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Google Reverses "Absurd" Mozilla Code Ban

Posted by kdawson on from the standing-athwart-history-yelling-"eof" dept.

Barence writes "Google has reversed its decision to ban projects created under the Mozilla Public License from being hosted on its Google Code site. Google banned the license in August, claiming it wanted to 'make a statement against open-source license proliferation' which it blamed for hindering the cross-pollination of code from one project to another. Chris DiBona, of Google's open source team, described its decision to ban the MPL as 'absurd,' citing the community's huge popularity." Jamie mentions that the issue was raised from the floor at OSCON at the Google Open Source Update panel, with DiBona on stage.

6 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Boycott Vibrant in-frame popups by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    I use adblock and noscript too. And I think that your scheme has one minor flaw, I'm not paying you any thing, and neither is anyone else.

  2. Re:Meh by Vexorian · · Score: 2, Informative
    Yep, It's probably only you who thinks like that, most likely because you are utterly wrong. Did you bother reading the licenses at all? The conclussion you took makes no sense.

    these licences are just a way of developers saying "I want my slice of the pie also"

    having to pay the author for commercial use or whatever

    No free software license has that clause, it breaks the def of free software.

    Remember kids, try getting informed before posting stuff in the interweb.

    --

    Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
  3. Re:Meh by Grey+Ninja · · Score: 3, Informative

    Do you even know what the GPL or BSD licenses require the user to do? Here's a hint for you. There's no money involved. In fact, you are explicitly allowed to sell the product. The main thing that the GPL prohibits you from doing is to distribute the product without also distributing the source code. And this isn't to get a "piece of the pie". This is to ensure that the code that you freed... remains free.

    Regardless, it sounds like you might prefer the BSD license. I'll leave figuring out what that means to you.

  4. Re:Multi-license ! by Vexorian · · Score: 4, Informative

    However the GPL does not forbid commercial usage of code, and thiking it does and posting about how it does so in web boards is just prima facie lameness .

    --

    Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
  5. Re:Multi-license ! by Atlantis-Rising · · Score: 4, Informative

    Code placed in the public domain does fulfill all of those qualities. Derivatives may or may not, but that's a different issue he wasn't talking about.

    And really, the ability to make non-free derivatives is a freedom too.

    --
    "It is possible to commit no errors and still lose. That is not a weakness. That is life." -Peak Performance
  6. Re:People still use Subversion? by S.O.B. · · Score: 2, Informative

    Real men think PVCS is junk.

    --
    Some of what I say is fact, some is conjecture, the rest I'm just blowing out my ass...you guess.