As I understand it, the prime underlying issue is that the VCV Rack project is licensed, developed & community managed in a way that leaves at least some contributors feeling (at a minimum) unappreciated, unwelcome and/or exploited.
The VCV "development team" is a single individual and it seems there are no project governance structures in place to manage risks around accountability. Dissent appears to be suppressed/hidden which leads people to enter the ecosystem/community unaware of pre-existing issues.
The VCV project does not accept outside contributions--presumably because this approach enables the developer to use both a GPL3 license (for source releases) and a commercial fee-based license (along with additional proprietary code).
The argument with regard to "exploitation" of third party developers is that it is presumed that some non-zero portion of the value which justifies the price of commercially licensed product(s) is due to the wide ecosystem of (mostly uncompensated/volunteer) third party developers who develop modules.
As far as I can tell the Cardinal project was not publicly released at the time this post was written thus its existence is not mentioned.
Editorializing: My perspective is that it seems the project is intentionally using the GPL license as a tool to create a power imbalance between the main developer & other developers which leads to the usual issues around power dynamics that occur in such situations. (As opposed to using the GPL license to protect the [combined] work produced by a community of developers who work together.)
Obviously it is the main developer's "prerogative" to act in this manner but it's reasonable for current or former community members to want to advise prospective community members of the reality of the situation so they're able to decide whether to participate in the VCV Rack community from a position of informed consent.
The introductory and concluding sections serve as context & examples of the harm that can occur to talented, passionate & creative individuals who aren't able/permitted to see the power dynamics in play until after they have already invested/participated in the community.
The VCV "development team" is a single individual and it seems there are no project governance structures in place to manage risks around accountability. Dissent appears to be suppressed/hidden which leads people to enter the ecosystem/community unaware of pre-existing issues.
The VCV project does not accept outside contributions--presumably because this approach enables the developer to use both a GPL3 license (for source releases) and a commercial fee-based license (along with additional proprietary code).
The argument with regard to "exploitation" of third party developers is that it is presumed that some non-zero portion of the value which justifies the price of commercially licensed product(s) is due to the wide ecosystem of (mostly uncompensated/volunteer) third party developers who develop modules.
Then there are specific problematic actions/events which are described in this section onward: https://aria.dog/barks/why-i-will-never-create-modules-for-v...
With regard to modules/hosting: https://vcvrack.com/manual/PluginLicensing
As far as I can tell the Cardinal project was not publicly released at the time this post was written thus its existence is not mentioned.
Editorializing: My perspective is that it seems the project is intentionally using the GPL license as a tool to create a power imbalance between the main developer & other developers which leads to the usual issues around power dynamics that occur in such situations. (As opposed to using the GPL license to protect the [combined] work produced by a community of developers who work together.)
Obviously it is the main developer's "prerogative" to act in this manner but it's reasonable for current or former community members to want to advise prospective community members of the reality of the situation so they're able to decide whether to participate in the VCV Rack community from a position of informed consent.
The introductory and concluding sections serve as context & examples of the harm that can occur to talented, passionate & creative individuals who aren't able/permitted to see the power dynamics in play until after they have already invested/participated in the community.