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Getting Paid To Abandon an Open Source Project?
darkeye writes "I'm facing a difficult dilemma and looking for opinions. I've been contributing heavily to an open source project, making considerable changes to code organization and quality, but the work is unfinished at the moment. Now, a company is approaching me to continue my changes. They want to keep the improvements to themselves, which is possible since the project is published under the BSD license. That's fair, as they have all the rights to the work they pay for in full. However, they also want me to sign a non-competition clause, which would bar me from ever working on and publishing results for the original open source project itself, even if done separately, in my free time. How would you approach such a decision? On one side, they'd provide resources to work on an interesting project. On the other, it would make me an outcast in the project's community. Moreover, they would take ownership of not just what they paid for, but also my changes leading up to this moment, and I wouldn't be able to continue on my original codebase in an open source manner if I sign their contract."
"Since you support free speech, I assume that you support and encourage flag burning."
A true advocate for freedom will advocate for the freedom to do things that he personally does not approve of.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
So do I (amongst other things), but those posters are not by any means "drama queens". You on the other hand are just a typical greed monkey whose "brain" locks up as soon as some dollar bills are in view.
If you were not, you would have immediately realized that that potential "employers" of the submitter of the article are simply scam artists (probably with the same mindset as you). They demand that he signs an eternal set of NDAs and "non compete" contracts, while offering to pay him in a definitely time-limited fashion (i.e. until the project completion, whenever that will be, or until they change their minds, whenever that might be). In short they wish to enslave him by denying him the use of some of his abilities forever (or in practical terms until he dies) in exchange for what amounts to a set of glass beads. The only thing even remotely approaching "adequate" compensation for such a thing are perpetual payments from these "employers" or an up-front amount guaranteeing him life-long comfort, neither of which are being offered as far as it can be discerned from the article.
> I code for a living - I MAKE MONEY for selling the product of my skills.
So do I, but I don't sign any non-compete agreements.
> I also code for fun, because I enjoy doing it. Not often, however, do the two categories overlap...
That is just sad. You spend a quarter of your life on the job, it makes sense to strive hard to find a job you enjoy doing. Even if it pays a bit less.