Vitalik Buterin backs copyleft to protect crypto innovation

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin has urged the crypto community to use copyleft open-source licenses. In his latest blog post, the Ethereum co-founder said that the increasing monopolization of power in tech and crypto ecosystems requires a more effective legal mechanism to allow joint innovation.

Previously, a supporter of permissive licenses, such as MIT or CC0, Buterin now views them as inadequate in an industry more characterized by secrecy and competition. He said that maintaining collaboration is possible with copyleft licenses, which require a user to open-source any derivative work.

He noted, “Historically, I was a fan of the permissive approach (eg. my blog is under the WTFPL). More recently, I am warming up to the copyleft approach.” He stated that the change was required to guarantee that the positive aspects of blockchain development would not be exclusive to large companies that refuse to contribute back.

Crypto culture shift spurs legal reciprocity

Buterin railed against what he termed a mercenary trend in crypto. Projects that used to open-source their code voluntarily are now opting to be secretive. In such an environment, permissive licenses do not provide safeguards against privatization of publicly available tools.

He proposed that copyleft induces reciprocity. It mandates that a community-built code can only be accessed by those willing to share in the development. He pointed out that the method relies not on goodwill but on enforceable rules.

Buterin stated that copyleft would help maintain open collaboration without top-down intervention, avoiding the emergence of monopolies in a decentralized fashion. He further cautioned that focusing only on permissive models exposes the risk of letting the influential players squeeze value without compensation.

Economic power imbalances call for open-source safeguards

Buterin used economic theories to substantiate his claim. He cited the work of Glen Weyl, saying that such power concentration is the inevitable result of superlinear economies, where large actors create disproportionate returns. In these systems, the more capitalized or scaled firms are more likely to move even further ahead.

He noted that governments across the globe have reacted by imposing the diffusion of technology. Among them are standardization requirements of the European Union, the transfer policies of China, and U.S. regulations of non-compete clauses. Buterin proposed copyleft licensing as a possible way to use a decentralized approach, allowing similar results but without being biased due to political or corporate interests.

“Copyleft creates a large pool of code that can only be accessed by those willing to share improvements,” he wrote.

Permissive licensing still has its place

Although he argued in favor of a wider change, Buterin conceded that permissive licenses can still be valuable in other scenarios. In the case of widespread use, limited restrictions can contribute to the fact that new technologies are disseminated more quickly. He also repeated his philosophical objections to intellectual property laws, but said the reality of protecting open-source communities has increased.

Adam Cochran, a crypto venture capitalist, concurred, adding that although copyleft is problematic in specific edge cases, the general ideology of copyleft can be found valuable in the contemporary context. Buterin stated that the use of copyleft used to be of little benefit, but now it is essential. 

Open source is no longer a radical vision but is in the middle of enterprise and blockchain creation. With more companies adopting open tools, stricter safeguards are required to ensure fairness and collective development. He encouraged programmers to consider the legislative foundations of their code.

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