>But what if you’re just part of a collaborative open source project, give away your app, or if there’s open source code in the product you put on the market? Who gets blamed when open source might be the heart of the problem?
Every other sentence is dripping in "sympathy for open-source creators", but buried in the subtext is "sympathy for the innocent commercial vendors who decided to rely on open-source projects."
>So, how is open-source software implicated? If a commercial software product causes harm, whoever put the software on the market will soon be strictly liable.
Good!
>You will need to prove that your code wasn’t to blame to escape the costs. But what if you’ve embedded open-source code, used open-source tools, or called open-source APIs? Under the pending rules, you’d be liable for any errors in those sources as well, regardless of whether you directly contributed or not.
Better! Now a big evil company _can't_ pass the buck to the unpaid hobby project creator!
> My prediction, for what it’s worth, is that open source’s days outside academia and hobbyists are numbered.
That is actually kinda concerning, if my MIT license of "no guarantee" won't protect me.
Other commenters who got it:
See here for example: https://www.euractiv.com/section/digital/news/eu-updates-pro...
Specifically: “The Directive will not apply to free and open-source software developed or supplied outside a commercial activity. The liability rules apply when the software is supplied in exchange for a price or personal data used for anything other than improving the software’s security or compatibility.”
IMHO the original article is either wrong or trying to spread FUD.
My take is, if this law passes, I’m an EU citizen, and I use your MIT software without paying you and without engaging with it through some service of yours (e.g. sevaghbook.com) then you’re not liable if I get damaged.
But here it is:
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2023/7393...
> With the aim of not hampering innovation: (i) free and open-source software developed or supplied outside the course of commercial activity, as well as (ii) the source code of software, should be excluded from the definition of products covered under the proposal.
> Worse still, how will you in turn identify or sue the collaborator or collaboration that actually wrote the faulty open-source code to recoup your costs? In that case, the license you signed likely insulates your open-source partners from your claims.
I sincerely hope this will never become a possibility. The chilling effect would presumably be catastrophic for Free and Open Source software in the relevant legal jurisdiction. Why would anyone voluntarily release their code as FOSS if it opens them up to lawsuits?
How does being liable for damages caused by software or services you sell equate to being an idiot? I just see it as the normal way to do business, and the reason why limited liability (the way I’ve been doing business for more than 2 decades) exists.
In light of it, I think the article I found didn’t link to it out of sloppiness, because their summary seems reasonably accurate to me, and the fine article didn’t link to it because they want to spread FUD, as the text you quoted directly contradicts some of the fear mongering in the original article.
IANAL but it seems clear cut to me: if you asked for money in exchange for your software (or to access to your software through an API or similar), or if you asked for personal information (in exchange for your software) then you’re liable, otherwise, you’re not.