Re: ActiveState seeking Lua community feedback

On Thu, Nov 3, 2016 at 11:16 Russell Haley <russ.haley@gmail.com> wrote:

On Wed, Nov 2, 2016 at 2:17 AM, Javier Guerra Giraldez
<javier@guerrag.com> wrote:
> On 2 November 2016 at 07:21, Jeff Rouse <jeffr@activestate.com> wrote:
>>> Your site says: "Why take risks with open source Lua and community
>>> support".
>>> I don't see any risks in open source Lua. What do you have in mind?
>>>
>> The risks for an enterprise is that they need to make sure of issues
>> like getting timely support, a contractual obligation for service,
>> assurances and timely security fixes. In many cases they need
>> the backing of a commercial entity to feel comfortable and in
>> some cases this is a legal or compliance requirement. To
>> them it takes risk away. So its important for us to speak to
>> that. It in no way reflects on how the community supports
>> the language.
>
>
> Here's some feedback:
>
> - most of the language in the site feels confrontational; offering
> your distribution (and support) as an alternative, not a complement to
> the community.

>From your page http://www.activestate.com/lua :

"ActiveLua OEM Edition takes the complexity out of open source
licensing by guaranteeing assurance and eliminating legal risk that
goes along with distributing Lua in commercial applications."

This is patently incorrect. There is no licensing risk in using Lua in
a commercial application due to the broad (and almost uniform) use of
MIT and permissive licenses in the Lua community. I think I speak for
everyone in saying you should change this and remove any implication
that licensing Lua software carries risk. While you may offer clients
the service of navigating complex licensing, Lua should not be
directly referenced as carrying any legal risk.

Also, I believe one reason for a "confrontational" feel is due to a
lack of any indication that Lua is in fact extremely business
friendly. You have not provided any positive attributions to using Lua
in a commercial environment and one would get the feeling that it
would be similar to using GPL and copy-left software. Again, the use
of an MIT license allows commercial applications the ability to create
proprietary extensions and embed Lua into their software WITH ZERO
LICENSING RISK. It's my opinion that you would make the community feel
more comfortable by changing from "OMG License risks!" to "No License
Risks, great software and we have the latest toolchains prebuilt for
you!". It is also a smart business case to encourage businesses to use
a software you support.

Regards,

Russ (And I didn't even rant once about GPL!)

Russ,

First, you don't speak for everyone on this list. I think you meant something much less emotionally charged there, but I won't guess.

It's good to remember that marketing people tend to use emotionally charged language, just as you are doing and amongst technical people who know better it has the same predictable result.

It is fine if you want to try to right this wrong, likely committed by an overzealous, non-technocrat who wants to compel IT managers to fork over cash by "stretching the truth".

To illustrate their challenge, consider that one way to say what they are trying to say is: "If you end up having a problem with Lua or it's extremely liberal license (both unlikely), we can be the neck that you ring!"

That is a valid reason and it might be a good enough reason for them to choose ActiveState. But it's also unlikely to compel a manager that may look at all "free as in beer" software as "something that has to go through an internally painful review process."

-Andrew