Voice of the Masses: Should FOSS licenses block adware?
There’s been plenty of furore about SourceForge in the last few weeks, and specifically its bundling of adware with installers for open source software. Which raises the question: should free and open source software licenses be modified to prevent this from happening? Should we add clauses that make it impossible to ship adware alongside FOSS programs?
Or alternatively, would these clauses go against the spirit of freedom in FOSS, and we should accept that some people will try to monetise open source programs? Maybe we should simply follow the example of the JSON team: “The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil”. Let us know your thoughts in the comments below, and we’ll read out the best in our next podcast recording.
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About The Author
Mike Saunders
Mike stores his data by printing out hex dumps and laminating the sheets. He's the author of The Haynes Linux Manual and the creator of MikeOS, an operating system hand-built from assembly language.
Great question, it deserves a lot of thought. If there were these kind of restrictions it we perhaps couldn’t use the word freedom anymore but even so my gut reaction is yes. This is a reaction rather than a well thought out opinion but I feel an incredible sense of injury and unfairness on behalf of the affected project when this happens.
FOSS licenses should learn from CC and be flexible, offering the option but leaving the decision to the developer.
I agree with Dan the Electronic Penguin. The “default” position of FOSS should be choice unless there is some clear and overriding reason for it not to be.
Perhaps Sourceforge should consider a small hosting fee? Maybe a tiered structure like WordPress? I don’t mind the paying for an add free blog.
I would say no. Sourceforge has a problem in that they are providing a service for free. How do they pay for it then? One way is spamming users with adware. This is unlikely to be acceptable to the maintainers of projects being hosted, so they should move away, and Sourceforge will lose that revenue stream. It is something the market will take care of.
No, they shouldn’t. That would go completely against the sprit of most (all?) FOSS licences by removing freedoms. If the maintainer wants to bundle adware with their software that their choice, but if the software is popular enough there will very quickly be other people that recompile the source into a package that doesn’t include the adware, or simply fork the project.
It would also bring into question clauses stating that the software can be sold. Something like synergy only allows you to download the installer if you donate, while still providing full sources (and you can actually download nightly builds freely). Adware is just another way to get a bit of cash to the project, even if most people hate the idea of it.
If adware is that much of an issue for you then don’t use that piece of software and when asked, don’t recommend it to other people.
commercial add-ware in floss projects is condemned by the community. Just look at the outrage that Ubuntu had over the shopping lens. That said putting a restriction on using a license to prevent this is also a troubling step.
Such a provision would cause devs to avoid that license.
I think I hold the paradoxical position that I am fine with ad supporting FLOSS, but I avoid all adds myself.
I don’t like ads on Internet, therefore I installed AdBlock plus and AdNauseam in my browser.
Will some project developper build an adware remover from SourceForge installers?
This said, ads, to my opinion shouldn’t exist anywhere, they are like plague.
People don’t want Ads. Peoples don’t want personal information data mining. But they want everything to be free.
Nothing is free! Unless you are you willing to pay for every web sites you read, Ads and data mining are there to stay.
The question is if the license of the software that is being installed automatically applies to the installer also. But even if this were the case FOSS licenses should not include clauses that make it impossible to ship adware alongside the software to be installed. In doing so we would be creating licenses that would be more restrictive than intended. Programs packaged with obnoxious adware will get less and less downloads and the problem will go away by itself.
I really like the Creative Commons approach, which puts the decision in the hands of the developer, and I wouldn’t mind seeing that implemented in FOSS licences.
I haven’t read up on the SourceForge case, but I think it’s quite cynical of them to bundle the ads so that they’re associated with the software rather than the site. I do think that, even if we don’t restrict ads in FOSS licences, it should be mandatory to declare that you have added them.
Umm, this is tricky. On the freedom hand, nothing should be restrictive, but on the choice hand, licences should allow for the user (or developer) to choose if adware be included. Personally, I prefer not to have adware, but as a minimum, to have the option to know if software contained adware. I don’t really want it in my software, but if I have the freedom to choose adware laden software, then developers and users should have the freedom to include it or not. It would be hypocritical to block it when we ourselves believe in software freedom. My only caveat would be to ensure the adware did not interfere with the security of my software or Linux install.
good question!
On one hand, I despise all forms of advertising and condemn the actions of sourceforge.
On the other hand, I already have a bit of a problem with GPL due to the restrictions is place on derivative works – i’m not a fan of “free to do as you’re told”, e.g I think it should be OK to create a commercial derivative of a piece of free software, and that the market (or lack thereof) should be allowed to decide whether it flourishes or fails.
While this would create an opportunity to “embrace, extend, extinguish”, In an ideal world it could also create an opportunity for the base FOSS project to see some extensive contributions from the commercial derivative – it’s in the interest of the derivative’s author to do so because then they don’t need to spend so much time patching. Yes, it does require a modicum of decency on the part of these people, but there’s some self-interest there too.
To sum it up, it’s my opinion that “free to do as we tell you” is not “free” enough in many cases, and I think that in many cases a BSD-style license (or LGPL) is preferable, so adding a “no adware” provision is a step backwards in my opinion.
Having said all that, I think that in some cases with important system software (the kernel), the GPL restrictions are probably a good thing.
I think a much better alternative overall is for the FOSS community to just stop using sourceforge, perhaps with an email campaign telling them why – when they see their hit count dropping like a stone they’ll very quickly come out with a “no bundled adware” promise, or they’ll die. That’s one of the beauties of FOSS – we’re not required to keep using anything we decide don’t like.
The GLP was created in a world where the majority of software was (c) all Rights Reserved. So if you used one line of code from a copyrighted work your entire code was infringing. So the GPL turns this around if you copy one line of code your entire code is open. Now we live in a world where the best code is all open that there is much less threat to open code, so I can see why people think such restrictions in the GPL are not necessary anymore.
Yes, you’re right, and I do understand why those provisions are there and how they got there, and I think for certain crucial projects like the kernel they’re probably still important and do more good than harm. But as you say there’s less threat to open source software these days and I think a more relaxed and “free-er” license is warranted, it would allow for the creation of better software, and I think that at least some of that work would likely filter down to the core FOSS projects.
I don’t have a problem with anyone adding whatever they like to a download, provided they notify you what they are including so you can make an informed decision. People have got so used to “free” services that they rarely stop to think about the cost of the service (that statement is probably less true for readers of Linux Voice than for the population at large).
A service like Sourceforge is not free to provide and must be paid for somehow, I don’t have a problem with how the owner of the service chooses to fund it as long as they are upfront about that before you use the service, allowing you to make an informed decision about whether or not to continue using that service.
Unfortunately, few companies seem willing to do that, and instead hide behind EULAs or similar.
The phrase “Or alternatively, would these clauses go against the spirit of freedom in FOSS, and we should accept that some people will try to monetise open source programs?” posed that way is dangerous and can lead to wild misinterpretations.
Actually monetizing F/LOSS isn’t a problem at all, what we are talking here is the way that a 3rd-party subrogates to itself WITHOUT ASKING UPSTREAM the right to bundle the stuff they share with Adware – that, as we all know, because we are all grown-ups, most of the times is a kind of MALWARE.
In my view it its the said 3rd-party – in this case SF, of course – who has to clearly states in which way your piece of software will be treated once it is residing in their servers. If they plan to bundle crapware to it, then THEY HAVE to state so in a clear and load way so the one uploading the software can decide whether or not to accept the proposed conditions.
Alongside because F/LOSS projects are often composed by a lot of people, from the ones who makes a one-time commit to the regular contributors, there should be a way to protect the decision of those who don’t want to see their contributions being hackneyed this way…
Ultimately the s* has hit the fan because the shady moves by SF which reminds me a lot to the way KaZaa and other well known pieces of software did things in the past.
Personally, I think the way SF did it is against regulations. They modify a software product by adding adware but still distribute it using the original product name. Whether it is open source or not, this should not be allowed. Double so when done without the owner’s consent. (Or what else is blocking the accounts of the owners called ?)
There is also the question of liability – thanks to SF the owner of the product will be plagued by all sorts of issues related to SF’s “modifications”. Not SF.
Gimp, nmap, … with adware is not the original Gimp anymore. SF should distribute a forked version.
However, if this behavior is part of the end user agreement of SF hosting. Then, however absurd, the discussion is over.
It is legal to distribute Free Software along with proprietary software. What’s wrong with monetized from Free Software if that is literately one of it’s principles– that one can redistribute the program with or without modifications, gratis or none gratis (and in the case of copyleft programs, with source code– with permissive programs, with our without source code).
What SourceForge did was in bad faith. If they want to add on to the installer that’s one thing but altering the packages is inappropriate and I can understand why Elementary OS ( http://blog.elementary.io/post/121768724076/goodbye-sourceforge ) is going with self hosted solutions. As long a s Digital Ocean keeps their clients happy by providing a great service for a low price SourceForge is about to see it’s end of days.