

Ask HN: Why will someone contribute to a project which is licensed under MIT? - navaneethkn

Since MIT is the most permissive license, your contributions could be used in a proprietary software. I am wondering, given this, why will some one ready to invest their time &amp; effort in contributing to something which at one point can be&#x2F;benefit a proprietary software?
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pjsg
It all comes down to why you want to write software. If you want to be paid
for writing software, then doing it on your own time and contributing to an
MIT licensed project is NOT the way to go.

On the other hand, if your goal is to have your software used by as many
people as possible, then MIT licensed may be the way to go. In my case, the
piece of software that I wrote that runs in the most places (measured in the
billions) is probably the IJG JPEG library that was very liberally licensed
and consequently found its way into all sorts of devices... Yes, I wrote the
code back in 1991 but it still gives me a kick to know how often it is used!

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rprospero
It all depends on which false dichotomy you're looking at. Correct me if I'm
wrong, but you seem to see the choice as being between the code being tied up
in a proprietary project and being readily available in a popular Free
Software project. Given those choices, I'll readily chose the later option and
avoid the MIT license.

A different false dichotomy, though is whether you'd prefer to see your code
buried in a proprietary project or to have every copy and back of your code
burned before your very eyes. Is it worse for some mooch to make money off
your hard work or for all your hard work to be wasted and no one benefits.

The vast majority of the code I've written will never earn me a single penny.
I've come to terms with that. There's a couple of pieces that my vanity has
convinced me have potential and they're licensed under the GPL. The rest,
though, is fully MIT licensed. If they wind up in a proprietary software
project, that's wonderful, because it means that someone is actually using it.
That's pretty much my best case scenario and far superior to the likely
outcome where the project fades into obscurity and the code benefits no one.

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antaviana
If you write code in the open, most often than not you do not really care what
other people will do with it. If the project is MIT, that's fine. If the
project is GPL, that's fine too. Often the license is somebody else's concern,
not the actual creator.

I remember Woz saying he planned to give away his designs and it was Jobs who
convinced him not to. Woz was fine too, he didn't care. Only Jobs cared.

Even if it is GPL I'm sure that many people will not honor it, just like there
are tons of deadbeats who do not pay for closed source software even if it is
just for the rush involved in outsmarting the closed source developer. It is
human nature and I'm sure that programmers working in GPL projects know it and
do not care.

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mcv
Even if someone uses your code in proprietary software, someone else may still
use it in something open, or contribute their own changes back to your
project. And it is advantageous for anyone improving the code to contribute it
to the project, because that makes the project better, and makes it more
likely that others will use it and improve it, and you will ultimately benefit
from their contributions too.

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kungfooman
I tend to avoid viral GPL/LGPL projects:

1) Because I wanna have the freedom to eventually sell the software based on
third party libraries.

2) Even if I would _want_ to open source parts of the project, I mostly can't
open source all of it, because of proprietary code from third parties (e.g.
bought assets from Unity Asset Store).

3) I have no interest in a license telling me how I have to license my own
source code.

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sarciszewski
> 1) Because I wanna have the freedom to eventually sell the software based on
> third party libraries.

GPL/LGPL doesn't restrict the copyright holder from selling. It's a public
license. You can still sell proprietary, more-permissive licenses to
companies, even.

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tobylane
Group A wants to use the code for profit. Group B wants to work with A but
will contribute some code back. Group C isn't too bothered about licence but
wants to work with B or on their resulting code. Group D prefers GPL, but uses
MIT because B and C are. It can flow the other way too, think how
insignificant GPL might be without GNU and linux.

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proussea
There is probably many different reasons.

Mine is that it's better that this work benefit to a proprietary software than
to nobody.

Then, there is a hope that bugs will be found, and even that corrections will
be sent back to the MIT licensed software.

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sillygoose
Basically it boils down to whether you think whatever you personally gain from
contributing outweighs the likelihood (or certainty) of _not_ making money
from it.

It's also worth noting that there's nothing inherently evil or distasteful
about proprietary software. It's proprietary exactly because it's meant to
produce a monetary return on the time and effort invested in it.

Whether you aim for monetary gain, and with what degree of certainty, is just
a personal choice you make.

