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Comment by jriddle567 | Hacker News Reader

FOSS is a specified exception in the CRA. Am I missing something?

This exception only applies if you have clear intent to make no money on the software. As soon as you put "donate" button the site, you lose the protections.

The "exception" doesn't go far enough. If code is open source then anyone can fork and fix it. Money doesn't change this.

It doesn’t matter in the face of how that directive is phrased today. No matter how much in denial one may be.

Donations are not a commercial activity if no good or service is exchanged (in which case they wouldn't be donations, just purchases).

This is correct, but EU's act we are discussing about says opposite, hence the discussion.

see the python software foundation's concerns

https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2023/04/the-eus-proposed-cra-la...

to wit: under a reasonable reading of the legislation, having any commercial activity (classes, conference tickets, etc) opens you to liability. Or imagine selling support.

Additionally: if open source code is included by someone besides the author into a commercially available product, it's not clear that the open source author doesn't hold liability there. Even if the author received $0, or is unaware of the use of the software he/she created.

Here, the PSF makes a mistake of referencing recitals, which are not really enforceable law in the strict sense.

In my understanding, in EU law recitals are explicitly part of the law.

They are part of the law, sure, but they are not legally binding in the same way as articles are. If there is ambiguity in a law, as there often is, a judge may use these for interpreting the overall "spirit of the law". But even then, articles always take precedence and these cannot be overruled by recitals.

forget selling support. Imagine you are a FOSS author and you're on public transport. You strike up a conversation with someone who happens to work in the industry. You tell them about your authorship of a project and then they say "Oh wow, that's great! Let me buy you lunch!"

How on earth are legislative bodies ever going to find out about that?

Not sure where you live but in most places it isn't the legislature enforcing the law.

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