intel's competitors?

With all of the layoffs happening, I think a lot of companies are going to come to regret all of their intellectual capital which the engineers take with them between their ears when they leave.

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