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Is It Really Open Source? How to Tell if a Project Walks the Walk
Quoting: Is It Really Open Source? How to Tell if a Project Walks the Walk - FOSS Force —
Free software licenses were conceived as a way to move power from software providers to users, but this burden is often too much for the license alone. There are plenty of ways in which an open source project can be less free than its license suggests, but how do you tell? One way is through a new website, Is It Really FOSS, which aims to provide users with insight into the actual freedom they can expect from a project advertising itself as open source.
I think this is important, and I think you should care. Here’s why.
The free and open source ecosystem features a dizzying array of licenses. Some veer more towards copyleft, meaning they strictly follow the four freedoms set out by Richard Stallman in the ’80s. The “permissive” licenses, are more “do as you will,” and allow the inclusion of their code within proprietary projects with few or no limitations. Others try to look like open source licenses, and sometimes even claim to be open source, but they don’t fit the definition and aren’t compatible with legitimate open source licenses.