Europe
News and information from Europe ๐ช๐บ
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism. We follow German law; don't question the statehood of Israel.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in other communities.
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
- Always provide context with posts: Don't post uncontextualized images or videos, and don't start discussions without giving some context first.
(This list may get expanded as necessary.)
Posts that link to the following sources will be removed
- on any topic: Al Mayadeen, brusselssignal:eu, citjourno:com, europesays:com, Breitbart, Daily Caller, Fox, GB News, geo-trends:eu, news-pravda:com, OAN, RT, sociable:co, any AI slop sites (when in doubt please look for a credible imprint/about page), change:org (for privacy reasons)
- on Middle-East topics: Al Jazeera
- on Hungary: Euronews
Unless they're the only sources, please also avoid The Sun, Daily Mail, any "thinktank" type organization, and non-Lemmy social media. Don't link to Twitter directly, instead use xcancel.com. For Reddit, use old:reddit:com
(Lists may get expanded as necessary.)
Ban lengths, etc.
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 7 or 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the primary mod account @EuroMod@feddit.org
view the rest of the comments
What if EU only funds open source that is GPLv3 AND promises to aid the projects in litigation if someone breaks the license?
I don't think they should limit themselves to just GPL. There are some other good (or even better) licenses out there, such as AGPL (I use this one on all my projects), MIT and so on.
I haven't read up on AGPL. How does it differ from GPLv3? :)
MIT f.e. would allow corporations to take the code and profit from it. GPLv3 would ensure that the funding from the EU would go to projects that remains open source and free.
AGPL is like GPL, but it also makes sure the source code of programs used via a network is available to the user.
Example: company provides a cloud service. The user uses that service via the internet. If the license of the service is GPL, the company doesn't have to give the user the source code, but with the AGPL they do.
Maybe the EU could fund only projects under strong copyleft licenses?
I like the idea of public funds supporting code that stays public, which strong copyleft license is used doesn't matter much to me to be honest.
The big thing would be if the EU helped litigate license breakers and not only fund the projects.
I fully agree, they should support FOSS projects on all fronts, not just the code itself (though the code is the most important part).
Btw, you might want to take a look at Public money, public code
AGPL is the superior license!
That truly explains the differences between the licenses, thank you shane.
Sorry I replied to the wrong comment in the thread.
Let me try to explain.
GPL was designed to give users access to the source code for hardware they control.
This worked pretty well until TiVo came up with locks that would only allow you to run kernels they signed. This was to prevent people from putting in cheap disks to their hardware.
So GNU came up with GPLv3, which closes the TiVo hole. It also tried to address the evils of software patents to an extent.
That works okay, but then people invented SaaS (software as a service). In that case the user doesn't own the hardware, so companies don't have to publish the source under GPL. Which meets the letter of the license and gives a big middle finger to the intent.
So AGPLv3 was developed to close that hole. With AGPL users must have access to any open source run by a service to provide them with that service, restoring the ability of users to see what the code is doing, and possibly forking and making their own version if it doesn't do what they want.
Thanks for the explanation and sorry for my sarcastic response. :)
That's not a good criteria, as it would exclude projects that are essential digital infrastructure like curl. The criteria for public investment needs to be general positive impact.
With hundreds of companies using curl in their software I'd say it's up to them to fund it.
Unless a strong copyleft license is used you'll soon find some companies lobbying to have their open source MIT licensed code funded, which they then use in proprietary applications and earn money from while no one else uses the MIT code that was paid for. Essentially having the public investment fund a private company.
Now apply that to roads, electricity grid, rail roads, hospitals, police, firefighters and everything that states pay to keep the economy running.
That's what taxes are for, and the proposal on the table from the EU side is to tax big tech companies to make sure the basic digital infrastructure is well funded.
I see your point but only partly agree. I can see why curl should be treated like infrastructure but I can also see that system quickly being misused as per above.
I strongly believe in having public money create public code, as in Lenas link (https://publiccode.eu/en/) elsewhere in this thread. As the funding isn't infinite I believe that is where it will create the most public good - at least in the long run. Of course there will be outliers and exceptions, and maybe curl would be one of those, I just don't want to see our money flowing straight into the pocket of another tech billionaire with good lobbyists in Brussel.