By that logic the GPL is also non-free, since you can't run a GPL program embedded in a closed-source management program.

Yes, you can. You have obligations if you distribute it. Even the AGPL simply gives you obligations.

There have been arguments about whether the AGPL is discriminatory, and those have been mostly waved away (wrongly, i think, but c'est la vie).

In that vein, SSPL is arguably a free license. It simply changes when obligations to distribute source occur.

Compare to the the commons clause, which is not a free license - it says you have no right to sell the software as a service at all.

I completely agree. I would only add that there have also been arguments about whether GPLv2 is discriminatory, though they also feel long behind us now.

In case it's interesting, here's my standard reference link on nondiscrimination under OSD 5 and 6: https://writing.kemitchell.com/2018/11/05/OSD-Copyleft-Regul...

There is always a case in which all license will be discriminatory when it comes to "specific fields of endeavor". If the endeavor is to break copyright then a copyright license can't permit that. To take a example, permissive licenses do not allow someone to take full ownership of the copyright of someone else work.

As such the Open Source Definition with the phrase "specific field of endeavor" is limited to cover areas which don't involve copyright law. For many reasons, including copyright law itself, it can not grant that which would be the most broad definition of nondiscrimination.

You own sentence shows the relevant difference: "embedded". The GPL license has always stopped at the OS process boundary. You can essentially do whatever you want with a GPL program as long as you interact with it over standard OS mechanisms, rather than direct modification; you're still obligated to distribute source but it's source that is already publicly available, so there's no proprietary interest in it. Mongo's does not. Neither does the AGPL, to show this isn't new.

> The GPL license has always stopped at the OS process boundary. You can essentially do whatever you want with a GPL program as long as you interact with it over standard OS mechanisms, rather than direct modification

Not strictly the case according to the FSF's FAQ; the GPL applies to anything that integrates deeply enough with the covered program to constitute a "derivative work" under copyright law, which is not necessarily the process boundary.

> Neither does the AGPL, to show this isn't new.

Indeed - so what is RedHat's rationale for permitting AGPL but disallowing this MongoDB license?

Red Hat Legal feels that AGPL stops at the tarball boundary, and the preamble isn't binding[0](2009).

[0]https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2...

> The GPL license has always stopped at the OS process boundary

No, it stops at the copyright law boundary of derivative work.

Whether or not a court would find that to be equivalent to an OS process boundary probably varies by jurisdiction and detailed facts of particular cases.

You absolutely can run GPL software embedeeded however you feel. You can't distribute it without meeting the conditions, however (and some database software providers think distribution within a company counts as distribution, so there's that)

AGPL is a totally different beast.

> you can't run a GPL program embedded in a closed-source management program

Uh? Of course you can. What kind of scenario are you envisioning that makes running a GPLed software not legal?

AGPL doesn't target specific users of the software, it affects all users regardless of how they use it.

We're specifically talking about GPL.

And in the parent post in the thread I mentioned the AGPL vs the SSPL. I was adding a contrast of the AGPL vs SSPL.

You can run it. The four freedoms refer to the freedoms when you receive the software.

You can use GPL software within non-free management software within your company without problems.

What you cannot do with the GPL software is distribute it as non-free. That is all.

But how you run it for yourself, from yourself, that is up to you.