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this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2023
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Asklemmy
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I think the point of a license is to affirm user freedoms, and to make explicit that it is free to use.
If something public has no license, I would probably assume that it's proprietary (but not necessarily closed-source) and therefore is illegal to use without getting the author's permission. The default is that you in general can't use copyrighted material without the copyright owner's permission, save for fair use. In my view, this position is stupid and bad because it impedes freedom of information, but unfortunately this position is the law.
More like the default is you can do whatever the fuck you want with copyrighted material as long as the owner isn't made aware
I sympathize with that attitude, but I cannot guarantee an employer or my customers that the owner won't be made aware by some goodie two-shoes.
I'm not saying you shouldn't ever use copyrighted material without permission. Actually, my view is that copyright is stupid and needs to be abolished, and that the entire purpose of FOSS licensing is to protect against the quirks of copyright and actors powerful enough to abuse them. However, just because you can (and arguably should) pirate copyrighted material doesn't make it always a prudent choice.
I am an anarchist, so I'm not interested in complying with the law for its own sake. However, I am interested in how the (thugs who enforce the) law could clamp down on me or my customers for reusing other people's work. Unfortunately, that requires either using FOSS, or going through the dog-and-pony act of setting up a licensing agreement. It is absolutely plausible considering my field that an employer might force me to use proprietary software or even allow my product to be proprietarily licensed, as much as I loathe proprietary shitware.