Vitalik Buterin: “The era of just saying please is over.
Ethereum’s co-founder just flipped the script on open source.
Vitalik Buterin — once a fan of permissive licenses — now says crypto devs should go copyleft.
Licenses like GPL and CC-BY-SA that require forks and derivatives to stay open.
No more optional sharing. No more corporate freeloading.
Why now?
Because Big Tech is watching.
He called out names like Google and Huawei,
accusing them of taking from the open-source stack without giving back.
And he’s not wrong — the crypto space has shifted.
It’s no longer just cypherpunks and hackers.
It’s mercenary builders, VC-funded stacks, and closed-source infra chasing yield.
What does “copyleft” do?
It turns copyright against itself —
forcing anyone who builds on top of your work to share theirs too.
Vitalik calls it “hard power” for open software.
A way to protect the values Ethereum was built on — not just trust that everyone plays nice.
His message to devs?
“The argument for open source cannot just rely on ‘please.’”
You want access? Open up your code too.
Permissionless doesn’t have to mean powerless.
🔥 So where does this go now?
Is this the start of a new licensing wave in DeFi, NFTs, even L2s?
👇 Should crypto projects mandate openness through licenses?
Or does that kill the freedom open source was meant to protect?
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