Because the soup kitchen is providing a charitable service and product to a segment of the population that wouldn't otherwise be able to provide for themselves.

Now imagine if there was a "charitable" catering group that accepted donations from large corporations and used it to provide free catering near corporate events. Should they be allowed non-profit status?

The whole argument is that it matters who the end product is going to. There are a number of open source projects that mostly get donations from large corporations who are the main end-users of the software. Should they be non-profit? And there's a whole grey area in between. The IRS seems to be drawing a strong line where the authors of this article think there needs to be more of a grey area.

Personally I don't have a problem with being more liberal with non-profit for FOSS organizations. But it's certainly not as clear cut as your analogy is making it sound.

> Now imagine if there was a "charitable" catering group that accepted donations from large corporations and used it to provide free catering near corporate events. Should they be allowed non-profit status?

Are the open to the general public? Are homeless people not turned away at the door? If yes, then yes, they should be allowed non-profit status.

Just because something is theoretically open to the public, doesn't mean it's accessible or useful to the public. If the catering event is setup outside Google HQ or even in a public park in a rich or rural area it's not like a bunch of homeless people are going to show up.

The same is true for many OSS products. Yes, anyone from the public with an internet connection has access to the software. But what's the point if the software is only really applicable to certain commercial interests?

> But what's the point if the software is only really applicable to certain commercial interests?

Because it's available to all companies with the same commercial interests. OSI approved licenses are all non-discriminatory, so if you are open sourcing the software your business is built on, then the code is useful to not just your own business interests, but every company that shares your business interests, competitors included.

I think that if you're releasing software in such a non-discriminatory manner then it is for the greater good (even if that greater good is only potential) and should be eligible for non-profit status.

While the soup kitchen's meals are available to all, they specifically target the disadvantaged.

And this is a scary bad thing that forces disadvantaged to stay disadvantaged or be cut from support at once.

You like putting a bomb under your society, you just go on.