7 ms·

Redis changes license from BSD-3 to dual RSALv2+SSPLv1

41 points by raid2000 2y ago

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562
ensignavenger 2y ago
Let the forking ensue. What a stupid move. They have illegally removed the BSD headers from contributions by various cloud vendors like Redhat and Amazon. I hope they can all get together to.maintain a fork, and maybe sue Redis Inc. for this unlawful infringment of there copyrights.
- rpeden 2y ago
  I don't see anything in the 3-clause BSD license indicating the copyright notice needs to be included in every file, though. They've kept a copy of it in the repository, and it looks like they left the BSD header in files where the copyright holder's name was an external contributor. They also mention that the license change only applies to future changes, not existing code - so it doesn't seem like there's any copyright infringement happening here, unless I'm missing something.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
warp 2y ago
At least one community fork (redict) has already been announced: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 I hope the community doesn't fracture too much and that at least one of possibly many forks gets enough momentum to be long-term sustainable.
Pet_Ant 2y ago
I haven't read this license but I wished they had at least gone with the BASL. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Source_License https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Source_License IANAL, but AFAICT the BASL is not open-source, but it is _eventually_-open-source is in the source will automatically transition to being open source (GPL v2 or compatible... not sure if either BSD or AGPL work). But if you are going to go source available, license proliferation is still a problem, please try to maintain sanity.
- remram 2y ago
  The SPDX identifier for Business Source License is BUSL: https://spdx.org/licenses/BUSL-1.1.html https://spdx.org/licenses/BUSL-1.1.html I have never seen anyone refer to it as "BASL".
  - Pet_Ant 2y ago
    Too late to edit it now, thanks for the correction. I knew there was a vowel in there and it was just "BSL" as the Wikipedia page has it. My bad.
blagie 2y ago
I am building a major open-source package around redis. This kills it. AGPL, I could go with. AGPL/proprietary dual licensing works well. There's an open ecosystem and a closed one. Non-free is a non-starter. It's no longer GPL-compatible. EVERY project under the GPL using redis now has a potential legal liability from (what's looking like) a sleazeball company. Now I need to figure out if I should move to a fork or switch to a different package. Fortunately, I have a nice key-value store abstraction, so it's easy to switch. I expect distributions like Debian, and Ubuntu by proxy, will move away from having a redis .deb as well. The damnable thing here is the dishonest copy: "In practice, nothing changes for the Redis developer community who will continue to enjoy permissive licensing under the dual license."
- martinky24 2y ago
  > I expect distributions like Debian, and Ubuntu by proxy, will move away from having a redis .deb as well. What about this change indicates that? This sounds like fearmongering, the new licenses really shouldn't affect this use case?
  - blagie 2y ago
    The new license is incompatible with Debian policy: https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-archive.html#the-debian-free-software-guidelines https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-archive.html#the... The new licensing scheme effectively excludes redis from most of the open ecosystem, by cascading network effects from things like this. In this case, if you're building a package, if you pick redis, you've excluded yourself from distribution in many major distros. Ditto for many other similar effects. It's not fear-mongering. It's following laws and policies.
    - Pet_Ant 2y ago
      That only prevents them from adding newer versions of Redis. The current version is still fine and I'm sure that the community will patch any security holes that are discovered.
ChrisArchitect 2y ago
[dupe] (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562) A more recent development of interest: Redict is an independent, copyleft fork of Redis https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986
- evanmoran 2y ago
  This fork is LGPL. Does anyone know of a fork that remains BSD? I’m sure this is fine for many people, but it isn’t ok for what I’m working on. Update: it looks like KeyDB is a good one. https://github.com/Snapchat/KeyDB https://github.com/Snapchat/KeyDB
  - drewdevault 2y ago
    What are your concerns with LGPL?
  - reconditerose 2y ago
    Several Redis maintainers and contributors moved to development here, https://github.com/madolson/placeholderkv https://github.com/madolson/placeholderkv. KeyDB is not bad though, it's an older fork that isn't very widely adopted.
bananapub 2y ago
truly a bizarre way of doing a dumb thing - they do not own the copyright of all the Redis code, so they cannot "change the license" of the existing code at all. instead, they need to license their new contributions under the new license, which will effectively make the combined blob of code only available under the new license. doesn't change what they're doing, but it's just disrespectful, incorrect and a breach of everyone else's copyright to remove the existing license and headers.

41 points by raid2000 2y ago

Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562

Let the forking ensue. What a stupid move. They have illegally removed the BSD headers from contributions by various cloud vendors like Redhat and Amazon. I hope they can all get together to.maintain a fork, and maybe sue Redis Inc. for this unlawful infringment of there copyrights.

rpeden 2y ago
I don't see anything in the 3-clause BSD license indicating the copyright notice needs to be included in every file, though. They've kept a copy of it in the repository, and it looks like they left the BSD header in files where the copyright holder's name was an external contributor. They also mention that the license change only applies to future changes, not existing code - so it doesn't seem like there's any copyright infringement happening here, unless I'm missing something.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

warp 2y ago

At least one community fork (redict) has already been announced: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 I hope the community doesn't fracture too much and that at least one of possibly many forks gets enough momentum to be long-term sustainable.

Pet_Ant 2y ago

I haven't read this license but I wished they had at least gone with the BASL. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Source_License https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Source_License IANAL, but AFAICT the BASL is not open-source, but it is _eventually_-open-source is in the source will automatically transition to being open source (GPL v2 or compatible... not sure if either BSD or AGPL work). But if you are going to go source available, license proliferation is still a problem, please try to maintain sanity.

remram 2y ago
The SPDX identifier for Business Source License is BUSL: https://spdx.org/licenses/BUSL-1.1.html https://spdx.org/licenses/BUSL-1.1.html I have never seen anyone refer to it as "BASL".
- Pet_Ant 2y ago
  Too late to edit it now, thanks for the correction. I knew there was a vowel in there and it was just "BSL" as the Wikipedia page has it. My bad.

blagie 2y ago

I am building a major open-source package around redis. This kills it. AGPL, I could go with. AGPL/proprietary dual licensing works well. There's an open ecosystem and a closed one. Non-free is a non-starter. It's no longer GPL-compatible. EVERY project under the GPL using redis now has a potential legal liability from (what's looking like) a sleazeball company. Now I need to figure out if I should move to a fork or switch to a different package. Fortunately, I have a nice key-value store abstraction, so it's easy to switch. I expect distributions like Debian, and Ubuntu by proxy, will move away from having a redis .deb as well. The damnable thing here is the dishonest copy: "In practice, nothing changes for the Redis developer community who will continue to enjoy permissive licensing under the dual license."

martinky24 2y ago
> I expect distributions like Debian, and Ubuntu by proxy, will move away from having a redis .deb as well. What about this change indicates that? This sounds like fearmongering, the new licenses really shouldn't affect this use case?
- blagie 2y ago
  The new license is incompatible with Debian policy: https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-archive.html#the-debian-free-software-guidelines https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-archive.html#the... The new licensing scheme effectively excludes redis from most of the open ecosystem, by cascading network effects from things like this. In this case, if you're building a package, if you pick redis, you've excluded yourself from distribution in many major distros. Ditto for many other similar effects. It's not fear-mongering. It's following laws and policies.
  - Pet_Ant 2y ago
    That only prevents them from adding newer versions of Redis. The current version is still fine and I'm sure that the community will patch any security holes that are discovered.

ChrisArchitect 2y ago

[dupe] (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39772562) A more recent development of interest: Redict is an independent, copyleft fork of Redis https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39789986

evanmoran 2y ago
This fork is LGPL. Does anyone know of a fork that remains BSD? I’m sure this is fine for many people, but it isn’t ok for what I’m working on. Update: it looks like KeyDB is a good one. https://github.com/Snapchat/KeyDB https://github.com/Snapchat/KeyDB
- drewdevault 2y ago
  What are your concerns with LGPL?
- reconditerose 2y ago
  Several Redis maintainers and contributors moved to development here, https://github.com/madolson/placeholderkv https://github.com/madolson/placeholderkv. KeyDB is not bad though, it's an older fork that isn't very widely adopted.

bananapub 2y ago

truly a bizarre way of doing a dumb thing - they do not own the copyright of all the Redis code, so they cannot "change the license" of the existing code at all. instead, they need to license their new contributions under the new license, which will effectively make the combined blob of code only available under the new license. doesn't change what they're doing, but it's just disrespectful, incorrect and a breach of everyone else's copyright to remove the existing license and headers.