Quoting Clark C. Evans ([email protected]): > The FSF considers works released under CC0 to be "Free Software" [1], > but, the rationale for this determination was never disclosed. Perhaps > because anyone could sue for patent infringement regardless of > copyright?
I might point out, too, in passing, that requiring the licensor to grant a royalty-free licence to any applicable patents has limited utility in even the rosiest scenario, as licensees could turn right around and be hit up for royalties on someone _eles's_ patents over techniques the code uses. It's arguable that patent peace clauses _can_ be good strategy, but I'd urge being careful to consider whether the specific clause one has in mind is going to achieve one's aims without excessive collateral damage. > The OSI couldn't come to an agreement on the fallback license, since it > explicitly withheld patent rights [2]. Well, sort of. My recollection is that some of the folks on license-review including me merely suggested to CC that they should consider just dropping the withholding-patent-rights language completely (for the reasons cited in OSI's FAQ). I don't think anyone on license-review said it was, to borrow the expression, a deal-breaker, just a bad idea to put into a licence generally. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss
