Why are we making this change?

We’ve experienced rapid growth of AYON since its 1.0 release a year ago. Hundreds of locally deployed instances have connected to ynput.cloud and AYON market during 2024. We’ve expanded our engineering team to keep up with the support demands, launched a robust cloud hosted offering for instant deployment globally, added many features focused on scalability, stability, and improved documentation substantially.

AYON was created to help studios of all sizes, and to keep fulfilling this mission it needs to be backed by a diversified, full-time team dedicated to its development and execution of the roadmap. This will enable us to provide a strong foundation for the community of users and our commercial safety for the studios that rely on us. Last year, we had many conversations with third parties that are using AYON in really cool ways and we can’t wait to collaborate with them, however there are also parties who are looking to take advantage of the benefits (and monetise upon it) without much care or support for the underlying project.

We’re by no means the first ones to face this and with this change, we’re proudly joining a growing community of sustainable companies creating Fair Source software.

What does this change mean for AYON users?

It is important to clarify that FSL will only apply to the two main server repositories (ayon-backend and ayon-frontend) while ayon-core, launcher, python API and all the pipeline integrations stay open-source with Apache2.0 license.

To see what this means in legal terms, please read the license, but the following is a summary without legal jargon.

You can use, modify, and share AYON for almost any purpose, including internal use, you cannot directly compete with AYON by reselling it as a service or incorporating it into a competing product. This restriction is in place to ensure that we can continue to invest in its growth and maintenance, while still providing the vast majority of users with the freedoms they expect from open-source software. After two years, each version of AYON licensed under FSL automatically converts to the Apache 2.0, making it fully open-source and removing all restrictions. This time-based approach balances community use while enabling a stable business model. It also ensures that should something unexpected happen to Ynput, the studios using AYON won’t be left stranded with an unsupported software.

Everyone using AYON with Apache 2.0 license will continue to be able to do so. However version 1.6.1 of AYON server is the last release under Apache 2.0. AYON backend 1.7.0 (with corresponding frontend) and all future versions will be FSL at the point of release and converted to Apache 2.0 after two years.

If you’re already using AYON, this change shouldn’t affect your deployment or modifications in any way.

✅ What studios CAN do with AYON under FSL (for free of course):

🛠️ Modify the server code: Add new features, connect to internal systems, optimize performance, and keep those changes private or share them with the community.
🤝 Collaborate: Make AYON available to subsidiary companies, clients, or other studios for project collaboration.
🧩 Create add-ons: Develop and share new AYON add-ons, whether commercial or open-source, via the AYON market or other channels.
⚙️ Customize: Change or extend the AYON backend and frontend to fit your company’s specific needs.
💻 Internal Use: Use AYON for any internal purpose within your studio or company.
⛅️ Freedom of deployment: Run AYON locally, in private cloud, hyperscaler or a cluster of calculators if you so wish.

❌ What studios CANNOT do with AYON under FSL:

☁️ Resell as a hosted service: You cannot sell AYON as a hosted service to other entities.
🔀 Create a competing product: You cannot wrap the AYON backend with a different frontend and make it commercially available or use the AYON backend as a base for your commercial product.

We’re committed to providing the best path forward for a long-term and sustainable maintenance of AYON by following the key principles of FSL:

⚖️ Balance: FSL balances user freedom with the need for developer sustainability.
🛡️ Non-compete: The primary goal is to protect AYON from direct commercial competition.
⏳ Time-based: After two years, each version of the software licensed under FSL automatically converts to the Apache 2.0 or MIT license, removing all restrictions.
👐 Permissive: FSL is mostly permissive, allowing you to use, modify, and share the software for almost any purpose except directly competing with the project.
🚫 Not Copyleft: FSL is not a copyleft license and does not require you to share proprietary source code.

We believe that this change will be beneficial for the AYON community in the long run, and we appreciate your understanding. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us. We’ll have an open discussion on our public forum.

To learn more about FSL, please visit https://fsl.software/ and read the FAQ on the bottom of the page.

For those seeking more information about fair source licensing, I can highly recommend reading Chad Whitacre’s blog post at https://openpath.quest/2024/the-historical-case-for-fair-source/