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InfoWorld reports
MariaDB Corp. has announced that release 2.0 of its MaxScale database proxy software is henceforth no longer open source. The organization has made it source-available under a proprietary license that promises each release will eventually become open source once it's out of date.
MaxScale is at the pinnacle of MariaDB Corp.'s monetization strategy--it's the key to deploying MariaDB databases at scale. The thinking seems to be that making it mandatory to pay for a license will extract top dollar from deep-pocketed corporations that might otherwise try to use it free of charge. This seems odd for a company built on MariaDB, which was originally created to liberate MySQL from the clutches of Oracle.
The license in question, the Business Source License, was devised by MySQL creator Michael "Monty" Widenius in 2013. It allows use for evaluation and sets a date when the source code will be placed under the GPL, but it's explicitly proprietary in pursuit of commercial ends.
Monty blogs
Here is a statement from a large software company when I asked them to support MariaDB development with financial support:
As you may remember, we're a fairly traditional and conservative company. A donation from us would require feature work in exchange for the donation. Unfortunately, I cannot think of a feature that I would want developed that we would be willing to pay for this year.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 21 2016, @10:52PM
Business scum infect everything like a plague.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by fnj on Sunday August 21 2016, @11:08PM
How is this any different from the way MySQL and PostgreSQL are monetized? The cores are all still open source. They all just provide value added for cost. Same as linux (Redhat Enterprise et al).
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 21 2016, @11:14PM
Windows is open source too if you join a club that gets a source license such as a large corporation or prestigious research university.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @01:33AM
Ha ha only serious, can't possibly be true, let's moderate Funny because Windows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source#Microsoft_Enterprise_Source_Licensing_Program [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source#Microsoft_Windows_Academic_Program [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Monday August 22 2016, @02:07AM
Ha ha only serious, can't possibly be true, let's moderate Funny because Windows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source#Microsoft_Enterprise_Source_Licensing_Program [wikipedia.org]
"The ESLP license agreement is among the most restrictive of the licenses associated with shared source programs, allowing no modifications of the code." (same link)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source#Microsoft_Windows_Academic_Program
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/redmond/events/fs2006/papers/WindowsAcademicProgram_ArkadyRetik.doc [microsoft.com] :
Neither of these seems to be an example of open source [opensource.org] software.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @02:11AM
If there is a license that restricts what the user can do with the item, that is NOT "open".
It's why M$ made up the deceptive name "shared source".
If you have to buy a particular proprietary item in order to make the "open" thing work, that is NOT "open" either.
It's why M$ made up the deceptive name "open core".
If the license can be revoked, that is NOT "open" either.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @03:53AM
GPL restricts your rights to source code you write, that is NOT "open" either.
It's why GNU made up the deceptive name "copyleft".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @09:37AM
GPL restricts your rights to source code you write
If you chose existing GPL code to modify, you knew the rules going in.
Don't like the rules? Don't start modifying the code.
It would be less deceptive of you to say that GPL restricts your rights to screw over others who have added code to the project under the understanding that the user always comes first.
Don't like the GPL?
Write your own code from scratch and release it under your choice of license.
...but don't assume that you can sponge off of other devs whose top value is freedom for the user.
copyleft
...which leaves copyright in place and adds MORE rights for the user.
Again, you can always build your codebase from scratch without leeching off of anyone else's work.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by TheRaven on Monday August 22 2016, @08:33AM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Monday August 22 2016, @03:32PM
Sounds like the build chain for a previous job. "If you can take the source and figure out how to build it... you're hired!"
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday August 23 2016, @07:56AM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday August 24 2016, @03:14PM
It is somewhat ironic that a continuous integration product has a obfuscated build chain.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 3, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Monday August 22 2016, @12:54AM
I'm not that worried by this. So they want to make some money? Fine, the DB itself is still open source.
If someone wants fork (again) no problem. If I was using MariaDB in a business I would be happy to pay money, and get support in return.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @02:38AM
AFAIK Red Hat is still 100 percent open source. They make their money selling support licenses.
This is kinda evil on Monty's part, by taking a key software component proprietary after releasing the initial version as open source. That's because customers make plans based on one set of assumptions, and then surprise, their vendor changes their business model and now it's pay up, or get stuck on v1.0 forever.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @11:08AM
The license, as described in the summary: "sets a date when the source code will be placed under the GPL". So no, you're not going to be stuck on v1.0 forever.
Personally though, I only ever judge a project by the merits of whatever version is released as Free Software.
(Score: 2) by schad on Monday August 22 2016, @12:25PM
This is the risk you take when making yourself dependent on a piece of software -- open source or not -- that's developed primarily or exclusively by a single entity.
There are plenty of reasons to favor open source. "But if the developer closes up shop, we can just fork the code and maintain it ourselves!" --That's not one of them.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Monday August 22 2016, @03:27PM
PostgreSQL isn't "monetized", to the best of my knowledge. At the very least, it's not monetized by Software in the Public Interest [spi-inc.org], which is the organization that manages it. Some of their major sponsors are guys like Red Hat that do sell support for it, but the core itself is entirely a non-profit venture.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by fnj on Thursday August 25 2016, @11:45AM
Taking this under advisement. I was probably making a bit of a stretch; however:
EnterpriseDB offers extensions to the PostgreSQL core, such as Oracle-compatibility, in the form of Postgres Plus Advanced Server. EnterpriseDB bills itself "The Postgres Database Company", and they don't seem to be getting sued.
Greenplum used PostgreSQL as the foundation of its Greenplum Database. Netezza used PostgreSQL as the database scaffolding to reduce the time to create its Netezza Performance Server. Aster Data makes use of PostgreSQL as a data store on each node of its nCluster massively parallel data warehouse.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday August 22 2016, @01:13AM
More reasonably, time to look into one of the other forks of MySQL that were started at about the same time. Considering what legal tactics were tried at the launch of MariaDB, this action shouldn't surprise anyone...disappoint them, perhaps.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by NCommander on Monday August 22 2016, @03:45AM
Honestly, I never got why people migrated from MySQL in the first place. MariaDB (AFAIK) and MySQL both have copyight assignment clauses to allow them to do this kind of thing, and I never saw any advantage to migrate from MySQL to MariaDB (hell, here at SN, we chose to migrate to MySQL cluster than MariaDB cluster).
I have no love for Oracle, but they've kept MySQL free and open source and it has improved release-after-release.
Still always moving
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @02:44AM
Time to kickem to the curb. It amazes me how these guys try to just take over code only to discover that we will just switch to something else. If we wanted to buy closed source garbage we would just use a macroshaft product.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @03:59AM
Sounds like the MaxScale part is mostly of interest to enterprise users. It also sounds like those same enterprise users are happy take it for free without giving back anything. Just like throwing a party, asking for donations to help cover the cost and the next day finding a measly $5 of donations. So next party gets a cover charge.