The Blender market is kinda revolutionary and noone really talks about it

All code on the blendermarket is GPL. Yet, it sold over 25 million dollars worth of software. No DRM on the assets, all free software. Free as in freedom, not as in beer. In spite of that, I have not seen once anyone in the blender community complain about piracy, let alone have I seen anyone distribute any software or assets sold on the blendermarket unofficially. It just isn’t a problem, or at least not more of a problem than on any other DRMed closed source alternative.

Around 10 years ago the developer of a closed source renderer called Corona ranted about Blender’s GPL, as it prevented him from integrating his renderer into Blender without disclosing its source code:

Because entire Blender is covered by GPL licence, it is forbidden to link anything closed-source to it (not just commercial as in “you pay for it”, but anything closed-source, which includes “it is free to use, but I won’t give you my source code”) […]

We thought there were some loopholes, but it turns out the “Free” Software Foundation thought about them too and explicitly forbidden them. […]

So, Blender has unusable licence. That is fine, any software developer is entitled to the choice of licence. If somebody wants to make a 3D studio legally usable only while not wearing underwear, he should be able to do it. What makes me angry is the whole FREE software ideology/advertisement. FSF goes on and on about “protecting users freedom”. Their interpretation is:

  • being able to choose from free plugins: freedom
  • being able to choose from the same free plugins, plus also commercial plugins: less freedom.
  • Forbidding good Corona renderer integration for Blender is freedom. Allowing it would make Blender less free. […]

I am not saying the OSS concept is wrong. There are other, much better and really free licences, like MIT/Apache/… If Blender would use any of them, we would start Corona for Blender right now. Too bad it uses the GPL bullshit. I feel bad for Blender users, because they will never have any fully-integrated commercial renderer plugin :/.

He feels bad for what? For users having a thriving software ecosystem with license that ensures it stays free and open forever? The Corona Dev wrote this 10 years ago, probably without realizing that blender was already on its way to become the most widely used 3D application. There are plenty of people making money developing comercial plugins for blender - and they are all GPL.

It makes me think about how much we all have been gaslit by the tech corporations that without DRM and that whole subscription-licenses nightmare they would run out of business. It is not true and we can point our fingers to the blender ecosystem to prove them wrong. I don’t know… I haven’t seen anyone point this out yet.

GenderNeutralBro,

Your business model is not sacred. If it requires benefiting from the GPL community without contributing to it, then you can either change your business model or go jump in a lake. This is exactly what the GPL was made to prevent. It’s not an accident. It’s because smarter people than you foresaw exactly what you’re trying to do and said “not on my watch”.

Ganbat,

tl;dr: The “Free” licence of Blender forbids me to make top-quality Corona plugin for it.

There’s nothing fordiding anything, this is entirely their choice. What a damned clown.

slacktoid,
@slacktoid@lemmy.ml avatar

These are clowns that don’t understand that people don’t like getting cucked by their own work.

polskilumalo,
@polskilumalo@lemmygrad.ml avatar

Haha, he can get fucked! I hate permissive licenses because they allow these idiots to apply “freedom for me but not for thee”.

They can kick rocks, freedom means freedom and if you want “freedom” to take someone else’s freedom you can fuck right off!

10 years ago too, ahhh I love people being proven wrong in the long run with how amazing blender is now.

LiveLM,

Funny that the Corona guy was complaining.
Vray is available for Blender and follows the license just fine.

nichtsowichtig,

the post I quoted from is pretty much 10 years old - except for the license blender changed a lot since then. Both Corona and V-ray have some kind of ‘bridge’ implementation, but they are not nearly as well integrated into blender as cycles is, and therefore their userbase is quite small.

Happy_Harry,

I thought this was a stupid joke about blenders’ blades spinning.

nichtsowichtig,

oh I use blender so much I have to put effort into associating the word with a literal blender

Somsphet,

I’ll admit, I was hoping this was about the software, but I assumed it was spinning blades.

GnuLinuxDude,
@GnuLinuxDude@lemmy.ml avatar

We thought there were some loopholes, but it turns out the “Free” Software Foundation thought about them too and explicitly forbidden them. […]

GOOD!

nichtsowichtig,

yep! I laughed when I read that. GPL working precisely as intended.

ravermeister,

My first thought was, he could have done it the red hat way🤪

sarmale,

If compatibility wasnt an issue then 70 procent of the industry would already switch to Blender

nichtsowichtig,

its true, but Autodesk’s walled garden approach is starting to crumble. FBX is on the way to be replaces by USD, Rendering is on it’s way to be streamlined by Hydra Delegates, and there are a bunch of projects by the ASWF that work on new open source standards for the industry.

SamsonSeinfelder,

They are just ganging up to make USD the industry standard.

poVoq,
@poVoq@slrpnk.net avatar

I see a lot of assets on the Blender market that are definitely not GPL or Creative-Commons licensed. Maybe I am missing something?

mkhoury,
@mkhoury@lemmy.ca avatar

I’m not sure, but OP specifies code being restricted to GPL, not all assets.

nichtsowichtig,

GPL or MIT is mandatory for any code-based product on the Blender Market.

All scripts, add-ons, and other code-based products may be licensed as either GPL or MIT. No other licensing options are currently permitted for code-based products.

Assets don’t have to be free the same way code is, so there are mostly royalty-free products when it comes to assets.

It is true however, many addons charge more money for a “studio license”. I’ve been confused about it too and I assume it wouldn’t be enforcable with a GPL license. I don’t mind it too much though as I think it fair to charge companies that generate more revenue a bit more than individuals

labsin,

I think they are free to charge some users more for a copy. But as it’s GPL, any person is allowed to make a copy and share that with a studio. But would it be worth it as it’s more trouble for accounting?

nichtsowichtig,

probably - I think most studios would be okay with paying more, the prices are pretty fair compared to what’s common in the industry. And on top of that they’d probably have to do without tech support from the devs which is quite important for studios

poVoq,
@poVoq@slrpnk.net avatar

My point was mainly that those 25 million might be largely made up from not GPL assets sold on that market place and not GPL software.

jarfil,

Could you link some examples?

Also keep in mind that people can release their work under multiple licenses, so they may upload the same work with a different license (like a privative one) to other markets.

Cralder,

Interesting points. Blender has always been a great example that shows how well FOSS can work. To not just be as good as closed-source alternatives but to actually outperform them in many ways is incredible. Kinda disproves any excuse for intrusive DRM implementations.

Rhabuko,

Blender was always capable but was held back by funding and some weird outdated design choices (right click for selection instead of following the rest of the world). Luckily both issues are solved these days and it gets more and more third party support from other 3D software.

nichtsowichtig,

right, since blender 2.8 it has been way more accessible for users to get into. I’ve always really liked blender’s unique approach to design though. The Blender Devs work in the same building as their in-house animation studio. This kind of synergy has always come up with unique workflows that are crazy powerful and useful once you get behind it. right-click-select is one of these things. The devs at the Blender Institute are always surronded by artsists who have tons of ideas on how to make things faster to use for the artists.

firecat,

I'm going to stop you. Blender developers never care about artist. There are many features they never included even after they were told to added it. Blender still lacks modern day tools that are available in other programs. They don't respect ideas of abandoning old things like shortcuts for everything. Not everything needs a shortcut. Blender lacks the ability to work with other free open source programs while Maya and Adobe are fine. You never think to gain a better understanding of Blender developers, they aren't the good guys. They are the greedy lazy type like Elon Musk.

kingmongoose7877,
@kingmongoose7877@lemmy.ml avatar

Take your temperature. I think you have a fever because you’re delirious.

firecat,

Ignoring Blender developers because you love blender to death isn't going to make Blender better. If no one stands up to the developers than you don't have the right to insult people or anyone.

kingmongoose7877,
@kingmongoose7877@lemmy.ml avatar

My apologies. You’re right. But I will leave you with these consecutive comments from your own link…

blenderartists.org/t/ive-been-fired/1473998/50

blenderartists.org/t/ive-been-fired/1473998/51

blenderartists.org/t/ive-been-fired/1473998/52

nichtsowichtig,

I don’t really want to argue in detail as I don’t feel like your critizism is constructive or specific. You’re right though, the blender devs aren’t the good guys… they are the best!

firecat,

They fire a Blender developer and people agree Blender is in the wrong here: https://blenderartists.org/t/ive-been-fired/1473998

nichtsowichtig, (edited )

I guess discourse in software development is very normal (and needed) and in the case of free software, it is generally held publicly. Well they still give away their code for free. Everyone is allowed to do the same thing the blender foundation does - aquire resources to fund blender’s development and sharing the product with everyone who wants to use it.

edit: reading the thread on blenderartists… that developer seems to be a bit of a drama queen… I can’t comment on the technical things as I know close to nothing about it, but him being rude like that is not good for any working environment.

firecat,

This is not normal, this is just Blender developers ways of "Their way or highway". People had found better ways to make certain things work better, the Video editor, VR, sculpting, game engine, etc. All of the things you wanted were never added because of jerks inside of Blender who became egomania like Elon Musk.

This is becoming a talking point: https://blenderartists.org/t/discussion-on-how-to-handle-contributions/1474581

Very Few Blender Developers paid by Blender understand code or review code that fixes their problems.

nichtsowichtig,

they give you stuff for free. Send them money if you want them to have more resources to manage all the contributions, or give money to someone who you think knows better than them. Calling them egomaniacs is absurd, wrong and rude, and will get you nothing but downvotes on Lemmy

firecat,

They got millions from gaming companies, money is not the problem and even if i give them money they will not do what i want. They handle money differently.

Dreyns,

My boy is hurt in his lil heart

firecat,

They fire one of the developers and people in blender agree it's a jerk move by Blender.
https://blenderartists.org/t/ive-been-fired/1473998

nichtsowichtig,

it has been truly wonderful to see it flourish throughout the years!

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