[License-discuss] Thoughts on the subject of ethical licenses

[Chris Travers]

On Sun, Mar 8, 2020 at 7:18 PM Drew DeVault <sir at cmpwn.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri Mar 6, 2020 at 6:22 PM, Coraline Ada Ehmke wrote:
> > There is a strong contingent of people within the ethical source working
> > group who agree 100% with this sentiment about licensing not being the
> > best strategy. Although it is the most visible of our many initiatives,
> > please rest assured that we are exploring a number of options to move
> > the agenda forward.
>
> I can understand this, and I think it's valuable for the ethical source
> community to take this experimental approach. However, I don't want to
> experiment with open source. It's too important.

As someone who has lived and worked in multiple countries on three
continents, I respectfully disagree.

A core rule has to be respecting the right of people to participate in
economic commons despite political, social, and cultural
disagreements.  The OSI has always respected such a right and we
should not cease to do so now.
>
> > I completely understand your position, even though I hold out hope that
> > it might prove to have a positive impact. But taking a step back, would
> > we even be having this conversation if the (admittedly deeply flawed
> > first version of the) Hippocratic License had not been released last
> > September? Had it not gotten so much press attention? Had it not
> > launched dozens of blog posts?
>
> For what it's worth, my personal exposure to this debate has been:
>
> 1. I heard minor murmurs throughout the internet about "ethical source"
>    and researched no further.
> 2. Someone mentioned that you were running for the OSI board, and that
>    it might be bad for open source. I took the opportunity to read your
>    (and the other candidates) campaign pages on the wiki.
> 3. I decided to vote based on this information.
> 4. I heard about Eric's thread and the inflammatory discussion that
>    ensued, and decided to join the discussion and petition for a more
>    reasonable debate.
>
> So, I've had very little exposure to any of the conflict you're
> referring to.
>
> > As an aside I also would like to caution you on the use of the term
> > “virtue signaling”. I am NOT implying that this applies to you, but
> > that term is something of an alt-right “god whistle” in very common
> > usage in dark and hateful corners of the internet like 4chan, 8chan,
> > some terrible communities on Reddit, and places like Kiwi Farms. It is
> > commonly used to dismiss, imply insincerity or hypocrisy, and generally
> > ridicule people working in the social justice space.
> >
> > That being said, taken without the culture baggage, what’s so wrong
> > about "virtue signaling" if you think of it as “this person is
> > publicly proclaiming a strongly held moral or ethical stance”? Don’t
> > people have the right to make such proclamations without having their
> > integrity challenged? In fact, shouldn’t we be encouraging that?
> > Doesn’t it have inherent value?
>
> I disavow any relationship with the (ab)users of the term "virtue
> signaling" you mention here. Thanks for giving me the benefit of the
> doubt, I didn't realize that such a usage of this term exists.
>
> To clarify my usage, I agree that virtue signaling is not inherently
> wrong. What I'm pointing out is that the license text _only_ succeeds
> at virtue signalling, and not at any of the ostensibly stated goals. I
> don't think it's legally enforcible, and I think it brings a lot of
> risks. These ideas are out of scope for software licenses. If you wish
> to signal your virtues, and I encourage you to do so, other approaches
> would be better. A code of conduct, or even a document which describes
> the virtues of the leadership directly, would be more effective.
>
> I'd rather not dilute the term "open source" with these doubts. Though
> these ideas are worth pursuing, I'd prefer to see it in a separate
> context from licensing entirely. In the ideal, software can be both open
> source *and* ethical source. Right now, the terms are mutually
> exclusive. I would prefer to see ethical source tackle these challenges
> outside of the framework of software licensing, so that the initiatives
> can co-exist in a single software project.
>
> To your earlier point, licensing is just one way you're looking at
> solving the problems ethical source tackles. However, I find open-source
> software licensing so important, and this approach so dissonant, that I
> cannot overlook it and vote for you on the basis of your other
> prospects.

Now, if we could only agree on what was ethical.

Here's the practical reality:

http://ledgersmbdev.blogspot.com/2016/02/why-commons-should-not-have-ideological.html

Putting ideological litmus tests on commons participation is
problematic for the reasons I wrote in the blog post above.

But there's another side which has occurred to me since, which is that
one of the lessons Europe learned from the 1930s was the danger of
economic control over ideology.  European antidiscrimination law
protects individuals against employer retaliation for private
political statements even if those are abhorrent.  This is because
without an ability to discuss issues frankly there is no way to work
through social issues and find common solutions.

I worry that pushing social activism on open source would amount to
pushing this same sort of imbalance that Europe decided was
intolerable after the experience with Mussoloni etc as well as trying
to force countries which don't want to follow the West into the world
of individualistic finance capitalism to redo their family structures
etc to our liking when frankly it should not be our decision.
>
> > Adopting an ethical license, at worst, is a way of stating very clearly
> > that you feel an ethical responsibility for the way your software is
> > being used. The strong feelings evoked by, for example, Palantir using
> > hundreds of open source libraries to help ICE put kids in cages are
> > valid, and as you say, developers have very strong reactions to knowing
> > that the code they so lovingly crafted and devoted so much of their time
> > to is being used in this way. Developers feel helpless. And to date no
> > organization that I am aware of has prioritized addressing this feeling
> > of helplessness.
>
> I know that this is hard, and I spoke to this before, but you are not
> responsible for how your software is used. ICE is funded by your tax
> dollars, too, but good luck not paying those. It's a tough hand we've
> been dealt, but ruining open source because we feel empowered to in the
> face of our lack of empowerment to effect change in our government...
> would be a really bad plan.
>
> > I disagree on this point, which I see being made quite often (usually
> > it’s more along the lines of “terrorists don’t care about
> > licenses”. The activities that ICE engages in at its concentration
> > camps are illegal but still being carried out by the government, and ICE
> > cannot be sued for human rights violations. But to return to the example
> > of Palantir: do you think their lawyers are going to even ENTERTAIN the
> > notion of using software with an ethical license? Being sued for license
> > violation is the least of their concerns. It would be a public relations
> > disaster if it was discovered that they were using ethical source
> > licensed software to support ICE.
>
> Let's state for the sake of argument that I agree with this premise. In
> that context, let me ask you the following: do you think that if we
> prohibit ICE from using our software, they will be any less effective in
> carrying out their mission?
>
> I think we both know that the answer is "no".
>
> Choosing an ethical source license is not actually solving any of these
> problems. It's just making us feel better. I won't accept platitudes at
> the expense of the core principles of open source.
>
> > The OSD does not define open source, it defines the characteristics of
> > open source licenses.
>
> I do not agree with this position, and I find it very important. This
> "fact" has been made up by people with ulterior motives in the past few
> years, and is being used to justify gas lighting users with
> faux-open-source software projects. This statement is made most often by
> people who want to capitalize on open-source, but wish the definition
> was slightly more suited to their interests. In fact, addressing this
> issue is the most important criteria on which I judged my votes for the
> new board members.
>
> I'm prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt, but be aware that,
> like I was mistakenly using the "virtue signaling" language of bad
> actors, you're using the language of bad actors here yourself.
>
> > Don’t believe the OSD does much to serve the constituents of the open
> > source community, the developers spending their precious free time
> > putting all of themselves into code that they hope someone will find
> > useful. Maybe the OSI shouldn’t concern itself with developers like
> > that? That’s for the organization itself to decide. But I firmly
> > believe that business-as-usual will lead to the increasing irrelevance
> > of the organization, and I think that would be a tragedy and great loss.
>
> I think that the OSI would do well to be a focused organization,
> concerning itself only with maintaining the OSD, scrutinizing licenses
> for compliance with it, and promoting the use of compatible licenses and
> software licensed as such. The Unix philosophy: do one thing, and do it
> well.
>
> Rather than expand the mission of the OSI, I'd prefer to establish new
> organizations (or support existing ones, they do exist, such as SFC),
> for addressing the needs of the developers and improving open source
> sustainability. Expanding the budget to support other initiatives is
> risky, it introduces a lot of political problems and is itself an
> existential threat to open source.
>
> > So I resent us-vs-them framing, even as I admit my own contribution to
> > that antagonism early on. I’m hoping that we can move past adversity
> > and come together to create the next great hack that ensures, in the
> > words of Karen Sandler, that software freedom is ALWAYS in service to
> > human freedom.
>
> Thanks for taking the time to address my concerns.
>
> _______________________________________________
> License-discuss mailing list
> License-discuss at lists.opensource.org
> http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org