Use the latest GNU Affero as license

[es20490446e]

This will ensure that:

• The extension can be packaged into libre operating systems.
• Anyone with commercial intentions must contribute back to this project, by publishing their own modifications under the same terms.
• The terms are legally recognized.

[ImprovedTube]

Hi! @es20490446e thank you! did you read #745 (comment) ?

can be packaged into libre operating systems
... The terms are legally recognized.
... usage rights section

👍

Anyone with commercial intentions must contribute back to this project, by publishing their own modifications under the same terms.

a non-profit OS could package ImprovedTube. There aren't new institutions every day asking to use it. So it would not be complicated but great to have some conversation first with the next ones who are interested. The next/all commercial users are likely to be spammers, who's edits wont serve a good/public purpose. - Which harms users, dilutes our visibility, reduced contributor motivation and proper, functioning citation

So we are not in a hurry with license.md. Giving away everything can't be undone.
It is an important topic = Important enough to think about a more fitting (new?) license,
with all the advantages but none of the disadvantages.

• allowing maximum meaningful usage.
• excluding bad usage.
• prominent citation / recognition for contributors.
• ...?

[es20490446e]

The place you are about to visit has been walked by many people before you.

=== NO PROFIT DOESN'T EQUAL NO INCOME ===

A non-profit OS cannot package this extension except if it is under a libre license, for a very simple reason: what commercial means in legal terms.

Commercial is anything that drives money to the project, including a non profit. People in a non profit can make money and have salaries, the only difference between profit and non profit is that the excess of earnings cannot be use for having extra earnings by the non profit owners.

=== OSES ARE SHARED AMONG DIFFERENT COMPANIES ===

The thing becomes more complicated being that non profit OSes usually serve as base to other OSes, including those maintained by profit companies. So non profit organizations avoid non commercial licenses anyway in all cases.

=== COPYLEFT PREVENTS THOSE BAD USES BETTER ===

But more interestingly the non commercial mindset comes from a mistaken supposition, that by allowing commercial companies to use your code you will lose relevance compared with them.

In practice what happens is that, if the software is under a copyleft license, those companies are forced to pay back the service to you by sharing their improvements. Improvements that you can borrow back yourself.

=== HEALTHY COPYLEFT PROJECTS ARE NEVER SUPPLANTED ===

Even further it never happens that a software that is under a copyleft license, and people ideas and contributions are heard, is forked into a new one that subtracts from the first one. If people can contribute to the original project, it's just easier for them to do that than fork. Forks only happened historically when developers didn't listen.

The perfect example of what I'm saying is the Linux kernel itself, so big and useful. It has no forks, because for people is just easier to contribute directly to the main project.

[es20490446e]

By the way I'm asking because I want to package this for one OS. It will be only possible after you approve this change 🧉😏

[comradekingu]

@es20490446e This is a great idea. Any license needs to be accepted by all contributors. Proliferation of licenses isn't good, so anything custom becomes cumbersome.

In #745 (comment) I mentioned an app store exception, but quite frankly I can't find info on it now (or the actual text).
Quite frankly I am tried of Google and Apple trying to bully the ecosystem with stores and CLAs, so I don't see a loss there. If anything, that is a win, and it seems @ImprovedTube shares this view (?)

---

• I want to license my contributions to YouTube-Extension as AGPLv3+

[ImprovedTube]

hi @es20490446e :) didnt mind #810 it to be open

[es20490446e]

I closed it because I deleted the fork. I only keep forks that are acted upon in a timely manner by their maintainers, so to keep only those that I see that are actionable by me.

In this particular case the decision of how to license shall start with you.