Okay, I guess I see that.
I didn't see it as entirely a case of moral positioning.
In the example that I created, if I were a member of
ethnic group, I would feel like I were not as welcome
to use the software as others are. Moreover, depending
on what exactly was said, I might also find it
Well, the copy attached to Sean's introductory email (also
on his web site) states among other things: ..the most
expendable, unimportant engineers work on GPL software and
the better software engineers work on BSDL-licensed
software.
In a gift economy / meritocracy like ours, that's just about
I think this change is mostly-positive. The only negative
aspect that I see is that it's twice as long as the previous
revision. AFL 1.2 had stricken a nice balance between
brevity and precision.
May I suggest that, alongside AFL 2.0, you publish one last
license in the AFL 1.x series, based on
For cases 2 and 3: who is to say that I haven't, in the past, distributed
the code to someone else and they happened to distribute a copy back to me?
For that matter, did I really get it directly from you, or did I get it from
someone else, who was redistributing it under the GPL?
If you're
So, is this template ready to be put before the board and considered for
approval? Is there anything that should change before this happens? Can I
assume that, if someone was strongly against this template, I would have
heard about it by now?
One final question: should this be published with
So far, no discussion. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
http://www.geocities.com/brucedodson.rm/hist_pnd.htm
Regards,
Bruce
- Original Message -
From: Bruce Dodson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Saturday, November 09, 2002 12:11 AM
Subject: discuss: approval request
[ Please discuss this template. It's a clever idea. You'd have
thought that someone would have thought of it before. Bruce has
sent a few changes since his submission. Please consult his web page
(URL at bottom) for the exact current submission. -russ ]
I would like to ask that the following
The pain you speak of, is this from a purely legal stand point?
If so, in what manner does it hinder or cause pain to an end user?
I'm not a lawyer so I never speak from a legal standpoint, even when I'm
talking about licenses. The pain is from a technical standpoint. If I make
a modification
Is it true that changing proper names is not a problem? I had always been
of the impression that, e.g. I couldn't just use the Apache License, change
the proper names, and call my software OSI Certified.
- Original Message -
From: John Cowan [EMAIL PROTECTED]
I urge you instead to see
What should one expect as a reasonable time period between the sumission of
a license-approval request, and some acknowledgement that the request has
been made?
--
Background:
On November 6, I wrote to license-discuss suggesting that the style of
permission notice used in Python 1.5, OGDI,
I understand that, Russ, and I have a great respect for the work that you
do. The role of filter is not a glamorous one. It certainly isn't a job
that I would want, and yet there you are, doing it.
I was just looking for an ACK that my email hadn't been eaten by your junk
mail filter or
The QPL uses the same tactic to control distribution of customized versions
of Qt. But this creates is a pain for developers and end-users alike. At
least your term #8 provides an alternative, changing this requirement to
distribute patches into something that's optional. But it's confusing the
Just remember, if I can't sell your stuff, it ain't open source.
extrapolate some of the benefits of the GPL. I have worked for
companies that will not use free software for fear of tainting their
development efforts and having their propietary code made free. [CFC]
Yes, there are companies
From: Chris F Clark [EMAIL PROTECTED]
It is more to discourage commercial users from using the open source
version. [CFC]
I don't know if you're going to see much support here for a license that
discourages use of the open source version, by any particular group. We
want to encourage the use
The amount of damages that courts would award might vary considerably from
one jurisdiction to the next, even if the license is interpreted exactly the
same way. Without naming any names wink, some countries are just more
litigious than others; some courts, more punitive.
- Original Message
with the warranty. I would no longer let
it stop me from using AFL in situations where I might currently use MIT or
Apache-style licenses.
bruce
- Original Message -
From: Lawrence E. Rosen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: 'Bruce Dodson' [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Thursday, November
From: Mike Nordell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Bruce Dodson top-posted:
Derivative Works means derivative works based upon the Original Work,
as
upposed to derivative works based upon Marvel Comics characters, or
derivative works based upon previously-unreleased Elvis tracks.
Since the definition
I disagree. (I know, I do that a lot, but I mean well.)
It's best if licenses are simply either approved or not approved. There is
no list of licenses that have been rejected or withdrawn; that would be
punitive. By the same token, there should be no special status given to
licenses in limbo.
I would like to suggest that a license template like the one below be put
forward for approval by the OSI board.
This is not really intended for new software. Nevertheless it's pragmatic
to approve it since many OSD-compliant licenses follow this template.
Examples include Scintilla/SciTE,
It seems clear to me, yet another non-lawyer:
Derivative Works means derivative works based upon the Original Work, as
upposed to derivative works based upon Marvel Comics characters, or
derivative works based upon previously-unreleased Elvis tracks.
Prepare - it doesn't say to prepare yourself
I can offer something without entering a relationship with each recipient.
I have software published on SourceForge; I entered into an agreement with
SourceForge but I have no relationship with the people who downloaded my
stuff from there. The people who downloaded might or might not have a
disagree? Also, does it give a different answer for software
than for cats?
- Original Message -
From: Lawrence E. Rosen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: 'John Cowan' [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 'Bruce Dodson'
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 'David Johnson' [EMAIL PROTECTED];
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent
I took it to mean any technical documentation which is provided by a
licensor, which may make the source code more accessible to a licensee.
Then you would be compelled to provide such documentation as was provided to
you when you received your copy of the source code. So, access in the
sense of
(Larry said...)
Not if it ain't a Derivative Work, I'd say.
...
What do you think?
I think the same. Common sense tells me that a book that isn't a derivative
work should be outside the scope of the contract. This concept is probably
non-technical enough that even a judge would be able to
I like the revised AFL. It's getting to the point where I may even use it.
I have just one concern, and that is with the warranty of copyright which
appears in both of these licenses. I think there must be a better way to
achieve that - it smells like a cludge to me - but since I'm not a lawyer
I don't know if this is quite what Larry was saying, but I for one consider
it an unfair tactic to try to discourage RSW from seeking approval. Russ
and other board members may think he is misguided in believing that others
will want to use his license, and might even be right, but that does not
For what it's worth, so far Netscape has been very responsible and careful
about not making ad-hoc changes to their license. Look at the trouble
they've been going to recently, to try and get all of their code
MPL/GPL/LGPL tri-licensed. It would have been easy to take advantage of
their right
they said. Too
much was said in private email for me to form an opinion. I can only look
to the result, which was an RSW discouraged to the point where he was ready
to say have a nice life and walk away.
Bruce
- Original Message -
From: Lawrence E. Rosen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: 'Bruce Dodson
In one of my licenses, I use the phrase the copyright holders and
contributing authors instead of my own name, in the disclaimers. The BSD
license says copyright holders and contributors, and the AFL goes one step
further, saying licensor, contributors, and copyright owners. (I think
licensor
I have published software under an MIT-style License, and I don't know if
that makes a good contract or not, but I get the feeling that it's pretty
vague, and that I might be better off to treat it as a permission notice and
not enter into contracts with all my users.
This ties back to recent
I kept my own email short because I knew there were other people, better
qualified to speak on this. Rod, thanks for stepping forward. You
presented the facts more thoroughly than I could. By the way, although you
say you disagree with me, I don't think I disagree with you. I'm not sure
I thought that section 117 was about the right to crack a program's copy
protection (if necessary) in order to make a legitimate backup copy. Well,
that's an oversimplification, but I think it's closer to the truth than Mr.
Bernstein's argument. It goes to show that you shouldn't believe every
Er, I agree. :-). But, as an open source author, does the limitation of
liability protect me? The contract that the end user clicked is between the
distributor and the end user; does it protect the original developer, who is
a third-party? (Or is the distributor is seen as an agent,
Here, here. I agree completely that this would be absurd. Yet I still
worry. Hopefully the law will eventually agree with us on this point.
In Canada we have a good samaritan law; I don't know whether something
like that exists in the USA. The good samaritan law says that, in an
Let me try to make it clear that I know the good samaritan laws don't apply
to software or any other non-emergency situation - only for emergencies,
where the time it takes to get a waiver signed could otherwise cost a life
(or a house). I am also quite aware that liability has nothing to do
[Whew!] I'm glad I checked this again before going to bed.
From now on until this approval process is done, I will talk about my
WILLINGNESS to make changes here on the list first, but I will not actually
MAKE the changes until someone from OSI tells me whether that will help or
harm my bid for
I made a revision to the SHPTRANS License Template.
http://gisdeveloper.tripod.com/shptrans_license_template.html
The changes are highlighted in the HTML.
For those looking at the text version which Russ posted:
I reversed the order of the first two conditions, got rid of the required
brief
I thought this process was one in which the license is submitted for
discussion, minor revisions are made if needed, and the license is
eventually accepted or rejected.
From your web page describing the approval process: 6. At the same time, we
will monitor the license-discuss list and work with
If copyright statute says that all rights not explicitly granted are
reserved to the copyright holder, doesn't that mean the user ought to have
gone looking for a license to make sure they had the right to use it? If
the premise is that you are not aware, then the assumption should be that
you
So far there have been no comments on the list since I submitted this
template for approval. I have tried to address the concerns raised in the
previous discussions (copyleft lite? and simple copyleft...) Perhaps
those who had suggestions for the previous versions could tell me whether I
I think the GPL itself would be fine for web pages, as long as you make it
clear that your page content is source code as far as you're concerned. You
can do that by putting the GPL's license notice in a comment block. But the
trouble there, I guess, is that GPL's idea of linkage doesn't mesh
Thanks for your help with the license template, folks. Although my last few
revisions have not generated any discussion on the list itself, helpful
comments have continued to trickle in through private email. I have now
submitted my license template to the OSI for approval. In case you want
Zacharias [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: Bruce Dodson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
CC: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: open source applications with closed source components
Date: Mon, 15 Jul 2002 16:59:28 -0400
MIME-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v482)
Received: from ns.crynwr.com ([192.203.178.14]) by
mc1-f39.law16
Do your recipients have permission to distribute the two closed-source
frameworks freely with their apps?
--
license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3
Thanks for the feedback so far!
By without fee I meant that copyright holder(s) were not imposing a fee;
this was confusing and unnecessary so I removed it.
I see what you meant meant about the rights not specifically granted are
reserved being superfluous. I've removed it for now, but might
) ARISING IN ANY
WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF
THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
The recipient must assume the entire risk of using this software.
- Original Message -
From: Andy Tai [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: Bruce Dodson [EMAIL PROTECTED];
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent
I'm trying for a simple, easy-to-read license with some degree of copyleft.
I hope it will be compatible with the GPL also. Please take a look at the
following, and help me find any flaws.
Thanks,
Bruce
__
software program name.
Copyright (c) year(s) copyright holder(s). All
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