One other comment though: a lot of what you said rests upon the notion that people were relying on these features.
First, barely anyone used datastar at that point, and those features were particularly arcane. So, the impact was minimal.
Second, its likely that even fewer of them contributed anything at all to the project in general, and those features in particular. What claim do they have to anything - especially when it was just freely given to them, and not actually taken away (the code is still there)?
And to the extent that they can't or wont fix it themselves, what happens if the dev just says "im no longer maintaining datastar anymore"? You might say "well, at least he left them something usable", but how is that any different from considering the pro changes to just be a fork? In essence, he forked his own project - why does anyone have any claim to any of that?
Finally, if they cant fix it themselves (especially when AI could almost certainly fix it rapidly), should they really be developing anything?
In the end, this really is a non-issue. Again, most of the furor is quite clearly performative. Its like when DHH removed typescript from one of his projects that he and his company maintain, and people who have nothing to do with ruby came out of the woodwork to decry the change in his github repo. And even if they do have something to do with ruby, they have no say over how he writes his code.
> a lot of what you said rests upon the notion that people were relying on these features.
They were, though. The blog post linked above, and several people in the Reddit thread linked in the blog post mentioned depending on these features.
We can disagree about whether it matters that a small percentage of people used them, but I would argue that even if a single person did, a rugpull is certainly a shitty experience for them. It also has a network effect, where if other people see that developers did that, they are likely to believe that something similar in the future can happen again. Once trust is lost, it's very difficult to gain it back.
> Second, its likely that even fewer of them contributed anything at all to the project in general, and those features in particular. What claim do they have to anything - especially when it was just freely given to them, and not actually taken away (the code is still there)?
I think this is a very hostile mentality to have as an OSS developer. Delaney himself expressed something similar in that Reddit thread[1]:
> I expect nothing from you and you in turn should expect nothing from me.
This is wrong on many levels.
When a software project is published, whether as open source or otherwise, a contract is established between developers and potential users. This is formalized by the chosen license, but even without it, there is an unwritten contract. At a fundamental level, it states that users can expect the software to do what it advertises to do. I.e. that it solves a particular problem or serves a particular purpose, which is the point of all software. In turn, at the very least, the developer can expect the project's existence to serve as an advertisement of their brand. Whether they decide to monetize this or not, there's a reason they decide to publish it in the first place. It could be to boost their portfolio, which can help them land jobs, or in other more direct ways.
So when that contract is broken, which for OSS typically happens by the developer, you can understand why users would be upset.
Furthermore, the idea that because users are allowed to use the software without any financial obligations they should have no functional expectations of the software is incredibly user hostile. It's akin to the proverb "don't look a gift horse in the mouth", which boils down to "I can make this project as shitty as I want to, and you can't say anything about it". At that point, if you don't care about listening to your users, why even bother releasing software? Why choose to preserve user freedoms on one hand, but on the other completely alienate and ignore them? It doesn't make sense.
As for your point about the code still being there, that may be technically true. But you're essentially asking users to stick with a specific version of the software that will be unmaintained moving forward, as you focus on the shiny new product (the one with the complete rewrite). That's unrealistic for many reasons.
> And to the extent that they can't or wont fix it themselves, what happens if the dev just says "im no longer maintaining datastar anymore"?
That's an entirely separate scenario. If a project is not maintained anymore, it can be archived, or maintenance picked up by someone else. Software can be considered functionally complete and require little maintenance, but in the fast moving world of web development, that is practically impossible. A web framework, no matter how simple, will break eventually, most likely in a matter of months.
> Finally, if they cant fix it themselves (especially when AI could almost certainly fix it rapidly), should they really be developing anything?
Are you serious? You expect people who want to build a web site and move on with their lives to dig into a foreign code base, and fix the web framework? It doesn't matter how simple or complex it is. The fact you think this is a valid argument, and additionally insult their capability is wild to me. Bringing up "AI" is laughable.
> Again, most of the furor is quite clearly performative.
Again, it's really not. A few people (that we know of) were directly impacted by this, and the network effect of that has tarnished the trust other people had in the project. Doubling down on this, ignoring and dismissing such feedback as "performative", can only further harm the project. Which is a shame, as I truly do want it to gain traction, even if that is not the authors' goal.
Anyway, I wish you and the authors well. Your intentions seem to come from the right place, but I think this entire thing is a misstep.
The sibling comment already thoroughly addressed all of this, so there's no need to me to do so other than to say that, despite your good intentions, you don't seem to have even the slightest understanding of open source.
> despite your good intentions, you don't seem to have even the slightest understanding of open source
Please. Resorting to ad hominem when you don't have good arguments against someone's opinion is intellectually lazy.
> At no point does it say anything like "I am obliged to maintain this for you forever, or even at all, let alone to your liking"
I'm well familiar with most OSS licenses. I never claimed they said this.
My point was about an unwritten social contract of not being an asshole. When you do a public deed, such as publishing OSS, and that project gains users, you have certain obligations to those users at a more fundamental level than the license you chose, whether you want to acknowledge this or not.
When you ignore and intentionally alienate users, you can't be surprised when you receive backlash for it. We can blame this on users and say that they're greedy, and that as a developer you're allowed to do whatever you want, becuase—hey, these people are leeching off your hard work!—but that's simply hostile.
The point of free software is to provide a good to the world. If your intention is to just throw something over the fence and not take users into consideration—which are ultimately the main reason we build and publish software in the first place—then you're simply abusing this relationship. You want to reap the benefits of exposure that free software provides, while having zero obligations. That's incredibly entitled, and it would've been better for everyone involved if you had kept the software private.
There's literally no ad hominem where you claimed there was. That itself is ad hominem.
I'll go further this time - not only do you not understand open source licensing or ecosystem even slightly, but it's genuinely concerning that you think that someone sharing some code somehow creates "a relationship" with anyone who looks at it. The point of free software is free software, and the good to the world is whatever people make of that.
Again, the only people who seem to be truly bothered by any of this are people who don't use datastar.
Don't use it. In fact, I suspect that the datastar maintainers would prefer that you, specifically, don't use it. Use it to spite them! We don't care.
I also retract my statement about you having good intentions/communicating in good faith. I won't respond to you again.
> the only people who seem to be truly bothered by any of this are people who don't use datastar.
Yeah, those silly people who were previously interested in Datastar, and are criticizing the hostility of how this was handled. Who cares what they think?
> Don't use it. We don't care. In fact, I suspect that the datastar maintainers would prefer that you, specifically, don't use it.
Too bad. I'll use it to spite all of you!
> I also retract my statement about you having good intentions/communicating in good faith.
> a rugpull is certainly a shitty experience for them
It would certainly be a shitty experience, if there actually was a rugpull, which there was not. People who were using the version of Datastar that had all those features are still free to keep using that version. No one is taking it away. No rug was pulled.
> a contract is established between developers and potential users
Sorry, but no. The license makes this quite clear–every open source license in the world very explicitly says 'NO WARRANTY' in very big letters. 'No warranty' means 'no expectations'. Please, don't be one of those people who try to peer-pressure open source developers into providing free software support. Don't be one of the people who says that 'exposure' is a kind of payment. I can't put food on my table with 'exposure'. If you think 'exposure' by itself can be monetized, I'm sorry but you are not being realistic. Go and actually work on monetizing an open source project before you make these kinds of claims.
> why even bother releasing software?
Much research and study is not useful for many people. Why even bother doing research and development? Because there are some who might find it useful and convert it into something that works for themselves. Open source software is a gift. The giving of the gift does not place obligations on the giver. If you give someone a sweater, are you expected to keep patching it whenever it develops holes?
> If a project is not maintained anymore, it can be archived, or maintenance picked up by someone else.
Then why can't it be maintained by someone else in the case of using the old free version?
> A web framework, no matter how simple, will break eventually, most likely in a matter of months.
Sure, the ones that depend on a huge npm transitive dependency cone can. But libraries or frameworks like htmx and Datastar are not like that, they are single <script> files that you include directly in your HTML. There is no endless treadmill of npm packages that get obsoleted or have security advisories all the time.
> You expect people who want to build a web site and move on with their lives to dig into a foreign code base, and fix the web framework?
Well...ultimately, if I use some open source software, I am actually responsible for it. Especially if it's for a commercial use case. I can't just leech off the free work of others to fix or maintain the software to my needs. I need to either fix my own issues or pay someone to do it. If the upstream project happens to do it for me, I'm in luck. But that's all it is. There is ultimately no expectation that open source maintainers will support me for free, perpetually, when I use their software.
> A few people (that we know of) were directly impacted by this
What impact? One guy blogged that just because there are some paid features, it automatically kills the whole project for him. There's no clear articulation of why exactly he needs those exact paid features. Everything else we've seen in this thread is pile-ons.
> Doubling down on this, ignoring and dismissing such feedback as "performative"
Aren't you doing the same thing? You have been ignoring and dismissing the feedback that this is actually not that big of a deal. Why do you think that your opinion carries more weight than that of the actual maintainers and users of the project?
The open core part of the project was removed from NPM. Available only on GitHub.
There are no published plugins from the community, nor is there a repo where the community could have collaborated on OSS adding/plugins.
Are people being entitled expecting it ? Yes.
Is there something stopping people from taking up this work and creating a repo ? No.
But it is illustrative of the attitude of the owners.
The point is not to accuse of rug pull but how confident is the community in taking a dependency on such a project. The fact that the lead dev had to write an article responding to misunderstandings is in response to what the community feels about this.
The argument on their discord for licensing for professional teams 'contact us for pricing' goes like it depends on the number of employees in the company including non-tech folks.
Our community is fine, all this is coming from people so far that haven't actually used Datastar on project at any kind of scale. If this is not the case please show your code and how it effected you directly. Otherwise, it's false outrage that I and the core team care zero about.
> People who were using the version of Datastar that had all those features are still free to keep using that version.
Why are you ignoring my previous comment that contradicts this opinion?
> No one is taking it away. No rug was pulled.
When Redis changed licenses to SSPL/RSAL, users were also free to continue using the BSD-licensed version. Was that not a rug pull?
In practice, it doesn't matter whether the entire project was relicensed, or if parts of it were paywalled. Users were depending on a piece of software one day, and the next they were forced to abide by new terms if they want to continue receiving updates to it. That's the very definition of a rug pull. Of course nobody is claiming that developers physically took the software people were using away—that's ridiculous.
> Sorry, but no. The license makes this quite clear
My argument was beyond any legal licensing terms. It's about not being an asshole to your users.
> I can't put food on my table with 'exposure'.
That wasn't the core of my argument, but you sure can. Any public deed builds a brand and reputation, which in turn can lead to financial opportunities. I'm not saying the act of publishing OSS is enough to "put food on your table", but it can be monetized in many ways.
> Open source software is a gift. The giving of the gift does not place obligations on the giver. If you give someone a sweater, are you expected to keep patching it whenever it develops holes?
Jesus. There's so many things wrong with these statements, that I don't know where to start...
OSS is most certainly not a "gift". What a ridiculous thing to say. It's a philosophy and approach of making computers accessible and friendly to use for everyone. It's about building meaningful relationships between people in ways that we can all collectivelly build a better future for everyone.
Seeing OSS as a plain transaction, where users should have absolutely no expectations beyond arbitrary license terms, is no better than publishing proprietary software. Using it to promote your brand while ignoring your users is a corruption of this philosophy.
> Then why can't it be maintained by someone else in the case of using the old free version?
I addressed this in my previous comment.
> Sure, the ones that depend on a huge npm transitive dependency cone can. But libraries or frameworks like htmx and Datastar are not like that
Eh, no. Libraries with less dependencies will naturally require less maintenance, but are not maintenance-free. Browsers frequently change. SDK language ecosystems frequently change. Software doesn't exist in a vacuum, and it is incredibly difficult to maintain backwards compatibility over time. Ask Microsoft. In the web world, it's practically impossible.
> What impact? One guy [...]
Yeah, fuck that guy.
> Everything else we've seen in this thread is pile-ons.
Have you seen Reddit? But clearly, everyone who disagrees is "piling on".
> Aren't you doing the same thing? You have been ignoring and dismissing the feedback that this is actually not that big of a deal. Why do you think that your opinion carries more weight than that of the actual maintainers and users of the project?
Huh? I'm pointing out why I think this was a bad move, and why the negative feedback is expected. You can disagree with it, if you want, but at no point did I claim that my opinion carries more weight than anyone else's.
> Why are you ignoring my previous comment that contradicts this opinion?
Because it doesn't contradict it, it just disagrees with it. Because what actual argument did you have that people using an old version of the software can't keep using it? The one about things constantly breaking? On the web, the platform that's famously stable and backward-compatible? Sorry, I just don't find that believable for projects like htmx and Datastar which are very self-contained and use basic features of the web platform, not crazy things like WebSQL for example.
> When Redis changed licenses to SSPL/RSAL, users were also free to continue using the BSD-licensed version. Was that not a rug pull?
Firstly, there are tons of people on old versions of Redis who didn't even upgrade through all that and weren't even impacted. Secondly, Redis forks sprang up almost immediately, which is exactly what you yourself said was a viable path forward in an earlier comment–someone new could take over maintaining it. That's effectively what happened with Valkey.
> My argument was beyond any legal licensing terms.
And my argument is that there is no 'beyond' legal licensing terms, the terms are quite clear and you agree to them when you start using the software. In your opinion should it be standard practice for people to weasel their way out of agreed license terms after the fact?
> Any public deed builds a brand and reputation, which in turn can lead to financial opportunities.
Notice that you're missing quite a lot of steps there, and even then you can only end with 'can lead' to financial opportunities. Why? Because there's no guarantee that anyone will be able to monetize exposure. No serious person would claim that that uncertain outcome constitutes any kind of 'contract'. Anyone who does should be rightly called out.
> It's about building meaningful relationships between people in ways that we can all collectivelly build a better future for everyone.
Then by your own logic shouldn't everyone contribute to that effort? Why is it that only the one guy who creates the project must bear the burden of maintaining all of it in perpetuity?
> Seeing OSS as a plain transaction
Isn't that what you are doing by claiming that OSS is about providing software in exchange for exposure?
> Yeah, fuck that guy.
The guy who didn't even explain what exactly he lost by not being able to use the new paywalled features? The guy who likely was not impacted at all, and was just ranting on his blog because he didn't like someone monetizing their own project? You want us to take that guy seriously?
> everyone who disagrees is "piling on".
Everyone who disagrees? Yeah. Anyone who provides a coherent argument about exactly what they are missing out on by not being able to afford the paid version? I would take them seriously. I haven't seen anyone like that here.
First, barely anyone used datastar at that point, and those features were particularly arcane. So, the impact was minimal.
Second, its likely that even fewer of them contributed anything at all to the project in general, and those features in particular. What claim do they have to anything - especially when it was just freely given to them, and not actually taken away (the code is still there)?
And to the extent that they can't or wont fix it themselves, what happens if the dev just says "im no longer maintaining datastar anymore"? You might say "well, at least he left them something usable", but how is that any different from considering the pro changes to just be a fork? In essence, he forked his own project - why does anyone have any claim to any of that?
Finally, if they cant fix it themselves (especially when AI could almost certainly fix it rapidly), should they really be developing anything?
In the end, this really is a non-issue. Again, most of the furor is quite clearly performative. Its like when DHH removed typescript from one of his projects that he and his company maintain, and people who have nothing to do with ruby came out of the woodwork to decry the change in his github repo. And even if they do have something to do with ruby, they have no say over how he writes his code.