[Beowulf] [External] Re: Anaconda distribution sowing FUD to generate sales?

Wed Apr 13 18:47:11 UTC 2022

On 4/13/22 12:57 PM, Joe Landman wrote:
>
> I've got general negative thoughts about conda, based upon $dayjob's 
> use of it.  I always enjoy trying to build something which depends 
> upon a conda-ized library which has been pooly built/packaged ... 
> yeah, good times.
>
You mean like when conda sits there for 15-20 minutes and then finally 
comes to live only to tell you it can't solve an environment? Never 
happens. ;)
>
>
> As for their bait and switch, they do need to cover network costs, and 
> if they are making the mistake of using cloud storage for this, then 
> their egress/storage costs are likely significant.  If you have to use 
> them, and really have no choice in the matter, it is better to support 
> them and enable them to stay in business, than let them whither and 
> die.  The latter guarantees some future flag days where you have to 
> start switching out quickly.
>
I get they need to make money. I just don't like when companies decide 
they're going to make money off of open-source software and then when 
their original business model fails they change models. I'm all for 
supporting open-source, and I've worked at several companies that really 
supported supporting open-source, either by allowing employees to 
develop for open-source projects as part of their job, or paying for 
support contracts that we might not really need just to support the 
open-source product. I'm more bothered by the how rather than the what 
or why in this case.
>
>
> Hence a point about a plan B ...
>
>
> On 4/13/22 12:11, Prentice Bisbal via Beowulf wrote:
>>
>> Recently, one of my users go this e-mail from a commercial account 
>> rep at anaconda.com:
>>
>>> Hi [User]
>>> I'm reaching out because I've noticed we are one of [Employer's 
>>> Name]'s preferred tools and also to offer guidance in navigating our 
>>> new Anaconda Terms of Service, as there are changes for the 
>>> commercial use of Anaconda. Based off my research, [Employer's 
>>> Name]is mirroring quite a few packages in the past few months.
>>>
>>> We remain deeply dedicated to OSS, and that cost is funded by the 
>>> long tail of our enterprise products and users. In short, we changed 
>>> our Terms of Service to prohibit commercial use of our Public Facing 
>>> Repo (repo.anaconda.com <http://repo.anaconda.com>) channel without 
>>> a paid license.
>>>
>>> We'd like to discuss how your organization can remain compliant and 
>>> discuss some options moving forward.
>>> Are you or someone in your IT department available to chat? Book 
>>> time with me [link to online scheduling service 
>>> removed]<https://anaconda.getoutreach.com/c/Cody_Foxwell>
>>> Cheers,
>>> [salesperson's name]
>>>
>> Have any of you received an e-mail like this?
>>
>> Since I work at an academic, government research site, I don't think 
>> we fall into the commercial category, so I'm pretty sure we're safe, 
>> but I still don't like this attempt to monetize open-source software 
>> like this. I'm not an open-source zealot like RMS, but I don't like 
>> when people take open-source software, try to monetize it it like this.
>>
>> What's interesting is their approach here - they are not trying to 
>> keep open-source software from your directly - they're saying you 
>> can't use their *repo* to get that software. So you can have your 
>> open-source software, but to get it from the dealer to your house, 
>> you need to pay a toll to use the roads.
>>
>> I don't like this because many people now rely on conda, and conda 
>> only has value because of the repo. If people using conda knew that 
>> this might be a problem, perhaps they would have stuck with the 
>> python.org distribution of Python and pip.
>>
>> The other think I don't like, is that you can't find any of this 
>> information on the anaconda.com website. Even after knowing these 
>> terms and conditions applied, I couldn't find any warnings about this 
>> on the product pages for the Anaconda Distribution. It's as if 
>> they're deliberately hiding this information from potential 
>> downloaders of Anaconda. I only found it by going directly to 
>> https://repo.anaconda.com, where they do have links prominently 
>> displayed.
>>
>> This seems like a trap to me. You download anaconda, completely 
>> unaware of these terms and conditions, and then use conda to install 
>> the packages you need, unknowingly violating their license..
>>
>> Your thoughts?
>>
>> Prentice
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> Prentice
>>
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> -- 
> Joe Landman
> e:joe.landman at gmail.com
> t: @hpcjoe
> w:https://scalability.org
> g:https://github.com/joelandman
> l:https://www.linkedin.com/in/joelandman
>
> _______________________________________________
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