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Comment by cjbprime | Hacker News Reader

Yes, wonderful news! A GPLv3 release of all code far surpasses my expectations, and I've griped about the lack of a source release in the past, so I think I owe the devs a public apology here. Sorry for doubting you!

I do have a question about the licensing -- will you be requiring copyright on code contributions to be assigned to you?

If not, you can't then sell those contributions outside of the terms of GPLv3, because you have to own them before you can relicense them, or obtain the owner's permission.

(If so, it's a little distasteful for the people contributing to know that their code is being used to make money for other people and they won't receive any of it.)

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Is it really that distasteful? I think it's a beautiful scheme, it allows the code to be free and obligatory open source, so a true contribution, whilst the possibility for the project leader to make money remains open.

You can always fork the project, put your own branding on it and make money off your contributions still :) It's just not possible to make money under their brand, or in a closed source product.

It's a good question. Today, I definitely agree with you that the Light Table team has given far more to the world than the world has given back to them, so it seems like a very fair trade. But in a few years, we could imagine that the majority of contributions come donated for free from volunteers. Would it still be fair then?

> You can always fork the project, put your own branding on it and make money off your contributions still :) It's just not possible to make money under their brand.

This doesn't sound right. You'd be forbidden from selling non-GPLv3 access to any of the existing code, even under a new brand, and any plugins that you created would either be GPLv3, or not distributable at all.

> This doesn't sound right. You'd be forbidden from selling non-GPLv3 access to any of the existing code, even under a new brand, and any plugins that you created would either be GPLv3, or not distributable at all.

You can definitely sell GPLv3 software. As long as the source is available and you abide by the terms of the licence.

Exactly!

I know that -- that's why I said "selling non-GPLv3 access". The point is that the LT devs can do something with your contributions (sell them under non-GPLv3 for money as part of a non-GPLv3 Light Table) that you can't, and it's reasonable that some would find this distasteful.

Unless you do a copyright assignment to them, they couldn't sell your GPL3 contributions under a non-GPLv3 license. It wouldn't just be distasteful, but would be against the license.

They actually can't, since your contributions have to be GPLv3 and thus their inclusion of your code has to be as well. The entire point of the GPL is to prevent what you're suggesting.

That is true, if the LT team doesn't require a copyright assignment by all contributors (or similar). If they do, they can relicense it. That's the question being discussed.

Yes sorry, I realised my omission and edited my post just before you commented. You are right that you wouldn't be able to sell your code under a different license than GPLv3, whilst the person you signed the copyright to would.

> But in a few years, we could imagine that the majority of contributions come donated for free from volunteers. Would it still be fair then?

I would hope that by that time, all significant contributions would be in the form of plugins, which are not required to be GPLv3 as far as I'm aware, or even require a sign away of copyright. The question would then be, do you want to sell your plugin through their system, or distribute it on your own.

> plugins, which are not required to be GPLv3 as far as I'm aware

Chris said in the thread that plugins would be "infected" by GPLv3: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/light-table-discussion...

What if your plugin communicates to a plugin that exposes a plain text interface? I guess it depends on the upcoming API copyright-ability ruling..

> But in a few years, we could imagine that the majority of contributions come donated for free from volunteers. Would it still be fair then?

Yes, because running a project, mentoring, moderation and releasing in an orderly fashion is far more work then most people expect.

I disagree that it's distasteful. It's only distasteful if it's dishonest or coercive. I think it's actually a great way to fund a Free Software project. It's like github. You pay nothing, and everything is public. You pay for privacy. With the GPL and selling exceptions, it's very similar in spirit. You pay nothing, and you must give back. You pay something, and you may restrict your users.

If someone contributes code and licenses their copyright to LightTable, knowing full well that the product they support and invested time in may acquire some funds because of it, gosh, I just don't see how that's a bad thing. And if they believe that their patch is significant enough to demand reimbursement, that they would like to charge LightTable for a copyright license, they are free to negotiate such a trade. And if LightTable actually makes money from relicensing, they'll probably be happy to pay for such things.

I do, however, hope that they ask for copyright licenses rather than copyright assignment. Copyright assignment turns the author into a person powerless to use their own work. See harmonyagreements.org.

If you think it's that distasteful just don't contribute. There are a lot of things in the world one can find "distasteful" where the simple solution is to avoid it. How is this even a concern? (I know you put it in parentheses, but still).

It might be useful to the people releasing code if how they are doing it is alienating some set of people.

Perhaps they are not aware of this and it matters to them; this makes it useful information.

If they don't care (or care but have other, more compelling reasons, for their choices) then fine. But at least they can make a more informed decision.

I am also interested re: copyright assignment. I think (and hope) that the answer is "no".

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