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Comment by vorpalhex | Hacker News Reader

No, open source means they aren't user hostile. Contractual landmines and restrictions on running the software are user hostile.

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1) who is the user?

2) let’s give some love to BSD, since GPL is hostile to my intention of selling modified software

What part of the GPL is forbidding selling modified software? There are tons of GPL software that is sold.

I assume GP implies without open sourcing his changes.

This is plain false: tivoization is the best example.

Amazon isn't an user. They are an exploiter.

Users aren't affected by any of the relicenses.

How do you draw the line between "user" and "exploiter"? Was there any point in the past Amazon wasn't an "exploiter"? What if a user becomes an exploiter? Can an exploiter become a user through repentance? Where's the legal boundary?

legal boundary or moral boundary? (Not that I have an answer in either case, but my impression was that "exploiter" was an expression of moral judgement, not a legal judgement)

Not OP and not really invested. You can probably replace "exploiter" with provider. A user uses the software directly, a provider provides it to users. Amazon can be both simultaneously, they can run ES to analyze sales and find out what products of third party sellers are worth copying, and they can also offer ES as a service to other users.

That kind of difference is pretty common in non-source-related things, e.g. you can use the API for your business, but you can't resell access to the API.

Are you able to, in your head, draw a difference between Amazon and Amin running some application in their home-built system?

That's how you draw the line.

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