But even back then, this only ever applied to the front-end. At least with commercial applications, the back-end was always kept proprietary. So learning how to write great web applications still meant piecing together lessons from books, tutorials, and hello-world-style code examples, not from production-grade commercial software.
The O'Saasy License seeks to remedy that. It's basically the do-whatever-you-want MIT license, but with the commercial rights to run the software as a service (SaaS) reserved for the copyright holder, thus encouraging more code to be open source while allowing the original creators to see a return on their investment.
We need more production-grade code to teach juniors and LLMs alike. A view source that extends to the back-end along with the open source invitation to fix bugs, propose features, and run the system yourself for free (if your data requirements or interests maks that a sensible choice over SaaS).
This is what we're doing with Fizzy, but now we've also given the O'Saasy License a home to call its own at osaasy.dev. The license is yours to download and apply to any project where it makes sense. I hope to read a lot more production-grade SaaS code as a result!
https://world.hey.com/dhh/336c5c8f/blobs/eyJfcmFpbHMiOnsiZGF0YSI6MjM4MjYzMTM0NCwicHVyIjoiYmxvYl9pZCJ9fQ--ca8e8c2eaa291c28171287ab2f86d9dd48d1e098ce75cce24e3eef1507fccab7/osassy-license.png?disposition=attachment "Download osassy-license.png"
https://world.hey.com/dhh/the-o-saasy-license-336c5c8f
