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

[Robby O'Connor]

I've pointed out my concerns multiple times on Twitter. It's a cute
thought experiment, but unfortunately will fall apart on legal scrutiny.
I could see a court completely invalidating the Hippocratic License for
example, either in whole or just the parts that exclude those like ICE,
Palentir, etc. from using software licensed under it. If they wanted to
actually have a license in place that could do this, they need to use a
framework that has the backing of international law, but they haven't
done that. Honestly, it does little to stop those they wish to block
from using their software in any way.

I do agree they should go off on their own and not try to co-opt the
Open Source Software movement for their own selfish ends. This is open
season to discriminate against people. I don't support this. Do I think
they'll succeed? No. They'll find like-minded folks -- but it won't
actually stop organizations they don't want using their software from
doing so.

I am really hoping that Coraline does not get a board seat because it
would be so detrimental to the Open Source movement.

On 3/10/20 12:18 PM, Gil Yehuda via License-discuss wrote:
> A few weeks ago I said that if I really wanted to know about "ethical
> source licensing" I would join the ethical source licensing discussion
> group. I was thinking at the time that I'm actually interested in open
> source licensing -- which is why I'm in /this/ group. But I thought --
> maybe I /should/ investigate first hand and come to /my
> own/ conclusions about this other movement. So I took my advice and
> requested to join their slack group. Although it is not for skeptics
> -- and I applied, saying that I'm a skeptic, I was allowed to join and
> given pre-reading to orient me.
>
> I have many concerns with what I saw. The Ethical Source Movement will
> face barriers and blockers to their success. The best way to help them
> is to list the many concerns and provide advice about addressing many
> of the issues they will encounter. But I'm not motivated to help. Why?
> Their stated approach is based on making changes to the open source
> movement, that would undo years of valuable work in an attempt to
> create other potential value. But I'm not seeing that promise being
> realized given their approach, nor the risk worth taking in trying.
>
> I think discussions are good. But Coraline's message this morning is
> that she's not continuing to be part of this discussion. Moreover her
> message indicates that she's been gathering feedback from this
> discussion in service to enhancements to her work. Which means that we
> should consider the value of continuing this conversation. We have an
> open list (consistent with our ethos), the ethical source movement's
> communications channel is not open. So this is asymmetric at best. The
> way she framed her message makes it seem exploitative.
>
> I think this discussion list should focus on ways to help the open
> source movement. If another movement wants to help, wonderful. If they
> want to exist independently in service of some other value, that's
> fine too. But I'm saddened to see this discussion being used as it
> has. If I thought helping them was a good idea I would urge them to
> reconsider their approach so that their success is not predicated on
> exploiting the open source movement.
>
> Gil Yehuda
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 10, 2020 at 9:41 AM Coraline Ada Ehmke
> <coraline at idolhands.com <mailto:coraline at idolhands.com>> wrote:
>
>     I’ve been trying to cultivate the ability to extract actionable
>     and constructive feedback from even rude, confrontational,
>     dismissive, personal, or smug criticism. Thank you all for
>     engaging, no matter if your criticism was well-intended or no, and
>     most importantly for giving me the opportunity to learn in public.
>
>     Watch for an important change on
>     https://ethicalsource.dev/definition next week.
>
>     Not responding to this thread anymore, feel free to carry on
>     without me.
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