It would seem to me that a pressure campaign to extend existing OS licenses to include a BDS license has the potential to see adoption among the more progressive tech-bros and at least significantly inconvenience tech firms in occupied Palestine. I did some (admittedly very spotty) research and couldn't find anything.
IANAL, and I'm also not a lawyer, so I won't try to model language, but I'm kinda surprised that I couldn't find a pre-existing example.
You would have to have a software project big enough that Israeli companies would want to use it and US companies would want to contribute to it, for it to matter at all. And they're not going to do that. Maybe the Free Software Foundation would allow something like that but I dunno. Pretty much unenforceable too. But I suppose you could make a license that you ban for use by "government security organs" or something. I think I've seen something like that before.
But I suppose you could make a license that you ban for use by “government security organs” or something.
It's the easier political fight to win, but I personally feel like losing the fight on BDS might be a more productive action, because it would open a door to certain radical politics in tech world.
yeah good point. kinda pointless if it isn't calling stuff out by name otherwise techbros will just think you're talking about big bad evil China 😂
The main problem is that most open source projects include contributions from dozens if not hundreds (or thousands) of contributors, which means the copyright ownership is just as atomized. Unless you can get all those contributors (many of whom are probably dead or cannot be contacted) to agree, the terms can't be changed.
A handful of projects require copyright assignment to an organization. Those could practically change licenses, but people in general are less willing to contribute to such projects because it's much more likely the organization will sell out and profit from their volunteer labor (See MySQL). The handful of organizations which won't sell out (like the FSF) are run by libs who are true believers in "the freedom to use the software for any purpose."
Practically speaking, if any software were going to be licensed with a BDS clause, it would have to start that way from day one. You might run into the problem @cawsby points out though, where the courts refuse to enforce it and it becomes effectively meaningless in practice (doesn't make it any less worth doing though, just makes the bourgeois courts look like pricks).
The handful of organizations which won’t sell out (like the FSF) are run by libs who are true believers in “the freedom to use the software for any purpose.”
I feel like this one is easily overturned as a principle by saying, 'you can't commit genocide using this code' and forcing them to refuse to accept that term and take all the associated shit.
No argument there. This "I don't agree with Hitler's systematized genocide, but by god he has the right to use those IBM computers however he wishes" shit needs to be savagely ridiculed.
Pretty sure national origin is protected under the civil rights act, and the US recognizes Israel.
Since Palestine is not a country recognized by the US, it is legal to discriminate against them, but illegal to discriminate against Israelis.
I don't think the Civil Rights Act confers protected-status on companies.
