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Comment by bachmeier | Hacker News Reader

> by owning the codebase I can protect myself from a larger player copying my work

I find this statement confusing. In what sense do you not "own" your codebase if you release it under the GPL? And if the software is released under the GPL, large players have no advantage, because they have to release all of the changes they make to your code if they're using it to compete against you.

What you're saying is that restricting and hiding your codebase allows you to make more money. And there's nothing wrong with that, but it's not right to spread falsehoods about free software licenses.

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That's not what I'm saying, and I don't think I'm spreading any falsehoods about free software licenses here.

Building a business is about distribution as well as product. My product is pretty good, but my distribution, compared to a large player with an existing user base, is woeful. If I licensed under GPL I would be giving explicit legal permission to any big player (who was open source) to take my product for free, and compete with me solely on distribution.

Licensing my product in the above way wouldn't be good for me financially, and as a result would decrease my likelihood of working full time on Dependabot. Worse still, it would disproportionally decrease my returns from working on the product, as opposed to distribution.

Thanks to copyright law we don't need to hide our codebases in order to charge for our work. That's a great thing, and there should be acceptance of code that is developed in public but without a permissive license. It's a perfectly rational decision, and creators shouldn't be put under pressure to give their development work away for free instead.

   Thanks to copyright law we don't need to hide our codebases in order to charge for our work.

I don't understand that part ?

Before patents, copyright law, and all that, secrecy was the only way to stop people copying your stuff. That was kinda crappy, and people went to great lengths to obfuscate their IP, expending lots of effort on something that had no benefit for their customers / the world.

Intellectual property law changed that - it made it possible for people to openly disclose their inventions whilst maintaining control of them (normally with some conditions). It was a really, really good thing for society, as it dramatically increased the returns to "thinking work".

I can probably dig out a link if you're interested.

How is copyright / patents / IP making companies' code bases open to public or it's secrecy is not as guarded as before (as implied by your quote) ?

Especially since copyright predates software or you know computers.

Citation needed.

   In what sense do you not "own" your codebase if you release it under the GPL?

There is no concept of property for information. By hiding your source codebase and the way it is being built (the same logic applies to your DAW music project, your video software editing file project etc...) you are making life harder for people who try to replicate features of your software, understand techniques behind it or pretend to be you to sell the software instead of you (others examples are welcome).

So I can understand that the GP /feels/ like he owns it more, even if it is just a feeling.

There is very little in the world of software that's hard to replicate. And there's almost nothing that does not have any F/OSS alternatives.

But still "harder", it puts a heavier barrier of entry for others to enter the same area as you. The fact that there are FLOSS alternatives has nothing to do with what we're talking about

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