Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On Tue, 17 Jan 2012 13:36:46 + Gervase Markham wrote: On 13/01/12 21:31, Francesco Poli wrote: Nonetheless, all the existing GPL-incompatibilities due to the MPL v1.1, including the *unintentional* ones, won't be solved, except for the cases where the copyright holders may be tracked down, and convinced to explicitly enable the compatibility: How would you suggest distinguishing between intentional and unintentional, without tracking all the copyright holders down and asking their intentions? And, once you've tracked them down, you might as well ask permission for relicensing under plain MPL 2. I admit that I cannot think of another way to distinguish between intentional and unintentional incompatibilities. It's unfortunate that a choice had to be made between (A) fixing unintentional incompatibilities, while upsetting the authors of intentional ones and (B) fulfilling the expectations of the authors of intentional incompatibilities, while failing to fix unintentional ones I understand why (B) was chosen, but it's unfortunate that no option (C) could be devised... :-( -- http://www.inventati.org/frx/frx-gpg-key-transition-2010.txt New GnuPG key, see the transition document! . Francesco Poli . GnuPG key fpr == CA01 1147 9CD2 EFDF FB82 3925 3E1C 27E1 1F69 BFFE pgpbG9dnXwqZW.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On 13/01/12 21:31, Francesco Poli wrote: Nonetheless, all the existing GPL-incompatibilities due to the MPL v1.1, including the *unintentional* ones, won't be solved, except for the cases where the copyright holders may be tracked down, and convinced to explicitly enable the compatibility: How would you suggest distinguishing between intentional and unintentional, without tracking all the copyright holders down and asking their intentions? And, once you've tracked them down, you might as well ask permission for relicensing under plain MPL 2. That's a reasonable and convincing explanation. Unfortunately, the clause does not include some additional words to clarify this rationale. As a consequence, some people willing to modify an MPL-licensed work could feel legal uncertainty and be scared away... That's basically what I meant, when talking about legal uncertainty. This particular provision of MPL 2 is very similar to that of MPL 1.1. Therefore, I am not too worried that it will create significant legal uncertainty. This is inherent in the idea of a copyleft licence which does not necessarily cover all the code in an Executable Form. LGPLv3 section 4 does the same for the LGPL (You may convey a Combined Work under terms of your choice...). I am not sure that this is exactly the same as in the GNU LGPL. The LGPL seems to only give this permission for Combined Works, while the MPL seems to allow sublicensing even for the Executable Form of an unmodified MPL-licensed Source Code... That is true; but in practice, the difference is tiny. If we required that people modify the MPL-licensed source code before being allowed to licence it under a new licence, there are any number of trivial modifications they could make. Gerv -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/4f15796e.6080...@gerv.net
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On Thu, 12 Jan 2012 14:19:00 + Gervase Markham wrote: On 05/01/12 23:16, Francesco Poli wrote: Clause 1.5(b) fails to solve existing compatibility headaches. It disables the default (L)GPL compatibility (caused by clause 3.3) for those works that were previously incompatible because they were only licensed under the MPL v1.1 (or earlier). This means that any existing compatibility headache stays unfixed, unfortunately. As you can imagine; this was an intentional choice. Some people chose the MPL because it was GPL-incompatible; pulling the rug from under them would have been an unreasonable move. Fair enough. Nonetheless, all the existing GPL-incompatibilities due to the MPL v1.1, including the *unintentional* ones, won't be solved, except for the cases where the copyright holders may be tracked down, and convinced to explicitly enable the compatibility: they may be unreachable or they may simply not care enough to actively take action. I mean: for all the existing GPL-incompatibilities, the situation is not incredibly better than before, when the issue could already be cured through an active action by the copyright holders (dual-licensing). [...] Clause 2.3 limits the patent license grant when Covered Software is modified. This may create troubles (legal uncertainty) for people willing to modify the work (see DFSG#3). No-one is going to offer to license any and every applicable patent they own relating to a work which can be arbitrarily modified. Otherwise, it's effectively giving a licence to everyone for every patent you own, because any software can be incrementally transformed into any other software. That's a reasonable and convincing explanation. Unfortunately, the clause does not include some additional words to clarify this rationale. As a consequence, some people willing to modify an MPL-licensed work could feel legal uncertainty and be scared away... That's basically what I meant, when talking about legal uncertainty. If I understand correctly, accompanying the Executable with the Source Code is considered an acceptable way to satisfy clause 3.2(a). Also, if someone offers access to the Executable Form from a place, then offering equivalent access to Source Code from the same place (at a further charge no more than the cost of distribution) is considered another acceptable way to satisfy this clause. Both of those are corect, although in the second case, it would be wise to include a notice in the executable form about where the download location is. Thanks a lot for confirming! Clause 3.2(b) allows to sublicense the Executable Form under different terms, while the corresponding Source Code must remain available under the terms of the MPL. This is very confusing, IMHO: having Source Code and Executable forms under different licenses makes things unclear for the recipients. This is inherent in the idea of a copyleft licence which does not necessarily cover all the code in an Executable Form. LGPLv3 section 4 does the same for the LGPL (You may convey a Combined Work under terms of your choice...). I am not sure that this is exactly the same as in the GNU LGPL. The LGPL seems to only give this permission for Combined Works, while the MPL seems to allow sublicensing even for the Executable Form of an unmodified MPL-licensed Source Code... This clause states that any law or regulation doing something shall not apply to this License: how can this be enforceable? can I write a license that disables laws, by simply stating that they do not apply?!? You can do that for laws which allow it to be done. The method of resolving license ambiguities is a default rule, but can be changed by the contract itself. OK. [...] It is effectively a protection for the Contributor, who might otherwise be stuck with a problem caused by Mozilla's inability to write clear English. Yes, but it may be a problem for the licensee, which, as far as I understand Free Software, should be the ultimate target of protection. Warning for people thinking to license their own works under the terms of the MPL: you have to really trust the Mozilla Foundation to always get things right, if you decide to license anything under the MPL! As with the FSF and the GPL (if you use or later). The key difference is that, with the GPL, you may avoid using the or later mechanism. I have done so myself in many cases, since I prefer the GNU GPL v2 over the broken-copyleft of the GNU GPL v3 and I no longer trust the FSF to always publish good licenses (there are too many past examples of bad licenses published by the FSF: any version of the GFDL, AfferoGPL v3, Verbatim Copying License, ...). With the MPL the or later mechanism is active by default and cannot be disabled. [...] It's good that this is permitted, but it should have been strongly discouraged! It has been:
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On 05/01/12 23:16, Francesco Poli wrote: Clause 1.5(b) fails to solve existing compatibility headaches. It disables the default (L)GPL compatibility (caused by clause 3.3) for those works that were previously incompatible because they were only licensed under the MPL v1.1 (or earlier). This means that any existing compatibility headache stays unfixed, unfortunately. As you can imagine; this was an intentional choice. Some people chose the MPL because it was GPL-incompatible; pulling the rug from under them would have been an unreasonable move. I think that it would have been far better if the license authors had enabled (L)GPL compatibility for previously incompatible MPL-licensed works. Doing so would have instantly solved many compatibility issues that currently affect MPL-licensed works. But possibly ridden roughshod over the intentions of the author of the works. Clause 2.3 limits the patent license grant when Covered Software is modified. This may create troubles (legal uncertainty) for people willing to modify the work (see DFSG#3). No-one is going to offer to license any and every applicable patent they own relating to a work which can be arbitrarily modified. Otherwise, it's effectively giving a licence to everyone for every patent you own, because any software can be incrementally transformed into any other software. If I understand correctly, accompanying the Executable with the Source Code is considered an acceptable way to satisfy clause 3.2(a). Also, if someone offers access to the Executable Form from a place, then offering equivalent access to Source Code from the same place (at a further charge no more than the cost of distribution) is considered another acceptable way to satisfy this clause. Both of those are corect, although in the second case, it would be wise to include a notice in the executable form about where the download location is. Clause 3.2(b) allows to sublicense the Executable Form under different terms, while the corresponding Source Code must remain available under the terms of the MPL. This is very confusing, IMHO: having Source Code and Executable forms under different licenses makes things unclear for the recipients. This is inherent in the idea of a copyleft licence which does not necessarily cover all the code in an Executable Form. LGPLv3 section 4 does the same for the LGPL (You may convey a Combined Work under terms of your choice...). This clause states that any law or regulation doing something shall not apply to this License: how can this be enforceable? can I write a license that disables laws, by simply stating that they do not apply?!? You can do that for laws which allow it to be done. The method of resolving license ambiguities is a default rule, but can be changed by the contract itself. Random Googled reference: http://contractman.blogspot.com/2010/04/ambiguity.html It is effectively a protection for the Contributor, who might otherwise be stuck with a problem caused by Mozilla's inability to write clear English. Warning for people thinking to license their own works under the terms of the MPL: you have to really trust the Mozilla Foundation to always get things right, if you decide to license anything under the MPL! As with the FSF and the GPL (if you use or later). I hope that the relationship of the spirit of MPL 2.0 to MPL 1.1 should be good evidence of our benificence in this area. It's good that this is permitted, but it should have been strongly discouraged! It has been: http://www-stage.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/FAQ.html#making-my-own-license Gerv -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/4f0eebd4.4080...@gerv.net
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
Paul Wise p...@debian.org On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 12:53 AM, MJ Ray wrote: Is the headline that, in a fit of Not Invented Hear and licence proliferation, Mozilla is planning to phase out the GPL/LGPL tri-licensing? Please redirect your complaints somewhere they may have an affect, to Mozilla themselves or one of the free software oriented news outlets like lwn.net. I've submitted something similar to one of the linked pages, but I'd appreciate other debian-legal contributor opinions because this move seems too incredibly daft to be true! Regards, -- MJ Ray (slef), member of www.software.coop, a for-more-than-profit co-op. http://koha-community.org supporter, web and library systems developer. In My Opinion Only: see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Available for hire (including development) at http://www.software.coop/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/e1rili4-0005qf...@petrol.towers.org.uk
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On Wed, 04 Jan 2012 06:07:46 +0800 Paul Wise wrote: Hi all, Mozilla has released the Mozilla Public License version 2.0: http://lwn.net/Articles/474070/ http://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2012/01/03/mozilla-public-license-version-2-0-released/ https://www.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/ Hi Paul, thanks a lot for the heads up! What follows is the completed text of the final MPL v2.0, as downloaded from http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/index.txt I will send my comments later. Mozilla Public License Version 2.0 == 1. Definitions -- 1.1. Contributor means each individual or legal entity that creates, contributes to the creation of, or owns Covered Software. 1.2. Contributor Version means the combination of the Contributions of others (if any) used by a Contributor and that particular Contributor's Contribution. 1.3. Contribution means Covered Software of a particular Contributor. 1.4. Covered Software means Source Code Form to which the initial Contributor has attached the notice in Exhibit A, the Executable Form of such Source Code Form, and Modifications of such Source Code Form, in each case including portions thereof. 1.5. Incompatible With Secondary Licenses means (a) that the initial Contributor has attached the notice described in Exhibit B to the Covered Software; or (b) that the Covered Software was made available under the terms of version 1.1 or earlier of the License, but not also under the terms of a Secondary License. 1.6. Executable Form means any form of the work other than Source Code Form. 1.7. Larger Work means a work that combines Covered Software with other material, in a separate file or files, that is not Covered Software. 1.8. License means this document. 1.9. Licensable means having the right to grant, to the maximum extent possible, whether at the time of the initial grant or subsequently, any and all of the rights conveyed by this License. 1.10. Modifications means any of the following: (a) any file in Source Code Form that results from an addition to, deletion from, or modification of the contents of Covered Software; or (b) any new file in Source Code Form that contains any Covered Software. 1.11. Patent Claims of a Contributor means any patent claim(s), including without limitation, method, process, and apparatus claims, in any patent Licensable by such Contributor that would be infringed, but for the grant of the License, by the making, using, selling, offering for sale, having made, import, or transfer of either its Contributions or its Contributor Version. 1.12. Secondary License means either the GNU General Public License, Version 2.0, the GNU Lesser General Public License, Version 2.1, the GNU Affero General Public License, Version 3.0, or any later versions of those licenses. 1.13. Source Code Form means the form of the work preferred for making modifications. 1.14. You (or Your) means an individual or a legal entity exercising rights under this License. For legal entities, You includes any entity that controls, is controlled by, or is under common control with You. For purposes of this definition, control means (a) the power, direct or indirect, to cause the direction or management of such entity, whether by contract or otherwise, or (b) ownership of more than fifty percent (50%) of the outstanding shares or beneficial ownership of such entity. 2. License Grants and Conditions 2.1. Grants Each Contributor hereby grants You a world-wide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license: (a) under intellectual property rights (other than patent or trademark) Licensable by such Contributor to use, reproduce, make available, modify, display, perform, distribute, and otherwise exploit its Contributions, either on an unmodified basis, with Modifications, or as part of a Larger Work; and (b) under Patent Claims of such Contributor to make, use, sell, offer for sale, have made, import, and otherwise transfer either its Contributions or its Contributor Version. 2.2. Effective Date The licenses granted in Section 2.1 with respect to any Contribution become effective for each Contribution on the date the Contributor first distributes such Contribution. 2.3. Limitations on Grant Scope The licenses granted in this Section 2 are the only rights granted under this License. No additional rights or licenses will be implied from the distribution or licensing of Covered Software under this License. Notwithstanding Section 2.1(b) above, no patent license is granted by a Contributor: (a) for any code that a Contributor has removed from Covered Software; or (b) for infringements caused by: (i) Your and any other third party's modifications of Covered Software, or
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On Thu, 5 Jan 2012 23:58:55 +0100 Francesco Poli wrote: Here's my own personal analysis of the license text. [...] Mozilla Public License Version 2.0 == [...] 1.5. Incompatible With Secondary Licenses means (a) that the initial Contributor has attached the notice described in Exhibit B to the Covered Software; or (b) that the Covered Software was made available under the terms of version 1.1 or earlier of the License, but not also under the terms of a Secondary License. Clause 1.5(b) fails to solve existing compatibility headaches. It disables the default (L)GPL compatibility (caused by clause 3.3) for those works that were previously incompatible because they were only licensed under the MPL v1.1 (or earlier). This means that any existing compatibility headache stays unfixed, unfortunately. I think that it would have been far better if the license authors had enabled (L)GPL compatibility for previously incompatible MPL-licensed works. Doing so would have instantly solved many compatibility issues that currently affect MPL-licensed works. I personally think that making this change would have been the only real motivation to draft and publish v2.0 of the MPL: I am very disappointed that this change was *not* made. To be precise, I am disappointed that it was only made partially, through an optional mechanism (even though I acknowledge that it's an opt-out mechanism, which is better than an opt-in one...) Just to be clear, this is not a Freeness issue in itself, but a big missed opportunity to make life easier for a good number of people... [...] 1.12. Secondary License means either the GNU General Public License, Version 2.0, the GNU Lesser General Public License, Version 2.1, the GNU Affero General Public License, Version 3.0, or any later versions of those licenses. Seeing the GNU AfferoGPL listed among Secondary Licenses does not fill me with joy... I am convinced that works licensed under the GNU AfferoGPL v3.0 are non-free: see http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2007/11/msg00233.html for more details. I personally would have omitted the AfferoGPL from the list of Secondary Licenses. This is not a Freeness issue in itself, but it further weakens the MPL copyleft mechanism (which is already not particularly strong), whenever compatibility with Secondary Licenses is not disabled. [...] 2.3. Limitations on Grant Scope The licenses granted in this Section 2 are the only rights granted under this License. No additional rights or licenses will be implied from the distribution or licensing of Covered Software under this License. Notwithstanding Section 2.1(b) above, no patent license is granted by a Contributor: (a) for any code that a Contributor has removed from Covered Software; or (b) for infringements caused by: (i) Your and any other third party's modifications of Covered Software, or (ii) the combination of its Contributions with other software (except as part of its Contributor Version); or (c) under Patent Claims infringed by Covered Software in the absence of its Contributions. Clause 2.3 limits the patent license grant when Covered Software is modified. This may create troubles (legal uncertainty) for people willing to modify the work (see DFSG#3). [...] 3.2. Distribution of Executable Form If You distribute Covered Software in Executable Form then: (a) such Covered Software must also be made available in Source Code Form, as described in Section 3.1, and You must inform recipients of the Executable Form how they can obtain a copy of such Source Code Form by reasonable means in a timely manner, at a charge no more than the cost of distribution to the recipient; and If I understand correctly, accompanying the Executable with the Source Code is considered an acceptable way to satisfy clause 3.2(a). Also, if someone offers access to the Executable Form from a place, then offering equivalent access to Source Code from the same place (at a further charge no more than the cost of distribution) is considered another acceptable way to satisfy this clause. If all this is true, then I think that clause 3.2(a) is OK, and is also a significant step forward with respect to MPL v1.1, where source had to be kept online for a given amount of time, after distribution of non-source forms. (b) You may distribute such Executable Form under the terms of this License, or sublicense it under different terms, provided that the license for the Executable Form does not attempt to limit or alter the recipients' rights in the Source Code Form under this License. Clause 3.2(b) allows to sublicense the Executable Form under different terms, while the corresponding Source Code must remain available under the terms of the MPL. This is very confusing, IMHO: having Source Code and Executable forms under different licenses
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
Paul Wise p...@debian.org Mozilla has released the Mozilla Public License version 2.0: http://lwn.net/Articles/474070/ http://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2012/01/03/mozilla-public-license-version-2-0-released/ https://www.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/ Is the headline that, in a fit of Not Invented Hear and licence proliferation, Mozilla is planning to phase out the GPL/LGPL tri-licensing? What are they thinking and are some independent bodies criticising this move? Sadly, it appears that FSF and OSI have approved :-( Concerning the licence itself because I expect there's some software which hasn't been iced yet: it appears to be a combined copyright and patent licence with all the usual problems of exporting software patents to non-swpat jurisdictions and terminating if you sue any contributor for non-software patent infringement. The saving grace is that it appears that most things under MPL 2.0 can be combined with a Hello World to convert to a GNU *GPL. Disappointed, -- MJ Ray (slef), member of www.software.coop, a for-more-than-profit co-op. http://koha-community.org supporter, web and library systems developer. In My Opinion Only: see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Available for hire (including development) at http://www.software.coop/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/e1riu5d-0002as...@petrol.towers.org.uk
Re: Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 12:53 AM, MJ Ray wrote: Is the headline that, in a fit of Not Invented Hear and licence proliferation, Mozilla is planning to phase out the GPL/LGPL tri-licensing? Please redirect your complaints somewhere they may have an affect, to Mozilla themselves or one of the free software oriented news outlets like lwn.net. -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/caktje6gej4cswjcjpogvfnx3+0prxkp+cxqvkkqzulfutmn...@mail.gmail.com
Mozilla Public License 2.0 released
Hi all, Mozilla has released the Mozilla Public License version 2.0: http://lwn.net/Articles/474070/ http://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2012/01/03/mozilla-public-license-version-2-0-released/ https://www.mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/ -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
