> that author have all the rights to impose all further restrictions they want
But, then, why did they distribute it under a license that directly conflicts with that? The authors have sent two conflicting messages: that you can remove additional restrictions and that you are bound by them. How is the user supposed to act when given permission by the authors to do something the authors prohibit?
I'm not disagreeing with you, as an author I would not have risked something like this, but let me try:
- maybe the authors wanted the "AGPLv3 look it's open source!" label
- maybe the authors liked the restrictions that come with AGPLv3 (if you use a modified version on a server, we want the modified source code "back")
- maybe the authors wanted to built upon a license they perceive as strong and solid
- maybe the authors haven't thoroughly checked the AGPLv3 and weren't aware of this particular clause, or actually decided they could add limitations anyway
- writing a license is hard so maybe they didn't want to roll their own
I personally think the Commons Clause license is a bad thing with a bad name, and is only going to wreck havoc and muddy the waters. Widespread open source / free software licenses are complete, self-contained work and internally coherent, adding stuff on top of them is only going to be fragile.
> - maybe the authors liked the restrictions that come with AGPLv3 (if you use a modified version on a server, we want the modified source code "back")
It's not a restriction, and it's not about the upstream author: the modifications are available to every user (so they can be sure what is done with their data, as one example). As any GPL, this is about user rights, not developer rights.
> - maybe the authors haven't thoroughly checked the AGPLv3 and weren't aware of this particular clause, or actually decided they could add limitations anyway
I'm betting on this one. AGPL makes sense if you want to force anyone using your software to release their enhancements to their users. You, as the original author, retain the right to license it under a different license to your own users (so they don't get the exact source code to the services they are using remotely).
Picking a license is hard and should be done carefully, because the license you pick can have permanent effects on what you can do with your own software.
Larry Ellison, for instance, didn't realize he just couldn't kill MySQL just because he became its owner when he acquired Sun.
But, then, why did they distribute it under a license that directly conflicts with that? The authors have sent two conflicting messages: that you can remove additional restrictions and that you are bound by them. How is the user supposed to act when given permission by the authors to do something the authors prohibit?