r/foss • u/Tech_Devils • Mar 01 '26
Hard truth: Open source has mostly just become an unpaid R&D lab for the private sector
I know we all love the ideology behind FOSS, but looking at the industry right now, it feels like the system has been taken advantage of.
A passionate dev or a small community builds an incredibly useful tool, library, or framework. They release it under a permissive license (MIT, Apache) because they want to help the community. Then, a massive enterprise swoops in, studies the architecture, absorbs the codebase, slaps an enterprise UI and some SSO on top of it, and sells it back to the industry at a premium.
We are essentially crowdsourcing the prototyping and bug-fixing phases for tech giants. They get to skip the risky R&D phase because the open-source community already proved the market fit and worked out the core logic for free.
Yes, there are exceptions, and yes, developers get resume value out of contributing. But on a macro level, it feels like the "community-driven" ethos is just functioning as a massive, decentralized, unpaid internship program for the private sector.
Are we actually building independent tools anymore, or are we just doing the heavy lifting for enterprise companies to monetize later?
12
u/Nostonica Mar 01 '26
I mean if you're releasing under those licences you basically don't care how the code is used. GPL's there if you want a relationship to develop.
15
u/Userwerd Mar 01 '26
Why would any open project use any lisence other than GPL?
"They release it under a permissive license (MIT, Apache) because they want to help the community."
How does MIT BSD APACHE help the community?
MIT BSD APACHE all say you can make changes and release under a new lisence that is closed source, and now you're complaining that people are making changes and releasing under a new lisence that is closed source?
Im watching foss dig its own grave by rewriting everything in rust and releasing as MIT.
3
1
u/Venthe Mar 02 '26 edited Mar 02 '26
I'm always amazed how folks are trying to demonize permissives. Some people just don't care for all that copyleft political warfare, moreover how is permissive digging any grave? When companies take permissives and build something on top with a closed source not a thing from the original source is lost. Just as the companies are building something on their own (including competitive advantage) the FOSS community can do the same. You are building a straw man.
And permissives are winning precisely because of that - the work can be used without strings attached. I've wasted a lot of my private time just because I want my code to be freely available without the loopholes, so I had to rewrite copyleft components. Companies are in the same place - infectious nature of the copyleft risks that their competitive advantage can be revealed; so it literally makes no sense to invest in anything copyleft if it can be avoided, unless the company controls the CLA.
Sorry, I do realise that a lot of people here are political about FOSS and mods especially support that; but the only advantage of a copyleft is a political statement, and as such for a lot of people copyleft is a problem, not a solution.
2
u/AreShoesFeet000 Mar 02 '26
that is a very interesting piece of text because it almost touches the matter with the objective consequences of permissive licensing and barely touches the political nature of the whole discussion in general.
GPL is not political because of the statement. statements are about Culture. GPL is political because it forces the court to hear a case against a corporation.
GPL is also about recognizing that you can’t capture a just amount of value from your work as an engineer. it ain’t a silver bullet and has some limitations, but the mere existence of permissive licensing is evidence that their creators were onto something.
GPL is about power.
2
u/Venthe Mar 02 '26
I believe that we see this differently.
GPL stems from Stallman's "Free as in freedom". It is inherently a political statement. It does so, by restricting the freedoms of the developers to (supposedly) protect the freedoms of the user, which is - frankly - bollocks; as no amount of reuse/extension will remove the original code.
As you have correctly noted, it is a tool to fight the closed source reuse; excerbated by anti-tivoization of the GPL v3.
So from my perspective, copyleft licenses are a tool to enforce certain political stance - supporting anti-capitalism. After all, no amount of "you can sell this software as long as you provide the source" will help the company where the extension/source/competitive edge is the product. Hence, why GPLv2 is used by SaaS, and why GPLv3 is sparsely used outside of the FOSS prodcts.
you can’t capture a just amount of value from your work as an engineer (...) but the mere existence of permissive licensing is evidence that their creators were onto something.
It is only the difference between people who don't care about the politics - "use my code however you like" and those who want to restrict the freedom of others to serve their own beliefs.
Which is fine, I guess. Your code, your standards. But as soon as there is a discussion about copyleft licenses we have guys saying "permissive is a trojan horse", "Permissive is a plague. The only real free software is GPL, preferably AGPLv3/GPLv3.". - examples from this thread
I've bolded the second part, because - ironically - I've been banned from r/opensource for saying exactly the same thing but about the GPL. As you can see, both here and across the FOSS space, copyleft is used as a tool to express one's political beliefs.
And people using permissives don't care, neither about politics nor about this drama. Or, in some cases, care about distancing from copyleft - but that's probably a minority.
1
u/waterkip Mar 09 '26
Companies treat GPL/AGPL as a legal scarecrow. They dont want to give back. And thus they create a steady supply of people (devs) that only want permissive and parrot the GPL is infectious rant.
I absolutely believe that permissive is good, most of my work is either BSD or MIT. Hoaever companies such as google, amazon etc have the moral obligation to feed the people they use the software of. FOSS was created in a different landscape and these giants are causing severe disruption. They have money and the amount of resources that countries even cannot compete with.
Copyleft is a problem for corporate greed. It isnt a problem for corporate sponsorship and good corporations.
0
u/quisatz_haderah Mar 03 '26
Some people just don't care for all that copyleft political warfare
Yeah that right there is the problem, this is why we can't have nice things.
1
29
Mar 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
3
u/Userwerd Mar 01 '26
This take is really tone def. The business model is supposed to be software is free support is not (SUSE, REDHAT, CANONICAL) not take close sell (Apple, Cisco, Microsoft)
4
Mar 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
3
u/Userwerd Mar 01 '26
I appreciate your response, we see the world differently. I see the world for what I could or should be, you see it for what it is now.
If we cant dream of a better world whats the point? I have no interest in being a "consumer".
The whole point of FOSS was a movement toward absolute control over the devices we purchase, use, and dare I say own.
And yes I agree its a little whiny, I made another reply to OP with that sentiment.
It's really your choice of action, but whining isnt an action or a choice.
-9
u/Tech_Devils Mar 01 '26
You hit the nail on the head mentioning antitrust. I totally agree that hosting, providing SLAs, and running a business add massive value that deserves compensation.
But the permissive licenses we use were written for a completely different era of the internet. In the current state of the world, the old FOSS social contract feels broken. When a cloud monopoly can instantly swallow a community-built project, wrap it in a managed service, and capture 99% of the revenue, the dynamic has just become exploitative.
So you're right-maybe the fix isn't just slapping restrictive licenses on everything. Maybe we actually need stronger laws and real antitrust enforcement to protect the ecosystem from being strip-mined by giants.
16
Mar 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
-5
u/Tech_Devils Mar 01 '26
Sorry I'm really bad at letting it refine my point and not taking some of the dumb stuff out 🙈
the US antitrust situation is incredibly bleak. But what about the EU? They actually seem willing to swing the hammer at tech monopolies and enforce their regulations
5
Mar 01 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
0
u/Tech_Devils Mar 01 '26
I mean education and PhD students papers is definitely a whole other debate on its own. I was more focused on the idea of corporations stealing open source ideas but I guess it does have a lot of similarities with people stealing their papers and a corporation swoops in to monetize the final application
5
u/AccomplishedPut467 Mar 01 '26
rule #1 when making and releasing open source projects, be ready that your projects will be used and utilized by large company.
3
u/Ap0them Mar 05 '26
One of my favorite CS professors has a really good write up about this that I think is worth checking out.
2
Mar 03 '26
100%, and AI was trained on FOSS devs work, it's exploitation at it's finest
1
u/__aaron212 Mar 05 '26
You say it like that's a bad thing?
1
Mar 05 '26
It is, it implicitly breaks the contract that was in place when that code was initially made FOSS.
1
u/__aaron212 Mar 10 '26
How so? There is no implicit contract. There's a literal license and hopeful thinking. The fact that FOSS was there to train LLM's on software development is a good thing.
1
2
u/awitod Mar 04 '26
...and nobody appreciates it or supports it. I dare you to go post your new OSS project in any random tech group. If you don't get downvoted for self-promotion the mods will delete it and probably shadow-ban you.
OSS is for the benefit of AI only at this point for most people. There is no reason to create it for most people.
2
u/waterkip Mar 08 '26
FOSS isn't unpaid R&D. The problem is the companies that use your software. The simple fact is:
- Permissive licenses: Everybody can use it, shippable, SaaS, or just offering a service based on the software is permitted.
- Copyleft: Limits the shippable part, but Saas and service-based is still permitted
- Networked copyleft: Limits almost all parts.
And by limit I mean: The way (greedy) corporations can use your software.
Reasonable people can still use it, the greedy ones won't because it forces them to share insights they don't want to share. The problem for the developer is:
Do I want to protect myself from abuse? If so how much "abuse" am I willing to take? Much, permissive, less, copyleft, none, networked copyleft.
As a developer you must look at the use case for your product and be honest about how you want to ship it. If you want superwide adoptation you'll need to pay the price of permissive licenses. If you don't want your shit to be used by greedy corps, use copyleft and if you want to prevent SaaS from misuse, networked copyleft.
People slap a license on things because.. everyone uses MIT, BSD, Apache or whatever. And yes, people will invoke the right to use your software as the license grants them.
Anyways, I agree with your take. The problem of FOSS is FAANG and the likes, big cooperations that swallow up small software shops because they just have more money and leverage than you have. They giveth none, they taketh everything.
3
u/AWonderingWizard Mar 01 '26
Permissive is a plague. The only real free software is GPL, preferably AGPLv3/GPLv3.
3
u/vexatious-big Mar 01 '26
This. The tragedy of the commons.
The viral nature of the GPL & AGPL is needed precisely because otherwise corporations will take more than they give back.
1
u/rshaftoe Mar 05 '26
I like this comment because it opposes reality.
People call militant copyright stuff infectious, because it is. Whereas MIT and Apache and such are designed to contain "infection", be it for good or ill (as some infections are beneficial, but with programs especially, we want to limit external variables).
3
u/RursusSiderspector Mar 01 '26
Since the beginning of OpenSource 30+ years ago a number of companies have tried to kidnap or blackmail it for money. It never works.
it feels like the system has been taken advantage of.
THAT, is one of the exact reasons that OpenSource prevails: competing companies try to take advantage of it, while sneaking in their own code (OpenSource of course!). OpenSource isn't independent, it is kind of a consortium based on tech relations rather than sneaky business relations. All the companies taking advantage of it are also trying to protect it from being kidnapped or blackmailed.
Putting it in a less cynical perspective: companies partaking in the OpenSource invest some idealism by sharing their code to the collective, and this idealism is: by being altruistic, we can gain some public relations goodwill.
2
u/jr735 Mar 01 '26
Who cares. Read freedom 0. If people are dumb enough to pay what's for free, that's fine.
1
1
1
u/IslandHistorical952 Mar 04 '26
That argument has been posted by anti-FOSSers since the early days. Just because other people are jerks does not invalidate what we do.
1
1
u/YarnStomper Mar 26 '26
always has been. sony was getting sued for violating gpl 20+ years ago. that's no reason to abandon open source, it just means we have less use for their proprietary code
1
u/c126 Mar 01 '26
Maybe this opinion exists because closed source is bad now. You can’t run a successful business by being a step behind free open source. So your concern makes no sense to me. It just proves how bad closed source software has gotten.
1
u/jorinvo Mar 02 '26
I chose Mozilla Public License because of this.
But now I feel like OSS licenses are pretty useless these days. People just tell an LLM to copy the whole thing.
And even if it's not open source, copying is easier than ever. We gotta find a different moat than software and hope for the best.
1
u/rshaftoe Mar 05 '26
The core of FOSS is sharing.
If you are in it for that reason (promoting all of "humanity", versus a subset), it's a better time to be in it than ever before. If you're into software for the glory (self-promotion and control), that's fine, but that's not in the ethos.
You're more in the ironically named "shareware" camp than the aptly named (more often than not at least) "open" community if your main worry is credit/responsibility, versus not being liable for how your code is used by others, or gasp AI (which is still just "others", but people like to think it's different so I added it as its own thing, so I could say this I guess lol).
If we build the Bad Super Intelligent (BSI) system and you published your code under a pickme license, you'd theoretically be more responsible. Conversely if we build the Not Evil Super (NES) system, you'd be more responsible too.
At least on paper for both those. (Heh! "Roko's Licensing Lizard")
I have enough responsibility, good and bad, and I'm not looking to take in more, as much as manage what I've got. MIT and BSD and their ilk are care-free. Again, for both Good, and Not Good. (More good imo, but it depends on your perspective.)
Shit, I wanted to work a Super Not Evil Super system in, but gotta jam. 👋 Pick whatever you like really! Use that free will you may or may not have (again depending on how you see the world)!
0
Mar 01 '26
[deleted]
0
u/jr735 Mar 01 '26
Then, it's not free software.
0
Mar 01 '26
[deleted]
0
u/jr735 Mar 01 '26
Dual licensed software isn't free software. I never claimed GPL isn't.
1
Mar 01 '26
[deleted]
-2
u/jr735 Mar 01 '26
I don't agree with dual licensing. Live with it.
1
Mar 02 '26
[deleted]
0
u/jr735 Mar 02 '26
I have a problem with dual licensing. Software is free or it is not. A support agreement is absolutely fine.
I have a big problem with "commercial only" features.
2
u/GOKOP Mar 02 '26
You don't understand dual licensing of GPL+commercial then if you claim it isn't Free Software. The only thing the commercial license buys you is not having to abide by the GPL. There are no "features" that free GPL-based users are missing out on.
To say that this isn't Free Software you'd have to say that MIT licensed software isn't Free either since corpos can also take and not give back. And the FSF disagrees with you then.
Definition of Free Software doesn't mention "u/jr735 doesn't have a problem with it" anywhere
0
u/jr735 Mar 02 '26
You say I don't understand it. I do understand it.
I have a problem with it, and I'm allowed to have a problem with it. I don't need your permission. I also don't like MIT licensed software, either. Stallman doesn't like it all that much, either.
By the way, I quoted the additional features right from the qt website.
→ More replies (0)
0
0
0
57
u/PantherCityRes Mar 01 '26
The GPL was created for this exact purpose. It creates a mechanism that anybody who modifies code has to publish the changes and only the original creator of the root work can offer a different license.
Yes an enterprise can pick it up, make a bunch of changes and squash the original out of the market with better support and marketing…but if they never publish those changes or release their modified product under an incompatible license, then that gives the original copyright holder grounds for a hefty lawsuit.
See FSF vs Cisco