Redis loses contributors as Valkey emerges from license change

In March 2024, Redis, a popular in-memory data structure store, changed its licensing model from the three-clause BSD to dual licensing under the Redis Source Available License v2 and the Server Side Public License. This unexpected shift, announced by CEO Rowan Trollope, aimed to ensure sustainable use but disallowed cloud service providers from utilizing Redis source code for free. The alteration led to significant repercussions in the developer community, with a steep decline in external contributions. According to statistics shared at the Monki Gras conference in London, the number of non-employee contributors dropped dramatically following the license change, indicating a fracture in the relationship between Redis and its external developer community. To address this gap, Madelyn Olson and Zhao Zhao, two core team members affected by the changes, quickly launched the Valkey project under a more permissive BSD 3-clause license, aiming to create an open-source equivalent that fosters inclusivity and collaboration. Olson, formerly with Redis, expressed her frustration over the license change during the conference, noting her efforts to contribute to the engine over several years. Valkey has since gathered a diverse set of maintainers from major tech companies such as Amazon, Google, and Alibaba, striving to hold meetings allowing broader community engagement, including the use of AI translation for non-English speakers. The situation mirrors broader concerns in the open-source community regarding