Claiming »Open Source« on the frontpage despite no open license

[jancborchardt]

Hey folks, I was a bit confused by your frontpage where you say that Whiteout is:

Standards-based and Open Source

Yes, you clarify on the following pages and the license file in the repository also states the code is not openly licensed. But arguably what it says on the main page is what people will remember.

It would be good to not call it »Open Source« when it isn’t truly what people know as open source – licensed to lift copyright so people are allowed to modify and redistribute. Especially because this is about crypto and hence trust in the software it’s strange to have this misleading element.

I do think it’s great that you work on usable email crypto and contribute to open source projects. Would be really cool if you decide to openly license Whiteout as well.

(In any case we could go for lunch some time – I saw you’re at Werk1 Munich where I sometimes work from too.)

[tanx]

Hi Jan,

sorry for the confusion. You're absolutely right. We're currently
discussing putting the code in the mail-html5 repo under an OSI-approved
open source license. Hoping to have something to announce here soon.

Lunch sounds great. Probably best in september due to vacation plans.

Tankred

Am 19.08.2014 um 10:45 schrieb Jan-Christoph Borchardt <
notifications@github.com>:

Hey folks, I was a bit confused by your frontpage
https://whiteout.io/#how-it-works where you say that Whiteout is:

Standards-based and Open Source

Yes, you clarify on the following pages and the license file in the
repository
https://github.com/whiteout-io/mail-html5/blob/master/LICENSE.txt also
states the code is not openly licensed. But arguably what it says on the
main page is what people will remember.

It would be good to not call it »Open Source« when it isn’t truly what
people know as open source – licensed to lift copyright so people are
allowed to modify and redistribute. Especially because this is about crypto
and hence trust in the software it’s strange to have this misleading
element.

I do think it’s great that you work on usable email crypto and contribute
to open source projects. Would be really cool if you decide to openly
license Whiteout as well.

(In any case we could go for lunch some time – I saw you’re at Werk1 Munich
where I sometimes work from too.)

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#110.

Whiteout Networks GmbH c/o Werk1
Grafinger Str. 6
D-81671 München
Geschäftsführer: Oliver Gajek
RG München HRB 204479

[jancborchardt]

That’s good to hear, thank you for the info!

[tanx]

Closing this issue as we're announcing our new license in the comping days.

@jancborchardt I'm coming to the owncloud meetup on Wednesday. See you there!

[jancborchardt]

@tanx great stuff, see you tomorrow! @DeepDiver1975 and I will also be working at Werk1 during the day so if you’re up for lunch (for example at Storchenburg) we could do that.

[tanx]

Storchenburg sounds good. How about meeting in the event space at 13:00?

[jancborchardt]

Yup, see you then!

[tanx]

Here's the announcement: https://blog.whiteout.io/2014/10/17/webmail-and-open-source/

The license should now be to your liking :)
https://github.com/whiteout-io/mail-html5/blob/master/LICENSE.txt

[jancborchardt]

This is indeed pretty damn awesome! cc @DeepDiver1975

(As I already mentioned, for software [rather than libraries] I prefer AGPL, but your call. :)