This was extracted from the raw data above, I uploaded the graphic from http s://abi-laboratory.pro/ images/opensource1.png
Not meant as disrespect (highly doubt it will be taken as such anyway) but only for posterity.
There seems to be some confusion regarding the nature of the license as discussed by @sneak and this confusion is not helping anyone involved.
Copyright (c) 2017 Steemit, Inc., and contributors.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer >in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
The currency symbols, 'STEEM' and 'SBD' are not changed and no new currency symbols are added.
The STEEMIT_INIT_PUBLIC_KEY_STR is not changed from STM8GC13uCZbP44HzMLV6zPZGwVQ8Nt4Kji8PapsPiNq1BK153XTX,
and the software is not modified in any way that would bypass the need for the corresponding private to start a new blockchain.
The software is not used with any forks of the Steem blockchain that are not recognized by Steemit, Inc in writing.
So under these rules if someone produces a variation on the code that would result in a fork of the Steem blockchain the witnesses are not allowed to run it without permission of Steemit, Inc.
Any claims made by @sneak that the witnesses get to decide to run what they want are either:
Wrong
Officially Recognized changes by Steemit, Inc
Since he is posting from a personal account and not from a corporate account, such as @steemitblog, we can presume that he is wrong.
In this case it means that Steemit, Inc can block any change it wants. Steemit has also pursued patents on various aspects of the technology and has made no commitment to use said patents for defensive use only (if someone sues Steemit).
I have long stated that I believe all IP to be a government granted privilege enforced by violence and not a natural right. It was conceived to control freedom of speech and must violate freedom of speech to be enforced. Against Intellectual Monopoly
In the past I have supported licenses under the theory that they only apply to those who believe in IP and that everyone who rejects the concept is free to use it. I have considered IP claims to be null and void among liberty minded individuals and companies.
Any company that must resort to government force to defend its "IP" is an aggressor.
At this point Steemit, Inc has launched the chain, established network effect, and has not attempted to enforce the license. Because of the license it did collect a hefty licensing fee from Golos and secured a share drop on Steem / Steemit. Should Steem continue to extort license fees from other clones or should it open up the license?
All these terms simply hold back innovation and limit our freedoms. It is time to let the code be free and make a commitment to only produce BSD or MIT licensed code going forward. I will never again write software that isn't BSD / MIT from the day I conceive it to the day it is released."
I honestly never pegged @dan to be that radical so reading that it was resonating positively with me as I have argued that IP is a crime against humanity since I first reasoned it in my early twenties, it's immoral to copyright and patent and rely on violent enforcement of the state to uphold that selfishness, and both are spiraling out of control and soon are going to come to a conclusion. It's driven exclusively by greed, to monetize an idea, a concept, what good can come out of that?!
I think the voluntaryst anti-IP stance is intriguing. You have a community that, on the one hand, upholds personal property rights as inalienable. But on the other hand, they demand that intellectual property, if public, must be commonly-owned (of course, trade secrets are fine - but everybody agrees on that one). I see how both of these are logical conclusions of the non-violence principle, but they also look (from the outside) to be a bit at odds with one another. This is neither the time nor the place to discuss it, I suppose. I'll write a blog about it one day.
re: Voluntaryist approach to infinitely reproducible works (ie: IP) - enlightened consumers are free to consciously choose to support their favoured content creators.
Thanks for the clarification. Now that you have resigned know there are those of us here that enjoy talking to you about things outside of steemit. Philosophy, Anarchy, Coding and other things. I am one of those that would be interested in seeing you at least stick around on the platform to engage in stuff like that with people like myself. I view this project as more than the code, and the money. It is also about the people and the ideas. You can still be involved with that. If there is some conflict of interest preventing it then I can understand that, but I did want to at least express that I for one would enjoy interaction with you. I find it personally valuable. If not here then it'd be nice to somehow know where you might be engaged/interacted with in the future. My email is simply my handle here at gmail.
As to the open source nature and what you wrote here. That seemed to be integral to what this project was being designed as. This is therefore concerning a number of people that see this as being different.
We market it as decentralized. In a way it is, but as soon as you lock it behind patents, and other barriers you are adding a degree of centralization/gate keeping back into the design.
Yes, that's true @jianjolly. However, dwinblood has a point that by imposing IP in the form of licenses those in charge of the licenses are a centralized force which is contrary to the "open" of OpenSource software.
It is also contrary to referring to the place a decentralized. It is only partially decentralized. The blocks themselves would still be decentralized but the actual platform would not.
That interpretation is the same as mine and pretty straight forward. It's plain that Steemit Inc has special power over the network as a result of this clause, since witnesses cannot freely fork without permission in writing.
IYO do/did these provisions in the license really have teeth? The idea of steemit inc actually litigating a claim of copyright infringement against a witness running an unauthorized version seems pretty far fetched to me. Was it ever discussed what would happen if someone just said "fork your license im running what i want"?
At best, it would be very expensive, very drawn out, and terrible PR. At worst it would be an asian land war like RIAA is fighting with filesharing.... constantly scanning the network for new witnesses running unauthorized versions and pursuing them.
The idea of steemit inc actually litigating a claim of copyright infringement against a witness running an unauthorized version seems pretty far fetched to me.
Downvoted in disagreement with the reward and also because Dan said that he wouldn't be posting or voting any more (and he did not specify a particular account but simply referred to himself). Perhaps he felt this issue was important enough to ignore that statement he made, but it wasn't necessary to self-upvote it as well. On the content, I agree entirely, so in that sense, thank you for posting this, Dan. Good to know that your future projects will be MIT/BSD. (Please also consider a patent clause.) Best of luck with those.
Thanks for posting this Dan. My friend Ben was concerned about the license 8 months ago. Seems he wasn't alone. I just wish you all could have worked out your differences instead of leaving the project completely.
The post is still on the blockchain. The license in question is the Steemit license which has some restrictions in it. It's been an ongoing debate and concern since the beginning.
He did not say that is why he left. It seems likely given the timing that it was somehow related, but going beyond that is speculation. Elsewhere ned has stated that dan was the one who came up with the license in the first place. Okay, maybe he changed his mind but that's a little bit different from just being outraged over it.
Agreed. I've been reading through Dan's comments, and he didn't say all that much, so this post was speaking volumes at the time it was published. As I said in reply to @kafkanarchy84: It's just a theory.
@dantheman we @phibetaiota
are exceedingly interested in you continuing
Open Source work. Please contact us when you're
ready to go to the next level. We are more than capable
in assisting you in your endeavors.
~The Management
wth just happened here
I don't know how to react to this post. All of this was so unexpected.
Will you try the
decline_voting_rightscommand?Will you ?
If I got his account, I will try.
This is what I was afraid of. Thanks for this post.
Edit: He deleted this post, but you can read it here:
https://steemd.com/tx/3b205c4416376e13722ddea0fb26a10aa83ecfdc
This was extracted from the raw data above, I uploaded the graphic from http s://abi-laboratory.pro/ images/opensource1.png
Not meant as disrespect (highly doubt it will be taken as such anyway) but only for posterity.
There seems to be some confusion regarding the nature of the license as discussed by @sneak and this confusion is not helping anyone involved.
Since he is posting from a personal account and not from a corporate account, such as @steemitblog, we can presume that he is wrong.
In this case it means that Steemit, Inc can block any change it wants. Steemit has also pursued patents on various aspects of the technology and has made no commitment to use said patents for defensive use only (if someone sues Steemit).
I have long stated that I believe all IP to be a government granted privilege enforced by violence and not a natural right. It was conceived to control freedom of speech and must violate freedom of speech to be enforced.
Against Intellectual Monopoly
In the past I have supported licenses under the theory that they only apply to those who believe in IP and that everyone who rejects the concept is free to use it. I have considered IP claims to be null and void among liberty minded individuals and companies.
Any company that must resort to government force to defend its "IP" is an aggressor.
At this point Steemit, Inc has launched the chain, established network effect, and has not attempted to enforce the license. Because of the license it did collect a hefty licensing fee from Golos and secured a share drop on Steem / Steemit. Should Steem continue to extort license fees from other clones or should it open up the license?
All these terms simply hold back innovation and limit our freedoms. It is time to let the code be free and make a commitment to only produce BSD or MIT licensed code going forward. I will never again write software that isn't BSD / MIT from the day I conceive it to the day it is released."
I always did think that restrictive license seemed pretty un-dannish.
I honestly never pegged @dan to be that radical so reading that it was resonating positively with me as I have argued that IP is a crime against humanity since I first reasoned it in my early twenties, it's immoral to copyright and patent and rely on violent enforcement of the state to uphold that selfishness, and both are spiraling out of control and soon are going to come to a conclusion. It's driven exclusively by greed, to monetize an idea, a concept, what good can come out of that?!
Yeah, dan is decently radical. :)
I think the voluntaryst anti-IP stance is intriguing. You have a community that, on the one hand, upholds personal property rights as inalienable. But on the other hand, they demand that intellectual property, if public, must be commonly-owned (of course, trade secrets are fine - but everybody agrees on that one). I see how both of these are logical conclusions of the non-violence principle, but they also look (from the outside) to be a bit at odds with one another. This is neither the time nor the place to discuss it, I suppose. I'll write a blog about it one day.
re: Voluntaryist approach to infinitely reproducible works (ie: IP) - enlightened consumers are free to consciously choose to support their favoured content creators.
not really. bitshares was restricted too in the beginning
Now, you are not afraid anymore because you know it! :D
Ah yes. Also can see history at https://scribe.steemian.info/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsteempeak.com%2Fsteem%2F%40dantheman%2Fmaking-steem-really-open-source
Thank you @neoxian. Very much appreciate the link.
tyvm for that link!!
Thanks for the link !👍
Thank you, was going to go looking for it 🙂
Undeleted: https://phist.steemdata.com/history?identifier=https%3A%2F%2Fsteemit.com%2Fsteem%2F%40dantheman%2Fmaking-steem-really-open-source
Thanks for the clarification. Now that you have resigned know there are those of us here that enjoy talking to you about things outside of steemit. Philosophy, Anarchy, Coding and other things. I am one of those that would be interested in seeing you at least stick around on the platform to engage in stuff like that with people like myself. I view this project as more than the code, and the money. It is also about the people and the ideas. You can still be involved with that. If there is some conflict of interest preventing it then I can understand that, but I did want to at least express that I for one would enjoy interaction with you. I find it personally valuable. If not here then it'd be nice to somehow know where you might be engaged/interacted with in the future. My email is simply my handle here at gmail.
As to the open source nature and what you wrote here. That seemed to be integral to what this project was being designed as. This is therefore concerning a number of people that see this as being different.
We market it as decentralized. In a way it is, but as soon as you lock it behind patents, and other barriers you are adding a degree of centralization/gate keeping back into the design.
Good luck, best wishes, and thanks for posting.
OP wasn't about "decentralization" but about its being open-source.
Yes, that's true @jianjolly. However, dwinblood has a point that by imposing IP in the form of licenses those in charge of the licenses are a centralized force which is contrary to the "open" of OpenSource software.
It is also contrary to referring to the place a decentralized. It is only partially decentralized. The blocks themselves would still be decentralized but the actual platform would not.
That interpretation is the same as mine and pretty straight forward. It's plain that Steemit Inc has special power over the network as a result of this clause, since witnesses cannot freely fork without permission in writing.
IYO do/did these provisions in the license really have teeth? The idea of steemit inc actually litigating a claim of copyright infringement against a witness running an unauthorized version seems pretty far fetched to me. Was it ever discussed what would happen if someone just said "fork your license im running what i want"?
At best, it would be very expensive, very drawn out, and terrible PR. At worst it would be an asian land war like RIAA is fighting with filesharing.... constantly scanning the network for new witnesses running unauthorized versions and pursuing them.
Me too.
Downvoted in disagreement with the reward and also because Dan said that he wouldn't be posting or voting any more (and he did not specify a particular account but simply referred to himself). Perhaps he felt this issue was important enough to ignore that statement he made, but it wasn't necessary to self-upvote it as well. On the content, I agree entirely, so in that sense, thank you for posting this, Dan. Good to know that your future projects will be MIT/BSD. (Please also consider a patent clause.) Best of luck with those.
Thanks for posting this Dan. My friend Ben was concerned about the license 8 months ago. Seems he wasn't alone. I just wish you all could have worked out your differences instead of leaving the project completely.
What license are people speaking about here? I'm in the dark.
The post is still on the blockchain. The license in question is the Steemit license which has some restrictions in it. It's been an ongoing debate and concern since the beginning.
Thank you, Luke. Now I see why he left.
He did not say that is why he left. It seems likely given the timing that it was somehow related, but going beyond that is speculation. Elsewhere ned has stated that dan was the one who came up with the license in the first place. Okay, maybe he changed his mind but that's a little bit different from just being outraged over it.
That's true.
It's a theory, anyway.
It's a theory with some pretty compelling evidence straight from @dan's fingers! I don't see @ned or @sneak refuting it... yet.
Dan made an unambiguous statement in his resignation thread about specifically why he chose to leave. It doesn't mention the license.
It's possible you have the cause and effect inverted.
Agreed. I've been reading through Dan's comments, and he didn't say all that much, so this post was speaking volumes at the time it was published. As I said in reply to @kafkanarchy84: It's just a theory.
@full-steem-ahead: here's the refutation you mentioned wanting to see.
Your link for refutation is bad. Is it appears to be a link to a comment in this article, is that right Luke?
Yes, I was linking to your comment about not seeing a refutation from @sneak while replying to his refutation. Make sense?
If my current confusion is cleared up by you informing me that @jianjolly == sneak then kewlness, otherwise I'm still confused.
Maybe this will help. If you see something different, that would be odd.
@dantheman we @phibetaiota
are exceedingly interested in you continuing
Open Source work. Please contact us when you're
ready to go to the next level. We are more than capable
in assisting you in your endeavors.
~The Management