So was Linux...

It is generally possible to download without uploading. You'll just likely get a dribble of data when you do.

AGPL is a plague. GPL, I tolerate, though I have a strong preference towards v2. But AGPL has no redeeming qualities. The hypothetical world where someone creates a closed-source fork of a web service, convinces everyone to use it, and then holds their data hostage just isn't particularly plausible.

Meanwhile, AGPL precludes any interesting integrations, custom in-house authentication systems, using custom database backends, and all sorts of other stuff that potentially is useful to keep company-proprietary, but that has no impact whatsoever on the hypothetical freedoms that the AGPL is intended to protect.

It's a license that is so toxic that even companies that are strong proponents of open source with large open source offerings have outright bans on letting AGPLed code anywhere on the premises.

As far as I can tell, the main benefit of AGPL is for companies that create code and want to release it to the public as "free software", because by requiring contributor agreements, they can keep their own branch proprietary while forcing everyone else in the world to comply with the AGPL, thus ensuring that the only company that can create their own proprietary features is them.

It's definitely an interesting case, but it doesn't fit the original description. The GPL didn't prevent Linksys from strangling the free version of anything. No free WiFi routers ever existed, and Linksys did not destroy demand for the Linux kernel or the GNU C library.

Also, nothing in that case forced Linksys to open anything. They could have switched to a BSD kernel and C library, and they would have been in compliance. They chose to open it because they figured it was an easy way to make the case go away, and it could produce good will in the community. And it ended up being a minor windfall for Linksys.

We were showing at over $660tn. Lol.

That more than all the wealth in the entire world (~$450tn).

I guess Amazon are trying to outdo Elon....

That's back pocket change to a company that big, and a teeny tiny fraction of the profits they made from their scummy scammy practises.

They made a political calculation to ask under oath about an affair that was nobody's business, hoping to catch him in a lie. I believe the word here is "entrapment". So the GP is right about when it started; he/she just incorrectly understood which party started it.

It was always the Republicans.

Nixon tried to start it back in the 1970s. He just found out the hard way that there were still too many Republicans with morals and ethics remaining in the party. So they spent the next four decades driving them out. What remains is the shell of the former Republican Party, surrounding a core of rot and disease. And that is why "President" Trump is still in office.

3. Download it off a torrent site, wait to get threatened by the copyright owner, show them proof that you purchased the product. If they sue you anyway, counter-sue both the copyright owner and Sony for conspiracy to defraud. Ask for seven figures on account of their vexatious litigation.

The advertising clause wasn't "non-free" as much as a practical problem that was incompatible with the GPL's ban on additional restrictions. It was largely removed when much popular software switched from the 4-clause original BSD license to the 3-clause or 2-clause version.

The appropriate copyright notice clause remained in 3-clause and 2-clause BSD licenses. This clause is also present in GPLv2 and GPLv3.

EU: "By January 2027, Google must also begin sharing anonymized search data with some rivals"

Google: "Europeans' private searches would be exposed to unfamiliar companies, without adequate anonymization of the data"

Em.... Google, the data is supposed to adequately anonymised! Sheesh.

Realistically, open source software that has a decent number of maintainers means that the quality is good and bugs get fixed, including security bugs. But what that also means is that when problems get fixed in the open source repo, those changes have to be pulled into the source code that companies are building into their products. The more they diverge from the open source version, the harder that becomes. So while a company theoretically could do what you are describing, the reality tends to be tht companies contribute the vast majority of their changes, keeping private only the parts that are specific to their custom integrations with their product.

For example, LLVM is under a permissive license, and some of the biggest contributors are companies like Apple. They use it in their proprietary products (Xcode). But they are basically using it as a library and giving back their changes. What they're not doing is giving back the tools that they wrap around it. But the original core functionality is still out there, still open, and still being maintained.

The GPL doesn't actually prevent that from happening. It just means that the code gets rewritten instead of being copied. It makes the closed-source app ever so slightly more expensive to develop and ever so slightly later to hit the market. If the closed-source app is better than the Free Software app, it will still dominate the market unless someone is prepared to throw resources into making the Free Software app equally capable, and the market will still determine the winners and losers.

I suspect GP's point is that every malware blocker in every browser is likely to treat this kind of script as hostile, except for Chrome because Google are currently nerfing the ability for blockers to intercept hostile scripts in one of the most blatantly user-hostile changes they've ever made.

If Apple play along with Safari then every other browser and its malware blocking plugins are about to be toast in a huge retrograde step for Internet privacy. But not even Cloudflare is going to get away with blocking every iOS device if Apple continues to allow blockers to intercept this kind of script.

Did anyone mention recently that simultaneously controlling both the most popular web browser and several of the most popular ad-supported web properties might be a little anticompetitive, and that it's about time that Google was broken up? It's probably time for that drum to start beating a bit louder again.

In the case of BitTorrent, even the fastest Internet connection won't get you a lot of successful peer connections if your ISP blocks all inbound TCP connections.

Such a new ecosystem already has grown, as I understand it. It's called getting Netflix, HBO Max, Paramount+, Disney+/Hulu, Peacock, Prime Video, or Apple TV to accept your pitch and fund it. These take the place of cable television channels in the pre-broadband economy. And there are still a lot more pilot screenplays than budget to produce all of them.

With the decline of third places, particularly since the pandemic and as online shopping has taken over the functions of malls, how do people usually meet people in 2026?

If only I could get my home ISP to add IPv6...

In all seriousness, though, if bankruptcy is a real possibility, the idea of a public buyout of some of these old companies isn't a terrible one. Maybe even have the government buy it and make it free for U.S. citizens, but continue to make money on the property abroad. :-)