Re: [xmlvm-users] Using xmlvm in a commercial product

[Arno P. <ar...@pu...>]

I understand that this is a touchy issue and there are arguments for and 
against either way. In my earlier days I began an Open Source CORBA 
implementation called MICO (mico.org). Very early on there was a similar 
request to change the license for MICO from GPL to LGPL. Since we 
complied, that surely spurred commercial usage. What made me a little 
bit sad is that we never received anything in return from those 
companies. When we asked them for a simple endorsement (we didn't even 
ask for funding back then), we got no reply. The only company ever to 
acknowledge that they used MICO was the Weather Channel.

Quite frankly, if you plan to use XMLVM in a purely Open Source project, 
why is the type of Open Source license important? Inder mentioned that 
he just wants to tinker with the project and he is basically by himself. 
I wonder why GPL isn't good enough for this.

Don't get me wrong. I certainly would like to see XMLVM grow and thrive. 
But at the same time I don't want to give in as easily as I did with 
MICO. I still believe it is only fair to give something in return. Open 
Source developers do (through their work) but companies often only take 
but never give back (never mind the handful of high-profile Open Source 
projects).

What is a good way to 'encourage' a company to return to the Open Source 
community?

Arno


Kevin Glass wrote:
> That's a real shame, it essentially limits your user base substantially
> since the majority of users are likely to be wanting to port existing
> android applications to iphone.
> 
> Couple of questions around this:
> 
> 1) The tool itself is GPL, but does that license cover the output? GCC for
> instance might be GPL but that doesn't make the object code it produces
> GPL.
> 
> 2) Presumably the objective C compatibility library is also licensed under
> GPL. Is there any chance you'd consider licensing just that part under a
> more permissive license. This way no one could resell XMLVM but the output
> would be usable in a commercial sense.
> 
> 3) If a user were to develop a new compatibility library (say me) and use
> this instead of the existing GPL one, would you consider that library
> linked with the output of the tool to be free of GPL?
> 
> Unfortunately it's just going to drive a bunch of copy cat projects as
> described below if there's isn't some mutually beneficial solution. This
> would be negative for both sides, no open source contributions for the
> project and duplicated effort all round.
> 
> Kev
> 
>> Hi Arno,
>>
>> I would love to support your project but I am an individual with
>> limited means who is trying to convert one of my Android applications
>> into an iPhone app. This is more as a hobby so I am not expecting to
>> make much money here.
>>
>> Your choice of GPL (not LGPL) probably hinders the broader use of your
>> technologies. I have created a bunch of open-source projects and
>> always chose BSD or Apache-style licensing. I humbly recommend that
>> you reconsider your choice of license.
>>
>> In any case, since I did not hear back from you in time, I went ahead
>> and created another open-source project that  provides a Java to
>> Objective C code-converter. See http://code.google.com/p/java2objc/
>> for my project. My goal here is somewhat different from yours. I
>> intend to generate Objective C source-code as if a competent
>> programmer would have written it. This is at the expense of providing
>> complete and accurate transformation which (I think) xmlvm strives to
>> provide.
>>
>> Thanks
>> Inder
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jul 6, 2009 at 2:30 PM, Arno Puder<ar...@pu...> wrote:
>>> Inderjeet,
>>>
>>> both GPL and L-GPL require you to submit any
>>> modifications/enhancements/fixes you make to XMLVM back to us. Both
>>> licenses
>>> allow you to use XMLVM in a commercial product. However, the GPL also
>>> requires you to make your own application available under the GPL
>>> license if
>>> you link the XMLVM libraries to your application. Most likely this is
>>> not
>>> what you had in mind if you want to use XMLVM for a commercial product
>>> (this
>>> requirement basically limits your business model to services around your
>>> product).
>>>
>>> We put a lot of efforts in making XMLVM. May I suggest an alternative:
>>> we
>>> are willing to grant you a commercial license for XMLVM that would allow
>>> you
>>> to use XMLVM in a commercial product. This commercial license would not
>>> require you to publish your own source code under an Open Source
>>> license. In
>>> return for the commercial license, you give us some funding to enhance
>>> XMLVM. This is the essence of dual-licensing (releasing source code
>>> under
>>> two different licenses: an Open Source as well as a commercial license).
>>> Considering all the work that already went into XMLVM, I think this is a
>>> fair trade. What do you think?
>>>
>>> Arno
>>>
>>>
>>> Inderjeet Singh wrote:
>>>> Thank you for writing the xmlvm tool: it seems like an awesome way to
>>>> write Java code that is usable in Android applications as well as
>>>> iPhone ones.
>>>>
>>>> I noted that you picked GPL as the license. Is your intention that
>>>> xmlvm be used only for open-source projects? Would you consider making
>>>> it available under LGPL so that we can contribute back modifications
>>>> to xmlvm but at least be able to use it in commercial apps?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks
>>>> Inderjeet
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> xmlvm-users mailing list
>>>> xml...@li...
>>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xmlvm-users
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> _______________________________________________
>> xmlvm-users mailing list
>> xml...@li...
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xmlvm-users
>>
> 
>