alt Hacker News> "Software authors should have basic decency and respect for the users of their software." Why? Not at all.
Because that's the core reason why we build software in the first place. We solve problems for people. Software doesn't exist in a void. There's an inherent relationship created between software authors and its users. This exists for any good software, at least. If you think software accomplishes its purpose by just being published, regardless of its license, you've failed at the most fundamental principle of software development.
> you have any right to command its author is the very definition of being an asshole.
Hah. I'm not "commanding" anyone anything. I'm simply calling out asshole behavior. The fact is that software from authors who behave like this rarely amounts to anything. It either dies in obscurity, or is picked up by someone who does care about their users.
> "I'm demanding that people work for free for my benefit! Unbelievable." Yes, that's unbelievable.
Clearly sarcasm goes over your head, since I'm mimicking what you and others think I'm saying. But feel free to continue to think I'm coming from a place of moral superiority and privilege.
If you want software to be free for everyone except for the authors to use, modify, distribute, and sell without restriction I am sure you could work with a lawyer to draft a new “Apache for everybody on earth other than the maintainers, who permanently waive all rights” license.
If that’s what all good maintainers do, and intend to do, there’s really no reason for maintainers to tempt themselves by using awful “open” licenses that allow them the loophole of doing what they want with the software they create. Plus who wouldn’t want to codify that they’re not an asshole?
It shouldn’t be hard to get maintainers that intend for their software to “amount to something” to adopt it, and it would bring a sense of comfort to the people that rely on the software that you write when you announce that it’s the new default license for everything in your repos.