is there something about rust which precludes copyleft licensing? (programming.dev)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 6 days ago) by some@programming.dev to c/opensource@lemmy.ml

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I often see Rust mentioned at the same time as MIT-type licenses.

Is it just a cultural thing that people who write Rust dislike ~~Libre~~ copyleft licenses? Or is it baked in to the language somehow?

Edit: It has been pointed out that I meant to say "copyleft", not "libre", so edited the title and body likewise.

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[-] cypherpunks@lemmy.ml 15 points 6 days ago

I often see Rust mentioned at the same time as MIT-type licenses. Is it just a cultural thing that people who write Rust dislike Libre licenses?

The word "libre" in the context of licensing exists to clarify the ambiguity of the word "free", to emphasize that it means "free as in freedom" rather than "free as in beer" (aka no cost, or gratis) as the FSF explains here.

The MIT license is a "libre" license, because it does meet the Free Software Definition.

I think the word you are looking for here is copyleft: the MIT license is a permissive license, meaning it is not a copyleft license.

I don't know enough about the Rust community to say why, but from a distance my impression is that yes they do appear to have a cultural preference for permissive licenses.