Open Source & Engineering Decisions Series

In September 2017, React switched overnight from BSD+Patents to MIT. The reason: the Apache Software Foundation put React’s license on its “do not depend on” list, and Automattic (WordPress’s parent) immediately announced it would stop rewriting its UI on React. Facebook couldn’t withstand the ecosystem pressure and folded. Seven years later, in March 2024, Redis moved its core from BSD 3-Clause to a dual RSALv2+SSPL license — within a week AWS, Google, and Oracle jointly forked Valkey to replace it.

In August 2023, HashiCorp moved Terraform, Vault, Consul, and all its core products from MPL 2.0 to BSL 1.1. The community erupted; a month later the Linux Foundation spearheaded a fork called OpenTofu. You’d think the story ends there — but in April 2024 IBM announced a $6.4 billion acquisition of HashiCorp, closing in February 2025, making HashiCorp a business unit under IBM’s Red Hat. The license-changing OSS company didn’t decline; it became an acquisition target.