Copyleft licenses are not “restrictive”
https://drewdevault.com/2024/04/19/2024-04-19-Copyleft-is-not-restrictive.html
@drewdevault I cant tell you how many times people released their innovated idea under a copy-left license only to be angered when they realized the consequences, the vital nature, and the lock-in that resulted. Many abandoned the project and had to start over...
To each their own, but I will never use a copyleft license again.
@freemo oh no, it prevented you from making proprietary software, what a tragedy...
@drewdevault No, I didnt say anything about proprietary software. And it allows for that just fine.
@freemo that's literally the only thing that vitality prevents
I assume you mean "virality".. and no, it prevents quite a bit else.. for example it prevents switching or in some cases even using other copy-left licenses. It is also well known for not working well along side other open-source licenses in general.
There have been countless open-source projects that had to be abandoned and restarted from scratch due to the virality of a copyleft license that prevented progress regarding open-source interests due to licensing conflicts.
@freemo name one?
X.org server I think was the one that had to be abandoned, or was it XFree86.. one of the major X11 implementations had to be completely abandoned and rewritten as whatever replaced it.
@freemo that didn't have anything to do with copyleft.
It literally did, though as pointed out by another commenter it didnt require a complete rewrite only partial, but did require a complet reorg and rename.
Here is a quote from wikipedia basically agreeing with what I said word for word.
> The newer terms are referred to as the XFree86 License 1.1. Many projects relying on XFree86 found the new license unacceptable, and the Free Software Foundation considers it incompatible with the version 2 of the GNU General Public License, though compatible with version 3.
That is correct, it is the other copyleft licenses in the eco system whose viral nature and incompatibility with the clause that caused the issue.