Redis Change license from BSD-3 to dual RSALv2+SSPLv1
The constant abuse by corporations and commercial products towards open source developments They are no longer only affecting small developers, but also The problem has arrived with popular projects and this time it is Redis that is affected and has decided to take action on the matter.
And Redis recently announced the news of the change in the license of your Redis database management system, the change will be effective from the release of Redis version 7.4, in which it is mentioned that the project will be distributed under two proprietary licenses: RSALv2 and SSPLv1, instead of the BSD license previously used.
RSALv2 and SSPLv1 are licenses with significant differences in their restrictions and obligations:
- RSALv2:
- Permits the use, copying, distribution, making available and creation of derivative software under this license.
- Prohibits marketing the software or providing it to others as a managed service without an additional agreement.
- Users can use the Redis source code for free under this license.
- SSPLv1:
- It is a copyleft license that requires the full code of the service to be revealed if it is used as part of the service.
- Users can also use the Redis source code for free under this license, but must comply with copyleft obligations.
Users can choose between RSALv2 and SSPLv1 depending on their specific preferences and needs. However, it is important to note that cloud service providers such as AWS, GCP, and Azure will no longer be able to use Redis products in the same way due to licensing changes. This implies that these providers must review and adjust their policies and costs related to the use of Redis on their platforms.
Previously, only additional modules that offered advanced functionality for corporate users were provided under a proprietary license. Now, the proprietary license will also apply to the core DBMS codebase.
In practice, nothing changes for the Redis developer community, which will continue to enjoy permissive licenses under the dual license. At the same time, all Redis client libraries under Redis responsibility will remain open source licensed.
Redis mentions that the new licenses available for Redis source code will allow Redis to continue offering permissive use of its source code sustainably. These changes represent a transition to a more advanced phase in the development of Redis, establishing it as a real-time data platform with a wide range of core capabilities and products. These offerings will include innovative features such as searchable, JSON, vector, probabilistic and time series data models, all integrated into a free downloadable software package.
It is worth mentioning that The license change does not affect previous versions of Redis that are distributed under the traditional BSD-3 license, which means that these versions can continue to be used without any problem. Additionally, it has been announced that important security patches will be provided for older versions of Redis under the BSD-3 license until the release of Redis Community Edition 9.0.
It is important to note that the open source community has expressed its opposition to this license change, since Both licenses have restrictions that affect certain categories of users, which makes them not considered completely open or free. The Open Source Initiative (OSI) has stated that these licenses do not meet the criteria to be considered open licenses, meaning that products based on these licenses should be considered proprietary. Additionally, products under the SSPL and RSAL licenses cannot be included in free distributions such as Fedora and Debian.
In response to this license change, Fedora developers are considering removing Redis packages from the distribution repositories or replace them with a "free" fork. The possibility of replacing Redis in the Fedora repository is being discussed with KeyDB, a fork of Redis 5 developed by Snapchat since 2019.
If you are interested in knowing more about it, you can consult the details in the following link.