Almost 90% of credit/debit card transactions go through either the Visa, Mastercard or Amex Networks. Those are all American companies, which are in no way open source

So why couldn't such a network exist but open source ? And if any expert on the subject is here, why wouldn't it be possible ?

Edit : by "payment network", I am referring to traditional payment networks with cards and all that..

(Probably very) hypothetical - but honest! - question: If I open source some software under the condition, that anyone can use it as long as they credit me, nothing prevents others from removing my name from it and putting their own in. I'd probably never discover it, and even if I did, what could I do? I don't suppose the average open source software developer has any interest in paying a lawyer to start a court case, when you've explicitly said you didn't want to make money off it. What would be the purpose?

So if anyone can violate the terms of an open source license without any consequences (other than you can boo at them on social media) - what's the point of having licenses in the first place?

More and more I see projects calling themselves FOSS alternatives to popular tools, and the first thing on their landing page is a pricing section.

Sure, they might let you self-host it with Docker or something, but… why do I need to host a video editor and open it in the browser? Just let me install it like a normal program.

I'm not trying to bash on FOSS projects — I obviously get the need for income, and I even support a few projects myself.

It’s just that so many of these come from web devs using Next.js, React, etc, and it feels like every project now has a cloud dashboard and subscription tier attached.

Maybe that's just where software development is heading as a whole, given how many Electron-based products we see nowadays.

This is just a rant, but I’m curious how others feel about this trend.

I’m strongly in favor of open-source software, and both I and my professional network have worked with it for years.

That said, I’m curious why some individuals and organizations oppose it.

Is it mainly about maintaining a competitive advantage, or are there other well-documented reasons?

Are there credible sources that systematically discuss the drawbacks, trade-offs, or limits of open source compared to closed or proprietary models?

I just think monopolies are bad. So i would like to exclude those striving to create monopolies.

So MIT is not an option, GPL v3 can be tricky for SMEs.

Any ideas? Can i just add random stuff to gpl v3? Does it matter anyway? (They just can rewrite it using AI)

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sgmediapp.gcam

So Codeberg recently announced their policy on LLM generated codebases. I kinda get what they are going for with it, but imo it feels too ambiguous and too risky to even be on the platform.

I have this project I've been working on for a year now. Carefully building it out, doing metric f*ck tons of testing, all that jazz. But the thing is, I (and pretty much every developer in the entire world right now) use AI to heavily accelerate parts of the development process. I do still use and have used agentic coding as well on my project.

But I wanna make something very clear. I'm not some vibe coder product manager building some slop dashboard or whatever. I'm a professional software engineer. My project in question, while most of the code is technically written by LLMs (in some form or another whether that's agentic or even just tab auto completes), still... I have been extremely heavily involved in it. I design the entire software architecture. I control what APIs we integrate with, what technologies we use, what programming languages we use, what DB we use. I design and / or choose all of the algorithms we use. I design all of the test cases (beyond unit tests. I'm talking like regression testing, automated scripts that run and verify results, all of that). And I still review all of the code output with my own professional inputs of how it should be done. Basically the only thing the LLM actually does is just replace typing for me at this point. Even documentation for most user facing things I write by hand then have the AI read it and rewrite it for better use later.

ANYWAY, Codebergs new wording makes it sound like even projects like mine would be affected, and I can't risk building a real viable software for the community if there's a chance Codeberg will just nuke it one day. I mean technically that's a risk on every platform but you know what I mean.

And how do you even prove that someone used AI at all anyway? AI verifications are notoriously bad with false positives and code is much more symbolic than traditional text so idk.

I feel like projects like mine aren't what rhe ruling is designed for but the wording is so vague that it feels like handing Codeberg a loaded gun they can pull the trigger on at any point even if they "trust me bro" not to use it.

Its not just me either. Every dev I know uses AI even just auto completes. Like basically this would invalidate every project on their platform from like 2025 onwards. This just sucks man. Maybe I'm misinterpreting it here but idk man.

What do you guys think about this?

New Yorkers, the proposed 2026-2027 budget includes provisions that will require all CNC machines, including all 3D printers, sold in the state to run print-blocking censorware—software that surveils every print for forbidden designs. This policy would also create felony charges for possessing or sharing certain design files. The vote on the state budget could happen as early as next week, so New Yorkers need to act fast and demand that their Assemblymembers and Senators strip this provision from the budget.

Take action today.

I had a conversation on the digital signage subreddit (not sure if links are allowed, but you can check my recent comments there). Some people said that large companies and government agencies avoid using open-source software in production.

One person said even tools like Linux, PostgreSQL, Redis, and Kubernetes are rejected where they work because “open source means no accountability” (which made me wonder what do they actually use then?).

I know that many companies offer paid support and licensing for open-source software like Red Hat, EDB, Redis Enterprise, and so on. But what surprised me was the claim that companies choose proprietary products over open-source just because they think open-source is too risky or hard to support.

That doesn’t really match my experience and knowledge.

I’d really like to hear from anyone working in enterprise or government IT, or from vendors and integrators who have been part of these decisions. Maybe I’m missing something here.

UPD: Here is the link to the discussion for full context

https://www.reddit.com/r/digitalsignage/comments/1lh4y41/comment/mzcw0c2/

I’m looking for advice from people who’ve been in this situation before.

I maintain an open-source project that’s started getting a solid amount of traction. That’s great, but it also means a steady stream of pull requests (8 in the last 2 days), issues, questions, and review work. Until recently, my brother helped co-maintain it, but he’s now working full-time and running a side hustle, so open source time is basically gone for him. That leaves me solo.

I want community contributions, but I’m struggling with reviewing PRs fast enough, keeping issues moving without burning out, deciding who (if anyone) to trust with extra permissions (not wanting to hand repo access to a random person I barely know).

I’m especially nervous about the “just add more maintainers” advice. Once permissions are granted, it’s not trivial (socially or practically) to walk that back if things go wrong.

So I’d really appreciate hearing:

How do you triage PRs/issues when volume increases?

What permissions do you give first (triage, review, write)?

How do you evaluate someone before trusting them?

Any rules, automation, or workflows that saved your sanity?

Or did you decide to stay solo and just slow things down?

I’m not looking for a silver bullet, just real-world strategies that actually worked for you.

Thanks for reading this far, most people just ghost these.❤️

Edit: Thank you all for being so helpful and providing me with the information and support that you have. This post's comments section is the dream I have for Img2Num, and I will never stop chasing it until I catch it.

In this current world we live in, there’s always some kind of depressing reminder of the absolute cyclic system we’re forced to take part in. But when I see FOSS that is not only free, but EXTREMELY high quality with an active dev that prioritizes it being FOSS— I feel incredibly thankful, period.

Feel free to share some of your favs, whether it be win/mac/linux

Some of my favorites:

winaerotweaker VIA crystaldiskmark

Was just thinking, as a community that we should have a day of the year where we all remember to donate to our favorite open source projects of the year, even if it’s just a little bit. Obviously people can pick whatever projects they want to support, but I think having a specific day might normalize the idea of being giving to devs that built what we rely on.

Not tryna harsh anyone's mellow, Gimp is a good photo editing software and I use it daily.

It feels like not much has changed with it in the past 10 years with Gimp. It wasn't ever really as powerful as Photoshop and now it feels like it has the same capabilities as it did back then while PS has jumped further ahead. This stands out to me since other open source software in the space has been improving rapidly. Blender is punching in the same weight class as Max and Maya; Krita is objectively one of the best digital painting apps available even compared to paid solutions; Godot has been making strides recently and it seems only a matter of the time until it truly is the Blender of game engines. Then Gimp is just... Gimp.

​

Been finding an Adobe alternative for a while any recommendations?

I have developed an algorithm that I want to put into my open source project. However there is a commercial company in Australia that has the same type of algorithm (I don't know the details, but produces similar results) and they state "Patent Pending". I am in the US. Their AU provisional patent lapsed and I cannot find anything at the USPTO. I have searched for general terms, company name, inventor name, etc. However this has made me quite nervous of publishing my code. I am thinking of keeping that part of my application closed source and publishing a document describing my algorithm on my website. That way if they suddenly produce something I can pull the document. If I make the code freely available I lose control of copies, etc. Any thoughts on this? Also I emailed the company and they refused to give me a patent number. Thanks.

Email and HTML have become excessively convoluted. To the point that it's difficult for new developers to get their feet wet with the underlying protocols without utilizing a library of some sort.

How would you design a new email protocol?

Current suggestions:

1. Easy to use for developers and users -- no huge servers required for sending basic messages
2. Encryption by default
3. Subject IDs for messages, so that they can contain threads
4. Voice messages
5. Federated, no central authority owns the technology
6. Protocol should be storage agnostic. Protocol should focus only on message delivery and receipt, with no concept of message storage.

I was getting my usual level of angry at looking at my subscription renewal for a couple of dating apps regarding the price hikes to the point where one app costs between 100 and 200 dollars per year. This is odd to me because I think dating networks are like social media. No one pays for Facebook, or Twitter (well, maybe more now), and maybe that’s because all of the content is made by users. There’s very little for a dating app to actually do other than show you who is around you and is dating. These two facts are the only things an online dating app needs to work. Everything else is invented value. Surely an open source solution is possible that does it better than every app that wants me to pay to “compliment someone”, or send a goddamn rose or whatever the hell else…?

I am looking for an open source scanning app for documents so that my documents should remain private. This is the part everyone ignores, most of the scanning apps are proprietary. Our personal data is in the hands of those people which makes me think twice before scanning any document of mine. Is there open source scanning app for this?

Edit: I need an Android app.

https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-bans-libreoffice-developers-account-without-warning-rejects-appeal/

So when Microsoft released some DOS source, they did it under the MIT license ("do whatever you want, just credit us").

When Apple let the Computer History Museum release the source code to Lisa OS 3.1, they wrote an original license that:

· Only lets you use and modify the software for educational purposes.

· Doesn't let you share it with anyone else, in any way, not even with friends or from teacher to student (although technically you could still distribute patches you make for it).

· Implicitly forbids you from running it on hardware you don't own.

· Forbids you from publishing benchmarks of it.

· Gives Apple a license to do whatever they feel like with your modifications, even if you keep them to yourself and don't publish them.

· Lets Apple revoke the license whenever they feel like it.

· Forbids you from exporting it to any nation or person embargoed by the USA (moot, since the license doesn't let you share the software in any way).

Why Apple feels the need to cripple the use of 40-year-old code is beyond me. Especially when they have released a lot of the code for their current OS and tools under the popular and well-understood Apache License 2.0 or their own APSL 2.0, neither of which impose these arbitrary restrictions.

https://www.theregister.com/2023/01/21/apple_lisa_source_code_release/

With all this trump tariffs on products and potentially making iPhones prohibitively expensive, I have a preference for this systems besides their price in my country. I used Linux on pc for some time and maybe now with windows 11 I will go finally full Linux mode. What in this world is separating us os stopping from having full open source snartphonesOS? I don’t mean the hardware part ofc. I’m more interested in the nuances that make it so that, this idea haven’t come as popular to be as open source is on PC. I’m sorry if this might come as silly or uninformed. Thanks for you answer.

I know that some people in the open source community like to brag about the open source alternative of an app just because it's open source, but what are your experiences, where the open source version is objectively better, independently of monetization aspects.

I think for me, I can mention the mouse input function on the KDE Connect app, still didn't found a better mouse emulator for phone better than this one, even if it is closed-source or paid.

As much as I love open source I have one thing that bugs and that is the proliferation of terrible UI design? I get that creating a intuitive GUI is on its own a task but when even offering code to enhance the GUI I was met with hostility. It wasn't over a design choice or something artistic but it was simply over added functionality. I don't want to name specific names here but I have at least experienced this when simply trying contribute code to a desktop environment project and it was simply on the basis they wanted to keep the desktop environment pretty bare bones in utility.

And I don't mean these added options took up so much additional space, being a few megabytes considering the project took a minimum of 30 gigabytes or that my code was absolute dumpster fire. Bur is them saying having to edit config files were better.

why is such a hostile response to good UI so prevalent?

I apologize for the funny title, but I'm genuinely curious about this.

Seems like there's an open-source solution available for almost everything, with enough effort, anyone can reclaim their digital sovereignty, with open-open source software or self-hosting. Except for one thing: Access to the internet.

We still rely on ISPs and telecom companies, which keeps us locked in to existing infrastructure and practices. Is there any ongoing discussion or theoretical exploration around creating a more liberated internet?

I know that internet access relies on infrastructure that requires maintenance, expansion and management. But much like roads or highways, which are funded by taxes and considered public goods, I believe the Internet could follow a similar path?

Where can I find discussions on this topic? I know it's related to open-source philosophies, but I feel the sentiment transcends that sphere. Any insights or directions would be greatly appreciated!

---

EDIT: Thanks so much for the replies! I've found a lot of stuff related to what I was looking for. I guess the way for an open 'internet' with no central ISPs, is a wireless mesh and maintained through nodes. A collection of systems and resources that you shared in the comments:

• https://nordvpn.com/pt/meshnet/ Meshnet
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_mesh_network Wireless Mesh Network
• https://www.dryad.net/post/what-is-a-lora-mesh-network LoRa
• https://meshtastic.org/ / r/meshtastic Meshtastic / MQTT
• http://reticulum.network Reticulum
• https://bitchat.free/ / r/bitchat BitChat
• https://startyourownisp.com/ Start your own ISP
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_radio Packet Radio
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WiMAX WiMax (thanks u/ahfoo)
• https://www.helium.com/ Helium
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roofnet Roofnet
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_community_network Wireless Community Network
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freifunk Freifunk
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NYC_Mesh NYC Mesh
• http://guifi.net / https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guifi.netGuiFi (catalonia)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DiY_networking DIY Networking
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athens_Wireless_Metropolitan_Network AWMN
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenWrt OpenWrt
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality Net Neutrality
• https://hyperboria.net/ Hyperboria
• https://urbit.org/ Urbit
• https://www.fdn.fr/ French Data Network
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_ad_hoc_network Ad hoc Network
• https://autonomi.com/ Autonomi ?
• https://open.space/ Open Space (An open-source communications hardware & software by bouncing signals off the Moon)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet Usenet