[License-discuss] What's wrong with the AGPL?

[Kate Downing]

As to your question about issues with the SSPL, at least for me it comes
down to this language in section 13:

“Service Source Code” means the Corresponding Source for the Program or the
modified version, and the Corresponding Source for all programs that you
use to make the Program or modified version available as a service,
including, without limitation, management software, user interfaces,
application program interfaces, automation software, monitoring software,
backup software, storage software and hosting software, all such that a
user could run an instance of the service using the Service Source Code you
make available.

Most, if not all, of my clients don't write their own management software,
monitoring software, backup software or hosting software. In many cases,
they're licensing proprietary code for these things that they have no right
to open source. Typically, if a vendor offers two versions of software -
one as on-prem/self-hosted and another as a hosted service, the self-hosted
customer is expected to go get this stuff elsewhere. It's not something
they're licensing as part of their product. So this provision is just
really far removed from what companies can do and honestly from what they
should be doing as a business. You probably *don't* want a vendor of
accounting software to also be writing their own security monitoring
software. It's not what they're experts in.

On Thu, Jun 13, 2024 at 3:42 PM Kate Downing <kate.v.downing at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I wrote about this at length here:
> https://katedowninglaw.com/2019/09/08/the-great-open-source-shake-up/
>
> On Thu, Jun 13, 2024 at 3:30 PM Dirk Riehle <dirk at riehle.org> wrote:
>
>> Hello everyone,
>>
>> I wrote this email three times and discarded it; I simply don't know how
>> to ask.
>>
>> Final try. If I believe various representatives (on Twitter and
>> elsewhere) of companies like AWS, they believe they can use AGPL
>> licensed code and the copyleft effect is wholly contained/doesn't affect
>> their tech stack at all. Those who pushed source-available seem to
>> agree; the SSPL was an attempt to a better copyleft license in the eyes
>> of their creators, irrespective of this list's conclusion that it was a
>> discriminatory license.
>>
>> Why is that? I look at the definition of "modified code" in the AGPL
>> license texts and to me it seems to do the trick (copyleft effect). I
>> find the explanation of conveyance to users less clear i.e. how the
>> traditional distribution is defined.
>>
>> Is there any recognized published statement that explains whether the
>> AGPL achieves a network copyleft effect as intended or not? And if the
>> conclusion is that it doesn't what's the alternative if you want this
>> effect?
>>
>> Thanks for bearing with me.
>>
>> Dirk
>>
>> --
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>>
>>
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