Summary
GoModel is currently released under the permissive MIT license. We want to keep it open and practical for developers, small teams, and independent projects. There are two cases where we may revisit licensing in the future:- We may make the license less permissive to protect the project from extraction by large cloud providers.
- We may use a different license for enterprise-grade features to keep the project sustainable.
Full story
An AI gateway is infrastructure. It sits between every request your application makes and every model it talks to. That kind of component should be something you can read, audit, extend, and trust. This is why GoModel is open source today. That said, we want to be upfront about the future. There are two reasons the license could change down the road.1. Protecting the project
There is a well-documented pattern where large cloud providers take open-source infrastructure, ship it as a managed service, and give nothing back. It has forced other projects to react:- MongoDB changed to the SSPL after AWS launched DocumentDB, a compatible managed service built on MongoDB’s work.
- Elastic moved to a dual license after AWS launched its own Elasticsearch service under the OpenSearch name.
- Redis switched to a source-available license citing similar concerns about cloud providers.
2. Sustainability
Building GoModel is how we make a living. Right now the project is fully open source, and we intend to keep it that way for as long as possible. If licensing changes ever happen, they will target companies that profit directly from the project, not individual developers or small teams building with it.Current license
You can always read the current license here.