OpenERP has a bunch of license crap (read violations). They switched from GPLv3 to AGPL overnight claiming that "OpenERP SA" (the company behind OpenERP) owns the entire codebase. Looking at it from many sides:
* the product is NOT open source if a single company owns the entire copyright ? why will they not call it proprietary tomorrow ? (they don't have a contributor agreement either)
* AGPL is the wrong license to have for an ERP system. In addition to all its ambiguity, AGPL software "must offer an ... opportunity for all users interacting with your Program through a computer network to request immediate transmission by HTTP of the complete source code of your modified version or other derivative work" [1]. Does that mean that 2500 users of the software in your company should be able to download the source code of your ERP to comply ?
For me, the license switch was to make the software impractical to use for any serious business and offer a "private use" license at a price as a vendor lock in.
Not sure I agree with you here. The AGPL keeps the code completely open and free to use...the only thing it does is insure that you have to pay OpenERP for a commercial license if you want to keep any customizations or custom modules you've developed private.
What's wrong with that? First, I'm free to use the code at no charge to me. I'm even free to customize it as much as I'd like...I just have to make a link available to those customizations that my users can access. I have no problem personally doing this...none of our users would have any interest in the code we develop. If I do decide downstream that I'd like to develop a private module, I can approach OpenERP and subscribe. I've already received pricing, and their cost for 1000 users annually is cheaper than what I pay for our commercial ERP for 100 users.
The way I see it, the AGPL insures that OpenERP (the company) gets their due for giving away the code. Nothing more. Seems fair.
* the product is NOT open source if a single company owns the entire copyright ? why will they not call it proprietary tomorrow ? (they don't have a contributor agreement either)
* AGPL is the wrong license to have for an ERP system. In addition to all its ambiguity, AGPL software "must offer an ... opportunity for all users interacting with your Program through a computer network to request immediate transmission by HTTP of the complete source code of your modified version or other derivative work" [1]. Does that mean that 2500 users of the software in your company should be able to download the source code of your ERP to comply ?
For me, the license switch was to make the software impractical to use for any serious business and offer a "private use" license at a price as a vendor lock in.
[1] http://www.affero.org/oagf.html