> To use React, you give Facebook permission to use any of your software patents throughout your whole company. Facebook gives you permission to use only the software patents necessary for React.
No, you lose the patent rights if you sue Facebook for any patents period.
> The license granted hereunder will terminate, automatically and without notice, if you (or any of your subsidiaries, corporate affiliates or agents) initiate directly or indirectly, or take a direct financial interest in, any Patent Assertion: (i) against Facebook or any of its subsidiaries or corporate affiliates
If you have to agree not to enforce any of your patents, that's pretty much equivalent to giving Facebook the rights to use them.
So if I understand correctly, if I were to use React for a marketing website about my patented system for <some extremely valuable invention> and Facebook steals/uses that extremely valuable invention, I can’t sue Facebook by virtue of using React?
Obviously, if that were to happen, you’d simply have to stop using React or else you’d get countersued for using React without a license right?
Why would anyone use React ever if that’s how it works? It feels like a payday loan – React makes it “easy” right now, but if your business is built dependent on React, you could pay a serious price later in exchange for “right now” convenience. It makes a strong case for Ember or Glimmer or any of the other front-end systems not tied to Facebook. Imagine a React “Native” app around which your business is based – you’d have to rewrite the entire thing of Facebook were to start using some patented aspect of your business.
Perhaps I am misinformed, but it seems absolutely bonkers to essentially indemnify Facebook from patent infringement just by virtue of using React somewhere in your business.
Imagine if Apple did this: if you release on the App Store using Xcode, you can’t sue us for any patent infringement ever or we’ll sue you for using Xcode illegally.
Is my assessment correct? Is React that good to risk such a situation? Facebook could sit back and watch a company using React develop something amazing, then Facebook could steal it and you’d have no recourse but to stop using React. Meanwhile, while you are rebuilding your application, you lose all your customers, but if you don’t rebuild your application, Facebook can legally take your invention and crush you in the market. Either way, you lose – simply because a few developers on the team were insistent on React’s greatness. If I were a VC, I’d be incredibly wary about supporting a company using React for their primary application.
Am I wrong? I am not trying to be argumentative – I just want to be sure I am understanding this correctly.
Yes, your understanding is largely correct. To be clear, you can still sue Facebook for stealing your patented invention, but then your grant to any patents that your use of React infringes would expire and Facebook could countersue over that. Facebook legal's response to this concern has been largely obfuscation and "trust us" which is not encouraging. They did change the patent grant two years ago to allow you to assert patent claims against Facebook without losing the grant if Facebook sues you first, but that's of limited utility.
It's funny you mention Apple, because the Apple Public Source License has a very similar provision.
> 12.1 Termination. This License and the rights granted hereunder will terminate:
> ...
>(c) automatically without notice from Apple if You, at any time during the term of this License, commence an action for patent infringement against Apple; provided that Apple did not first commence an action for patent infringement against You in that instance.
The good news is that the Apple Public Source License is basically dead and not used for anything of importance.
Please explain to me - are they able to change it again at any time in the future to "unclear" it again or just change wording altogether? Will it affect all users retroactively in that case? Because all this "they had bad wording in license but they changed it so we can use it now" sounds kinda crazy.
The patent grant is solely a grant from Facebook to the world, so Facebook can choose to grant more rights at any time. Just like I can sign a contract with you allowing you to borrow my bicycle on Thursdays and then later unilaterally decide that you can borrow it on Mondays as well.
The University of California did something like this in 1999 when they cancelled the advertising clause of the original BSD license. See ftp://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/pub/4bsd/README.Impt.License.Change.
> You lose the patent rights if you sue Facebook for any patents that involve React
I see nothing that limits the termination clause to patents involving React. The only limitation following those general lines is the one you quoted, which is a limitation on the exception, implying that the license does terminate if the patent over which Facebook sued you is a React patent.
W̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶p̶l̶e̶a̶s̶e̶ ̶q̶u̶o̶t̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶e̶x̶a̶c̶t̶ ̶t̶e̶x̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶g̶i̶v̶e̶s̶ ̶F̶a̶c̶e̶b̶o̶o̶k̶ ̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶s̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶u̶s̶e̶r̶'̶s̶ ̶p̶a̶t̶e̶n̶t̶s̶.̶ ̶A̶s̶ ̶f̶a̶r̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶I̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶ ̶s̶e̶e̶ ̶o̶n̶l̶y̶ ̶F̶a̶c̶e̶b̶o̶o̶k̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶a̶c̶t̶u̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶g̶r̶a̶n̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶p̶a̶t̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶s̶.̶ ̶Y̶o̶u̶ ̶l̶o̶s̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶a̶t̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶s̶ ̶i̶f̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶s̶u̶e̶ ̶F̶a̶c̶e̶b̶o̶o̶k̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶p̶a̶t̶e̶n̶t̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶v̶o̶l̶v̶e̶ ̶R̶e̶a̶c̶t̶ ̶o̶r̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶s̶u̶e̶ ̶a̶n̶y̶o̶n̶e̶ ̶u̶s̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶R̶e̶a̶c̶t̶.̶
https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS
edit: nvm, I misread line 16-17. Naturally line 21-26 is mostly useless.