Today FUTO released an application called Grayjay for Android-based mobile phones. Louis Rossmann introduced the application in a video (YouTube link). Grayjay as an application is very promising, but there is one point I take issue with: Grayjay is not an Open Source application. In the video Louis explains his reason behind the custom license, and while I do agree with his reason, I strong disagree with his method. In this post I will explain what Open Source means, how Grayjay does not meet the criteria, why this is an issue, and how it can be solved.
Open source is not a very useful term. Grayjay isn’t free and libre software because it restricts commercial use, and it is definitely source available software. Whether that makes it open source depends on who you ask, and no, OSI is not the undisputed arbiter of all things open source just because they say so.
Griping because someone is using a different definition of open source than you do when they are being very clear about what exactly their license allows is not productive.