[jrv]

That sounds nice in theory, but the reality is also that a lot of more permissively licensed (BSD / Apache) projects now cannot use (most) parts of Grafana / Loki / Tempo anymore, since realistically they won't be able to or want to switch to the AGPL as well (because of all the pain that would incur on others, in turn). That means that basically the whole free code sharing idea goes out of the window, at least in one direction – Grafana can of course still integrate code from more permissively licensed projects into their codebase.

[Seirdy]

That's kind of the point. The purpose of MIT/BSD is to enable nonfree derivative works; the purpose of the AGPL is to only allow free derivatives. AGPL maximizes freedom by prohibiting further restriction of it; it's a local maxima of "user freedom" as a function of "developer freedom".

If you want to use AGPL software in your project, you're free to relicense under AGPL.

[josephcsible]

I agree with the substance of what you said, but I'm going to nitpick a bit of wording: what you call "developer freedom" isn't freedom at all, and is more rightly called power.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.en.html

[open0]

> If you want to use AGPL software in your project, you're free to relicense under AGPL.

And this condition is the reason that the answer will be "no" every time to using copyleft. Why would anyone ever choose a piece of software which, however you want to twist words, is actually less free in the sense of what it permits and will have less adoption as a result?

I run some websites without ads used by thousands of people and I never intend to monetize them, but I would still avoid these projects solely due to their licensing.

[jordigh]

> projects now cannot use

They can, they just don't want to because they want to ensure other people can produce non-free work.

Remove the desire to produce non-free work and you can perfectly legally put copylefted code into weakly-licensed free code. Weak licenses don't forbid this. Copyleft licenses don't forbid this. There's no need for anyone to change the license or copyright to combine weak licenses with copyleft licenses.

Copyleft licenses forbid proprietary code. And proprietary licenses forbid a lot of other things.

[ezrast]

On the contrary, AGPL (and GPL) cannot be combined with any other license. See section 5c: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.en.html

[the8472]

> but the reality is also that a lot of more permissively licensed (BSD / Apache) projects now cannot use (most) parts of Grafana / Loki / Tempo anymore

Doesn't that depend on how they use it? They're only AGPLing their backends. The tools still follow open protocols, so the client libraries can be permissive. I.e. the rest of their project won't be "infected".

[533474]

I suggest you read more deeply into the legal interpretations; it is not so clear cut as you put it.

A more permissive license is simply incompatible with this project's ideals - they are willing to sacrifice developer convenience for user freedom and prevent corporate theft and bastardization of the codebase into competing products

[533474]

*Correction: My comment is a reply to Seirdy's answer