Re: [License-discuss] I've been asked to license my open source project CC0

[David Woolley]

On 07/11/17 17:09, Shahar Or wrote:

Is there good reason for this request, at all? I mean, can they not 
otherwise depend on my software, if their software is CC0 licensed?

When I conveyed my reluctance it was suggested that I dual-license.


Dual licensing is pointless, as CC0 is always more permissive, so there 
is really no point in anyone using the alternative licence.


Please request the person making this request to indemnify you against 
all actions for damages as a result of using the software, and ensure 
they have the resources to back that indemnity.


The reason for not using CC0 is that open source licences generally 
always include a waiver of warranty as part of the conditions of the 
licence.

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Re: [License-discuss] Is Sun Identity Manager (Oracle Waveset) Open Source compliant ?

[David Woolley]

On 11/08/17 09:33, Ilona A.M. Fleck wrote:


I am posting this question in the assumption that there is a register of
all products which are compliant.


There is a list of approved licenses, not of approved products.  Vetting 
products for compliance with upstream licences would not be possible for 
a not for profit with no mechanism for charging fees.

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Re: [License-discuss] New maintainer, changing license?

[David Woolley]

On 29/07/17 10:27, Johnny A. Solbu wrote:

The copyright holder stopped working on the project in 2005.
I am continuing the development, but do not have the copyright.


You should get the copyright owner to assign copyright to you, as, 
currently, no-one is able to enforce the licence except for non-trivial 
parts of the code contributed by third parties, given the current owner 
seems to have lost interest.


If it is an important project, the FSF might also be willing to buy the 
copyright for a token amount (one cent or one dollar), but I think that 
would require that right in all contributions have been assigned to the 
original owner.

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Re: [License-discuss] New maintainer, changing license?

[David Woolley]

On 29/07/17 09:38, Johnny A. Solbu wrote:

I am the new upstream maintainer of the cd ripper Grip


What do you mean by the maintainer?  If you are the actual copyright 
owner, you can distribute it under any licence you like, as long as you 
continue to honour requests to supply the source code for versions you 
previously distributed.


To the extent that you do not own the copyright in any particular file, 
you can redistribute that file under the relevant version 3 licence.


If you have accepted non-trivial changes without copyright being 
assigned to you, or the right to re-licence, you do not fully own the 
copyright in the affected files and cannot make an arbitrary change of 
licence, but can still upgrade to version 3.




The code licence is stated as follows:

==
 * This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
 * modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as
 * published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the
 * License, or (at your option) any later version.
==
Some files are licenced under the Lesser GPL, with the same type of terms 
saying that one can use a later version.

My question is: Does this mean that I can change it to say it's released under 
GPL version 3 and later?



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Re: [License-discuss] GPLv1?

[David Woolley]

On 18/06/17 15:59, Thorsten Glaser wrote:

is it deliberate or accident that the GPLv1 is not on
https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical ? What’s
the stance on it?


My guess is that it was already deprecated before the OSI approval 
process was set up, so FSF didn't submit it for approval.


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Re: [License-discuss] patent rights and the OSD

[David Woolley]

On 07/03/17 13:30, Christopher Sean Morrison wrote:

It left me blinking too.  Which OSD clause requires the distribution terms to 
permit use?


I believe that position here is that OSD only covers copyright licensing 
and that US copyright law gives permission to use software (for 
copyright purposes) to anyone with a copy.  UK law does require an 
explicit use permission.


Because it is US-centric, there was no conception that you might need to 
give an explicit permission to use.

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Re: [License-discuss] OSI equivalent

[David Woolley]

On 15/02/17 16:58, Karan, Cem F CIV USARMY RDECOM ARL (US) wrote:

Does OSI have a license compatibility chart for the various approved licenses?


I would have thought that any such document would constitute legal 
advice, which is illegal for half the list members to provide, and the 
other half would only provide in the context of their specific client's 
circumstances.

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Re: [License-discuss] step by step interpretation of common permissive licenses

[David Woolley]

On 18/01/17 15:26, John Cowan wrote:

Pace David Woolley, it is not only the *changes* but the *entire*
derivative work of which you are the copyright owner.  Of course you
cannot prevent the making of other derivative works under license from
the original author.


That doesn't seem to be the US Government position, at least during the 
last administration. To me <https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ14.pdf> 
says that you only own the new bits, and, in fact, if you want to 
register the copyright, you must specifically identify in which bits you 
have copyright and in which you don't.

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Re: [License-discuss] step by step interpretation of common permissive licenses

[David Woolley]

On 17/01/17 16:44, Massimo Zaniboni wrote:

every change to A made by B is automatically owned by B author, thanks
to Berne Convention


Not entirely true. Only significant changes are owned by B. De minis and 
obvious changes don't attract an independent copyright.


More generally on this topic, the requirement to include the copyright 
and licence in the permissive licences is only really codifying best 
practice.  That's especially true for open source derivatives, where the 
implied warranty that the supplier has the right to issue the end user 
licence, or even distribute the software, is being waived.


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Re: [License-discuss] Using opensource in a company not in the software business

[David Woolley]

On 28/11/16 10:23, FREJAVILLE Etienne wrote:

Second, I would like to understand what 'distribution' stands for.


Giving the software to your customer constitutes distribution, and will 
generally trigger any rights they have under the open source licence.

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Re: [License-discuss] Creative Commons vs private content

[David Woolley]

On 21/10/16 13:47, Stephen Paul Weber wrote:

Any license that divides the world into groups of "these people may see this work, 
but those other people may not"


That doesn't even sound like the job for a license, but for a privacy policy / 
terms of use.


Licenses are terms of use!

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Re: [License-discuss] Source-attribution licenses and Javascript compatibility

[David Woolley]

On 20/05/16 03:06, Andi McClure wrote:

 "For purposes of the above license, 'source' is defined as the
preferred form for making modifications to the code. In other words,
minified Javascript which is not intended to be modified does not count
as a 'source distribution'."

…and if I included such a clarifying paragraph outside the license,
would I break the magical spell of OSI compliance which zlib normally has?


I think any such phrase would be treated as part of the licence, not 
"outside" it.  Text that appears outside the licence is generally in the 
form of a statement of the intent of the licence, not a definition of 
terms used, e.g. the preamble to the GPLs.


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Re: [License-discuss] BSD 3-clause and copyright notices

[David Woolley]

On 02/10/15 10:22, Gervase Markham wrote:

* Pick a project license which does not require attribution (that
basically means a Public Domain dedication); or



Public domain dedication is impossible in Europe.  There is some doubt 
as whether it is even possible in the USA.  The nearest you would get is 
something like CC0, which attempts to disclaim as much IPR as it is 
possible to disclaim.

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Re: [License-discuss] Source code distribution for web application dual licensed under GNU GPL Affero Public License? [closed]

[David Woolley]

On 16/09/15 22:34, Kevin Fleming wrote:

The statement 'dual licensed' is illogical here, as only only license is
named (AGPLv3)


In fact, the upstream has made such a mess of the license file, that the 
OP really needs to contact them directly, to clarify the licence terms 
and make sure that they had actually understood the licensing on any 
third party code they used.


If they had actually complied with the licence, the LICENSE file would 
have contained the actual legal text of the Affero licence.

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Re: [License-discuss] Category "B" licenses at Apache

[David Woolley]

On 26/08/15 01:45, Tzeng, Nigel H. wrote:

Larry,

Scenario A:   I’m looking for an example in my codebase on how to do Foo
(of course) and I find a code snippet to do roughly what I want.  I cut
and paste it into where I need it, modify it slightly and move on.
  Developers do this all the time.


The purpose of open source is to allow them to do this legally.  Coders 
who do this all the time on published code that doesn't have an open 
source type licence are continually infringing copyright.


One of the main reasons for the GPL is to ensure a large pool of code 
that cane be re-used and re-purposed, whilst, at the same time ensuring 
that the resulting code goes back into the pool.


Scenario B:  I am debugging some code and find a spot where an if test
should be <= bar rather than < bar.  I fix it while inside the debugger


That change is going to have insufficient creative content to have any 
copyright associated with it.  So all you have demonstrated there is 
that your organisation's configuration control procedures are broken and 
their ISO 9000 status may need revoking.  In any case, typical copyleft 
licences permit the use of modified versions within an organisation.



without realizing that it was in the Category B module.  Since I’m
modifying the Apache product quite a bit anyway was not immediately
obvious that when I checked my changes into the local repo for the
Apache product that I made a change in the Category B module.  Maybe I
simply never knew or had forgotten that I had to be aware there was a
category B module.


I believe another intent of the GPL Is that people should be able to 
debug and repair the code that they possess.





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Re: [License-discuss] Option to fall back from GPL to ASL

[David Woolley]

On 25/08/15 22:26, Richard Eckart de Castilho wrote:

The vendors of BAR also offer a commercial license for BAR. If somebody buys 
that license, we want them to be able to use FOO under the commercial-friendly 
ASL terms without having to give them any extra permission. Right now, those 
people would still face the GPL label on FOO even though they removed it for 
themselves from BAR by buying a license.


This only becomes an issue if they want to redistribute the code linked 
against BAR, or want to redistribute a version of the code that only 
works with BAR.  The GPL does not restrict modification or linking 
within an organisation.  It's intent is only to ensure that when it is 
passed to a third party they can modify and rebuild it without being 
forced to pay for other licences and without being dependent on code 
that they are unable to see or modify.

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Re: [License-discuss] Syntax for AUTHORS.txt

[David Woolley]

On 22/08/15 17:00, Nuno Brito wrote:

Is there something else missing to be considered or included?


Country.   This can affect the copyright regime that applies to that author.
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Re: [License-discuss] Fwd: Question regarding GNU Terms of use

[David Woolley]

On 18/06/15 13:27, Riccardo Ciullo wrote:



I am writing to you because I have a doubt regarding GNU/MIT terms of
use, which I hope you can clarify:  what happens if someone creates a
_new system_ by using a _combination_ of (more than one) existing
softwares covered by the GNU/MIT public license (or other free software
licenses)? Will he be able to i) _commercialize _ this new


Suggesting that open source and commercializable are mutually exclusive 
won't get you much sympathy on this list.  That's even true for strong 
copyleft.


Even Microsoft have open source software in their products:  a recent 
version of IE has BSD, JPEG, ISC, and Apache licensed material in it, 
and Windows Server 2003 also had MIT licensed material.  I imagine that 
the core of Windows still has, but I couldn't find the third party 
credits document for a later version.


RedHat has built a large business on top of what is almost entirely open 
source and for which they provide all the source code.


Google and the mobile phone companies have made a lot out similar set of 
components, together with open source Java from Google itself; it's 
called Android.


Tivo and other set top box manufacturers have maybe half the code as 
open source (again Linux so again the same sort of mix) and they have to 
release the modified source code for those parts.



system/product, characterized by a totally new application if compared
with the used source codes (covered by the relevant open license),
without facing any infringement of the license?  and ii) will he be able
to prohibit no-authorized parties to copy it, use it, sell it, etc in
the market?


Again, you won't get a lot of sympathy here, but MIT licensed material 
fully supports that, as the only obligations are to acknowledge the 
original copyright owner, not to take their name in vain, and not to 
hold them responsible.


GPL is more complex.  Generally if the GPL code is sufficiently at arms 
length from the proprietary code that glues it together, or forms 
another part of the application, the proprietary code remains the 
exclusive copyright of its owners.  The GPLed code and modified versions 
of it are covered by the GPL and you must provide the source code of 
those parts, and cannot restrict the use of that source code.


The authors of the GPL generally take the position that if the code is 
statically or dynamically linked, or any part is physically included in 
the input to a compiler, it is covered by the GPL and if the 
relationship is like that of shelling out to a Unix shell command, or 
via a network connection or file, it probably isn't.  However, if you 
have any uncertainty about the meaning of GPL, you should employ a 
qualified lawyer to analyze whether your intended use is compatible.


The people who use MIT and BSD licences want maximum exploitation of 
their original code.  The GPL people also want to prevent proprietary 
forks of their code.


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Re: [License-discuss] Fwd: Question regarding GNU Terms of use

[David Woolley]

On 18/06/15 14:42, Kevin Fleming wrote:

In that situation, the person who produced the new work will *not* be
able to restrict copy, use, sale, etc. of the new work, since it is a
derived work of the GPL- and/or MIT-licensed original works. The
combined work's license will necessarily need to be compatible with (if
not identical to) the licenses on the works that were used to produce it.


The MIT licence imposes none of those restrictions.  The GPL only 
applies to that part covered by the GPL, which may be larger the 
incoming GPL content.




If by 'commercialize' you mean 'offer for sale', yes, the person could
certainly offer the combined work for sale.


As do RedHat, even with a horizontal product.  It is even easier with 
vertical products.



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Re: [License-discuss] Shortest copyleft licence

[David Woolley]

On 01/04/15 22:17, Rick Moen wrote:

Quoting David Woolley (for...@david-woolley.me.uk):




A significant number of postings on this list are from people who
are trying to interpret GPL in a way that would be inconsistent with
any CC-like summary of it.  Those people would still try to find
loopholes based on the full licence, not the lay summary.


IMO, their pain is a happy accident.

So, basically, what's your point?  I believe Nigel's audience of concern
was reasonable people seeking to understand a legal instrument, not
rules-lawyering proprietary software businesspeople.


It means he may think that the licence is preventing the sort of 
commercial exploitation he doesn't like, but the commercial exploiter 
will ignore the words he is relying on and instead exploit based on 
their attempt to re-interpet the letter of the formal licence.


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Re: [License-discuss] Shortest copyleft licence

[David Woolley]

On 01/04/15 15:37, Tzeng, Nigel H. wrote:

CC-BY-SA

Sufficiently apolitical for me without manifestos, widely accepted and
used.


It gets political by the second word of the full form of CC!  Common 
ownership of intellectual property is definitely a political goal.


A more complete manifesto can be found in 
.

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Re: [License-discuss] Shortest copyleft licence

[David Woolley]

On 01/04/15 18:32, Tzeng, Nigel H. wrote:

Have I read all the legalese behind the CC licenses?  No.  I trust the
brand and while I have perused some just as a sanity check I also realize
that I¹m not a lawyer and I would miss the nuances anyway.

So I depend that the CC organization has put forth a best effort in making
sure the human-readable summaries match the legal text.


A significant number of postings on this list are from people who are 
trying to interpret GPL in a way that would be inconsistent with any 
CC-like summary of it.  Those people would still try to find loopholes 
based on the full licence, not the lay summary.


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Re: [License-discuss] Reverse Engineering and Open Source Licenses

[David Woolley]

On 10/03/15 23:53, John Cowan wrote:

You didn't buy the software.  You bought a piece of hardware with a
>single copy.

By that definition, I don't buy books either, but that turns out not to
be the case.



You can buy a book (i.e. hardware consisting of paper and ink), but you 
can't buy the novel that it contains (the author will not assign 
copyright to you).


Incidenally, UK publishers do, or at least did, put constraints on the 
resale of books (not to be sold or lent in any cover other than the 
original).


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Re: [License-discuss] Reverse Engineering and Open Source Licenses

[David Woolley]

On 10/03/15 16:55, co...@ccil.org wrote:

I've bought software exactly once, a boxed set of
Red Hat Linux back in 1999.


You didn't buy the software.  You bought a piece of hardware with a 
single copy.  Red Hat don't even have the right to sell most of Linux as 
people like the FSF own it.


A lot of what you were probably trying to say is US specific, as it 
relates to the first sale doctrine.

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Re: [License-discuss] [FTF-Legal] Reverse Engineering and Open Source Licenses

[David Woolley]

On 06/03/15 09:09, Reincke, Karsten wrote:

Why do I only say ‘very similar’ instead of ‘equal’. The problem with your 
summary is this: you do not talk about the license text! Your term “combined 
work” DOES NOT OCOUR in


The problem with your approach is that you do not talk about the spirit 
of the licence.


I believe the intent is that you should have access to enough 
information to be able to modify the LGPLed parts and still have a 
working piece of software.  If it turns that you have tightened the 
interface specification for the LGPLed work, and that breaks the 
composite work, you must have right to use invasive debuggers to 
discover in what way the proprietary work is now no longer compatible.


What I think you are doing is looking for mistakes in the drafting, to 
help you defeat the spirit of the licence, although I also think you are 
doing so on a misunderstanding of how much information the user is 
actually required to be allowed to access.


I should point out that the authors of the licence discourage its use, 
because they believe that it is almost always better to work with the 
full GPL.



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Re: [License-discuss] Reverse Engineering and Open Source Licenses

[David Woolley]

On 04/03/15 15:16, Reincke, Karsten wrote:


In the past I was involved in some full discussions concerning the issue
‘reverse engineering and open source licenses’. Although personally
esteeming and inspiring, such discussions sometimes became a bit
explosive: If – at least – the LGPL-v2 indeed requires to allow the
reverse engineering of those programs which use LGPL-v2 licensed
components, then companies are not able to protect these ‘private’
programs against revealing the embedded business relevant secrets, even
if they do not distribute the corresponding source code. And – as far as
I know – at least some companies have therefore forbidden to link
essential programs against the LGPL-v2.


From my lay point of view, this appears to be under very limited 
conditions. My gut feeling is that the fact that you are in the EEC 
means that recipients have more rights to reverse engineer under EU law 
than they have under the terms of this licence, and both are trying to 
achieve similar aims, which is to allow third party code to interface 
with the software.




I have taken the view that this ‘rule of reverse engineering’ cannot be
applied  in case of distributing dynamically linkable programs. By
arguing that way,  I caused astonishment and dissents. But often, I was


The status of dynamically linked programs is a hot topic in the open 
source community.  The Free Software Foundation, who created the GPL, 
essentially takes the view that dynamic linking has the same copyright 
status as static linking.  A number of frequent posters on this list 
disagree with that interpretation.



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Re: [License-discuss] Fwd: Query whether BSD Licence liability disclaimer is "viral".

[David Woolley]

On 14/02/15 01:37, Savva Kerdemelidis wrote:



I have a question about whether the liability disclaimer in the BSD
licence is "viral" i.e. does it apply to downstream software
incorporating BSD licensed code? If so, doesn't that mean that including
any warranties for such downstream software (e.g. proprietary) will
breach the license?


My understanding is that only if those warranties are given in the name 
of .  The proprietary developer can give warranties, in 
their own name, and I think Microsoft does.


However, as I'm not a lawyer you cannot rely on this as legal advice, 
and the lawyers on the list will also not give you legal advice because 
they are not your laywers.

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Re: [License-discuss] PHP License v3.01 comments

[David Woolley]

On 06/02/15 14:07, Pamela Chestek wrote:

unincorporated association if it is in a state which
recognizes them. Are there parallels in other countries?


They can certainly have bank accounts and be subject to independent 
taxation in the UK.  Many would claim copyrights, although I couldn't 
say whether or not they are legally enforceable.

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Re: [License-discuss] 3-clause BSD with additional clause forbidding key disclosure

[David Woolley]

On 05/02/15 11:27, Simon Phipps wrote:

Surely this is a matter to handle via a 1:1 contract with your
customer?  I have doubts that the additional restriction you are
proposing is OSD-compliant.



In fact, the current wording seems to share a problem with software 
patents, in that you can create a derivative work that violates the 
licence without knowing that you have done so, even if it is 
statistically unlikely.


Also, the real problem here seems to be that the people using this 
software have no understanding of the security implications. I can't 
imagine such people will read and take notice of any open source licence 
terms.

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Re: [License-discuss] Does this look like an open source license?

[David Woolley]

On 25/01/15 07:47, Maxthon Chan wrote:

This lead me to create two thing: a 3c-BSD equivalent in simple English,
and a 3c-BSD equivalent in Chinese (under law of Mainland China).


This sounds like a recipe for licence proliferation.

Note you can only do this if you own all the copyrights.

Also, any more complex licence, like the GPL, will only be valid in one 
language.  There may be official translations, but they will normally 
say that the primary language version is definitive, if there is any 
conflict.



The incident is that one project owner found his code used in an
commercial product without attribution but the Chinese-speaking court
says that the license is not enforceable if it is written in a language
that the judge cannot understand, and that particular judge have only
beginner level English.



I assume part of China's accession to the WTO was that they implement 
the basic principle that everything is copyright by default.  In which 
case, if the licence is considered unenforceable, there is no licence, 
and therefore no permission to make copies of the copyright work, so the 
distributor of the commercial product is in breach of the copyright. 
That might cause other problems, of course.


I would also have assume part of WTO was the choice of law principle.
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Re: [License-discuss] Does this look like an open source license?

[David Woolley]

On 23/01/15 01:09, ChanMaxthon wrote:

I was once using straight 3c-BSDL but one incident (I am not from an Anglophone 
country) proved to me that it's language is too complex in local courts. Now I 
am sort of forced into creating a functional equivalent using only simple 
English (definition: restrict word usage to the 3000 basic English word defined 
by Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary) so this is my first attempt.


You can't expect to do that without creating a significantly longer 
document, as you must make explicit all the nuances of the original 
language.


Legal documents are written in natural languages but have very carefully 
crafted meanings, which often depend on the precise meanings of the 
words chosen.


Whilst the BSD licence is probably relatively easy in this respect, 
longer licences could easily be completely misrepresented.


You can see this in the way the Creative Commons licences are done. 
There is a plain language version to try and give the general public an 
idea of the meaning, but there is also a legal code version, which is 
the one intended to be used by the courts.


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Re: [License-discuss] FAQ entry on CLAs

[David Woolley]

On 20/01/15 19:48, Engel Nyst wrote:

Please do, though. It's worse to practically state that using an OSI
approved license(s) doesn't seem to give the permissions necessary,
within the bounds of the license, for anyone to combine one's project
from different sources and distribute it.


One of the uses of CLA's is to allow the software to be re-licensed 
under a different open source licence.  This can prove highly desirable, 
but almost impossible, if there are large numbers of contributions under 
the old licence.  It might be needed because it has become important to 
integrate the work with work under and otherwise incompatible open 
source licence.  In the past, I think it has been necessary to remove 
contributions from a minor contributor, to achieve this, because they 
were unable or unwilling to licence it under the new licence. 
(Something similar happened with OpenStreetmap's map database; some 
geographical features had to be removed because the project was unable 
to get permission to use it under a new, less restrictive, licence.)


Another common reason is that the open source project is being sponsored 
by a commercial organisation, which wants rights use the software in a 
proprietary way as well.  They will not redistribute contributions which 
are not compatible with this.  That is the case with Asterisk.


In both cases, a third party can integrate their work without using a 
CLA, but they will have created a competing forked version, so their 
work is likely to much less well used than the official version.

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Re: [License-discuss] BSD license, source distributions and interpretations of "retain"

[David Woolley]

On 10/01/15 18:16, Michael Bradley wrote:

Now suppose Project B’s source code is derived from Project A’s source code, 
but the maintainer of Project B wishes to use a different license. In an effort 
to avoid confusion, Project B has that different license text at the head of 
each of its source code files, while Project A's original license text has been 
moved off to a file bundled in Project B's source distributions, e.g. 
“licenses/ORIGINAL-PROJECTA-LICENSE.txt”.

Would that be in compliance with the “retain” language in clause #1 of the 
3-Clause BSD license? Is there any case law to that effect or to the contrary? 
References to legal write-ups on this question (or similar) would be 
appreciated.


This is not legal advice, but in my opinion the least B could get away 
with is the inclusion of a reference to the file in the source files 
derived from A, and possibly also a statement that the file cannot be 
redistributed without the licences file.


Especially given the shortness of the BSD licence, I would think the 
community expectation would be that the source file contained the text 
of both licences, indicating who owned the copyrights under each.  The 
paragon would be to also identify in the code which bits came under 
which copyright.


If B had not created any new copyright in the file, e.g. they did no 
more than change some customisation parameter, I would say the file 
should only contain A's copyright notice, and licence terms.


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Re: [License-discuss] Public domain license - Public Domain Customized

[David Woolley]

On 04/12/14 17:57, Joe Kua wrote:

I wish to release my software in public domain including giving
explicit patent grants. Is Public Domain Customized a good license to
choose ?


There is no such thing as a public domain licence.  The documents are 
combinations of an attempt to abandon copyright, meaning you can't 
licence, and a, fallback, licence that attempts to give away as many 
rights as possible, even though you still own the copyright and moral 
rights.


If you didn't want patent rights, why did you patent it in the first 
place?  Actually there might be a good reason in that the existence of a 
patent might be more reliable than publishing your invention in 
establishing prior art, and therefore blocking another patent.  However, 
I think there is no way of abandoning a patent once you have acquired it.


In most countries, including the UK, an attempt to abandon copyright 
will fail; if you want to put something in the public domain, you must 
die and then wait 70 years.  Many question whether anyone except the 
federal government can abandon it in the USA.

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Re: [License-discuss] [Osi] [General enquiries] Submission by Mistake

[David Woolley]

On 09/19/2014 03:40 AM, bibhudutta.p...@gmail.com wrote:



Hi, I may have subjected my code to Apache 2.0 license by mistake (i.e.
without intending to do so). I had earlier written a code that was
subject to
Apache license and I meant it to be so. Subsequently, I have developed a
separate license and while uploading it on a webstore, copied all
information
in the profile page of my earlier code (that included reference to Apache
license). While I have referred Apache 2.0 license,  have not included a
notice, in the exact form, as prescribed under "APPENDIX: How to apply
the
Apache License to your work".
Given the above, can I now retract all references to Apache 2.0
license or
will my work be compulsorily subject to Apache license?


You can retract all references in copies that you control, but if anyone 
has taken advantage of the Apache license, they may still have a licence 
under the old terms.  If that has happened, you need to consult a lawyer 
as to whether the licence was actually valid, and possibly also as to 
whether you could revoke it.  Revoking licences is frowned upon in the 
open source community.


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Re: [License-discuss] [Trademark enquiries] MIT License attribution question

[David Woolley]

On 14/10/14 08:54, John Cowan wrote:

Since you are not distributing copies, I don't see how the requirement
to distribute the license can affect you.


I don't think he meant he was only using it as part of the tool chain. 
I think he meant he was only distributing it in binary form.


In any case, only the person who applied the original licence can really 
tell him what they intended.  For the strict letter of the law, they 
need their own lawyer.  For the spirit, they need to contact the licensor.

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Re: [License-discuss] Fwd: submission type: Approval license name: MIT for ExploreJaipur Project

[David Woolley]

On 24/09/14 09:25, Tarun Dixit wrote:



/submission type: Approval/
/Rationale:/Clearly state rationale for a new license
/license name: MIT//
/


There is already an approved licence with that name.

If it were not approved, you would not be able to submit it because you 
do not control its wording.




Copyright (c) 2014 

The whole of the text "" is supposed to be replaced 
by a list of the copyright owners, preferably using their legal names.


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Re: [License-discuss] You need to pay to access AGPL3 scripts?

[David Woolley]

On 11/06/14 22:24, Ben Tilly wrote:

The AGPL is supposed to avoid this issue.  Because now they have to
acknowledge you, adn let you see their improvements.


Not really about freedom then.  They lose the freedom to hide their 
upgrades, but you don't.  The tactic may be within the rules, but it 
seems against the spirit.   I though the real intent of the AGPL was to 
ensure that users could see the enhanced code, rather than as a way of 
feeding back to a privileged originator.


In any case, the originator can only use a clean room re-implementation 
of the enhancements if they want to retain the privileged position of 
being able to charge for their code.  If they include the upgrades as 
is, they are now downstream of an AGPL contributor and must use the AGPL 
rules.

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Re: [License-discuss] You need to pay to access AGPL3 scripts?

[David Woolley]

On 10/06/14 22:26, Kuno Woudt wrote:


I assume FullContentRSS has the copyright on their own software, and can
license it as they want.  Including selling it to you under AGPLv3,
while not offering a download themselves for their users.


I find it difficult to work out why someone would use the AGPL unless 
there was an upstream AGPL constraint or the wanted the software to be 
free of charge to users of their service.


The only thought I had was that it was to put competitors at a 
disadvantage, as they would have to provide free source, but that 
doesn't really hold water.


As far as I can see, for someone who didn't want to maximise 
availability of the code and wasn't under an AGPL constraint from 
upstream it would be better to use the plain GPL.


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Re: [License-discuss] You need to pay to access AGPL3 scripts?

[David Woolley]

On 10/06/14 06:51, ChanMaxthon wrote:

I believe it is perfectly fine. RMS himself even *encourage* that.


I think people are missing the point here.  Assuming the requestor has 
used the service, this is a clear violation of clause 13 of the AGPL, 
and, if allowed would make the AGPL effectively indistinguishable from 
the GPL, as you could select a fee that was so large that it was 
unrealistic to exercise the additional rights you gain from the AGPL.


Where you have the option to make an arbitrary charge is for supply of 
the software when you never obtained a copy of the software in any form 
from them and never used the service based on that software.


If the site is AGPL compliant, there is no need for someone who is using 
the service to request anyone to supply the software, as  there will be 
a link providing a free download.





On Jun 10, 2014, at 13:11, ldr ldr  wrote:

Here is an excerpt from the response I received:

"Yes, FullContentRSS is an AGPL3 script, you can use and/or modify the
script as you want. However you can get the script for $20."

Is that congruent with the AGPL3 license?


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Re: [License-discuss] Obtaining Open Source licence

[David Woolley]

On 18/12/13 13:34, Miles Fidelman wrote:



- if you're the author (as implied by "upload" and the currently empty
sourceforge repository with what looks like your name attached) - YOU
decide what license you release the code under, you don't have to "get"


You must be the sole author.  If you use code from other people, the 
licence you choose must be compatible with any restrictions validly 
imposed in relation to that other software.  One of the aims of open 
source is to achieve this sort of re-use.



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Re: [License-discuss] Beginner question on CCSA and derivative work

[David Woolley]

On 18/11/13 14:24, Nick Yeates wrote:

I am unsure if this forum is the correct place for this question, so let
me know if I need to ask elsewhere…

I am considering using a Work, on the public web, that is clearly
licensed under the CCSA: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0
England & Wales license
. The work also
states this: "this page is © 2007-2013 University of Oxford."

I am considering using a piece of this work, in a commercial document.
It is not likely that the commercial work will be distributed to the public.
So far, CCSA seems to be OK with this occurring.

My question is, if I am incorporating it into a work that is
considerable larger, do I need to license the entire piece of work as CCSA?
The parts from U of Oxford will be, say, 3% of the complete content
(derivative work???). Really, most of the content is new/mine.
I don't want to have to make my entire work CCSA, because I am including
a comparatively small chunk of work that is CCSA.



1) this sounds like it is not software, so not really on topic for this 
list.


2) the answer depends on whether or not it constitutes a derivative 
work, and that tends to be a very controversial area on this list (with 
several people using a more limited definition than many authors 
assume).  You probably need to consult a lawyer for an answer that you 
can rely on.  It will probably depend on whether your work is meaningful 
without the U of O document being included.


The safest thing to do is to clear it with the University.



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Re: [License-discuss] Tweaking the BSD license template

[David Woolley]

On 07/11/13 22:31, Gervase Markham wrote:



That seems like a pretty rare case, and would require an additional
permissions grant anyway, as it's not the legal default.



It's very common.  Microsoft use a lot of BSD code and I'd be surprised 
if they hadn't modified it, and therefore become one of the copyright 
owners.  I hadn't noticed Microsoft being shy about branding their products.


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Re: [License-discuss] Tweaking the BSD license template

[David Woolley]

On 07/11/13 10:35, Gervase Markham wrote:



I would argue that the above sentence also establishes a precedent that
it's OK for the OSI copy of a historical license to be genericized in
this non-parameterized way.


Some or all of the contributors may also be copyright holders.  The 
organisation making the distribution in question may have modified it in 
such a way as to become a copyright holder, but might not want that 
clause to apply to themselves.

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Re: [License-discuss] Newbie post: Localisable open source software license

[David Woolley]

On 21/10/13 07:39, Maxthon Chan wrote:



There is a project, Creative Commons, that focuses on providing free
license for art, music and works alike. They tackled the localisation
issue well, by providing localised licenses that is interchangeable with


No they don't.  All the licences seem to be in English.  What is 
localised is the lay person's summary of the licence.  E.g., the Chinese 
summary of CC-BY-SA, is 
, but the first 
link on that page (法律文本（许可协议全文）), 
, points to the 
English language text of the actual licence.



each other, even in the copyleft variants.However Creative Commons does
not work well with software. I can CC license my documentations but not
the software itself.



I would like to know your opinions on a localisable open source license.


In general, a translation of a licence is a different licence, because 
one cannot exactly translate from one language to another.  In fact, one 
could probably argue that choice of law needs to be specified, as well.


Although Creative Commons have chosen to create the lay versions of the 
licence, I suspect many open source drafters would not want to do so, 
because users might believe that the summary is the licence.



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Re: [License-discuss] Open source license and non disclosure agreement

[David Woolley]

On 03/10/13 09:54, Quentin Lefebvre wrote:

This is the important part:


must do so exclusively on your behalf, under your direction and
control


It means that they cannot use it for their own purposes.

The GPL doesn't restrict internal use within an organisation, or the 
keeping secret of development versions that have not been provided to 
someone outside the organisation.  This clause extends this to people 
acting as agents of the organisation, but only to the extent they are 
agents.  If they have access to the software in any other role, they 
have the right to redistribute.


There are situations where is unlikely that re-distribution will occur, 
but not illegal for it to happen.  One would be a gentleman's agreement. 
 Another is where the product is sold to a company which would have no 
incentive to redistribute (often true of specialist, but horizontal, 
market products sold to utilities, etc.).

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Re: [License-discuss] we need a new license for earning money

[David Woolley]

On 20/09/13 23:04, Pirmin Braun wrote:

+ explain how this development was financed. Because either there were
+ non-paid just-for-fun programmers at work who may turn away at any time
+ or the professional services have to pay the bills.

In my experience, open source is much more supportable in the long term 
than proprietary software.  Proprietary software tends to get 
end-of-lifed after three or four years, and, as only the supplier could 
maintain it, you are left without a paddle.  If the vendor gets taken 
over, it can become unsupportable in months.


In some cases, commercial software is end-of-lifed, because a newer 
version is being marketed, which, on a suitably more powerful machine, 
will perform the same function, but it also happens because the market 
is no longer seen as profitable.


Whilst open source software may get declared end of life, you still have 
the source code, or at least you do if had the foresight to take a copy, 
so you can still get any competent programmer to maintain it for you.


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Re: [License-discuss] Endorsement clause?

[David Woolley]

On 15/08/13 03:44, ldr ldr wrote:


3. Once every quarter (4 months) of active use [defined as >10 users],
an email endorsement to  must be sent stating total number of
users; and preferably company the installation is associated with.


It's a field of endeavour restriction.  It restricts the use by anyone 
who does not have internet email capability, or for privacy reasons is 
not prepared to send such email.  It also means the licence dies when 
the email address dies.


I'd also say that it tantamount to an additional licensing fee, as there 
is a time cost, and endorsements are certainly a thing of value in terms 
of being consideration for the licence.


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Re: [License-discuss] Is Web application including GPL libraries covered under GPL?

[David Woolley]

MURAKAMI, Keiko wrote:


The application is not static linked.


The exact point at which combining software creates a derivative work 
under copyright law is controversial.  However, you should note that the 
Free Software Foundation considers dynamic linking to do so.



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Re: [License-discuss] Is Web application including GPL libraries covered under GPL?

[David Woolley]

David Woolley wrote:



(Some recent licences have taken the position that this is a loophole 
and have tried to close it.)


The GNU Affero General Public Licence, is an example of a licence that 
attempts to do this.


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Re: [License-discuss] Is Web application including GPL libraries covered under GPL?

[David Woolley]

MURAKAMI, Keiko wrote:


When we deliver our application just as Web application, by using but not


If you deliver the actual application, then all the licences apply.

If you only deliver a service, many licences don't impose restrictions, 
however, you should carefully read all the licenses and consult a lawyer 
if there is any doubt.


(Some recent licences have taken the position that this is a loophole 
and have tried to close it.)


distributing the libraries, should we distribute it under GPL? 
Should we be ready to show the complete source code to any user?


That would be respecting the spirit of open source, but may not always 
be legally necessary if the user never receives a copy of even the 
binary version of the code.



The application is not static linked.

I'm not sure whether this is the right place to ask, but I appreciate your
help.


The right place to ask is your lawyer's office!

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Re: [License-discuss] opensuce distribution license

[David Woolley]

Alejandro Antonio Loyola Ruiz wrote:

I have a question: what are the steps performed by Open Source to 
consider a license as open source software?




http://opensource.org/approval

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Re: [License-discuss] public domain recognition

[David Woolley]

johann Sorel wrote:


I'm searching for the best course of action to develop a project in 'public 
domain'.
I've read the FAQ and different threads on PD and CC0 in the archive. Basicaly 
the OSI do not recommand using PD/CCO. So ... I don't care, since it's the 
right choice for my objective.



The best way is to work for the US government.  Even then, the work may 
still be copyright work outside the USA.  I believe it debatable as to 
whether an ordinary person can put something into the public domain, 
other than by dying and waiting for 70 years, in the USA, and it is 
almost certain that they can't do so in Europe.


There are no international conventions on public domain, so a public 
domain declaration in one country may not have any effect in another, 
whereas a copyright one would.


You would be much better advised to use a short licence that gave 
permission to do almost anything under your copyright rights.


Even in the USA, I think it has been suggested that public domain 
dedications don't absolve you of responsibility for consequential 
damages, so retaining copyright and attempting to disclaim warranty is 
generally considered safer.



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Re: [License-discuss] Changes made by derivative works

[David Woolley]

Gervase Markham wrote:

On 31/01/13 10:37, David Woolley wrote:

In the case of GPL one is it mainly meeting the minimum requirements for
establishing the copyright status of the file when used outside of the
original application.  Such re-use is fundamental to the GPL concept,
even if many open source developers only think of their programs as ever
being used as a whole.


That's just not true. The entire _point_ of open source licenses is that
you can use the code without having to care who owns the copyright,
because the license under which they have released it gives you all the
rights you need.



Particularly with the GPL, many people don't really understand what they 
are doing when they use it.  They may not even have the right to grant 
the licence.  One case may be that is is actually work for hire. 
Another real case is that someone used source code distributed under a 
no-commercial use condition, for the G.729 codec, and distributed a 
derivative work claiming that it was under the GPL.


Also, a statement of the copyright owner is normally part of the 
condition for establishing copyright.  It would certainly be very useful 
if the terms of the licence had to be enforced.  I think it is with 
respect to enforcement, that the GPL makes this requirement.


Anyone who receives software for which they cannot establish the 
copyright owner, should be very careful.



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Re: [License-discuss] Changes made by derivative works

[David Woolley]

Prashant Shah wrote:



Is there any license out there that puts it in a better way ?



You keep repeating the question without explaining what is wrong with 
the existing clauses.


In the case of GPL one is it mainly meeting the minimum requirements for 
establishing the copyright status of the file when used outside of the 
original application.  Such re-use is fundamental to the GPL concept, 
even if many open source developers only think of their programs as ever 
being used as a whole.


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Re: [License-discuss] Changes made by derivative works

[David Woolley]

Gervase Markham wrote:


If you are writing a license, please don't include a line like this.
Depending on how you interpret it, it's either ineffective (because the
next person can simply remove your notices as part of their change) or a
pain in the behind (as your file fills up with notices which are best
maintained in your source code management system anyway). This makes
such lines in existing licenses far more honoured in the breach than the
observance.


The purpose of such clauses is not to track the provenance, but to 
maintain the purity of the  official version, so that forks cannot be 
passed off as approved versions.




The days of tracking code provenance via in-file comments are gone. And
they are not missed IMO.


One of the key objectives of open source is code re-use.  This means 
that a file must be usable outside the context of the original 
application, and therefore with a different, or no, source management 
system.


If you are going to rely on a source management system, you must insist, 
in the licence, that any distribution of the code contains all the 
source management meta-data.  It is still standards practice to 
distribute source as a single version tar.gz or tar.bz2, i.e. without 
any of the meta data.


The meta data also often doesn't contain legal identity of the 
modifieres, and doesn't distinguish between de mimis changes, and ones 
where the modify owns copyright.


Requiring that the complete repository accompany the code would be a 
real dampener on open source.


There may be compromises, but the less information you include in a 
file, the more difficult it is to re-license it, once divorced from the 
original source management system.


Incidentally, source management systems are not new technology.  I would 
succest that they pre-date the formalisation of the open source concept.


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Re: [License-discuss] Changes made by derivative works

[David Woolley]

Prashant Shah wrote:


Is there any better way to handle changes made by any derivative works
rather than using the following sentence.

"You must cause any modified files to carry prominent notices stating
that You changed the files"



That really depends on the objective you are trying to achieve!

I think that clause is actually there to protect moral rights (i.e. the 
right not to be falsely attributed as the author), rather than copyright 
rights, particularly in countries that don't have any formal concept of 
moral rights.


On the other hand, from a copyright point of view, unless it is clear 
who the copyright owners are, it can be risky to use any piece of software.


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Re: [License-discuss] web forums for license-* [was Re: proposal for revising code of conduct]

[David Woolley]

Luis Villa wrote:

I've personally never seen open source forum software that wasn't an
abysmal nightmare from a usability perspective, whereas many people
here have email clients that they have chosen and customized

I would definitely discourage forums.  I think a lot of forums are 
created for vanity reasons, and forum services play on that because they 
are really after trackable advertising targets (the need to login means 
that, even if you don't post, and therefore allow personal targetting, 
the ad-rotator can ration repeats).  The result tends to be 
fragmentation of the discussions, as multiple, competing, forums get 
created.


Also the need to pull the postings, and that it is difficult to get them 
out of the cloud, make them a hassle for readers.


(On the other hand, it is true that relatively few people know how to 
use mailing lists these days.  There seems to be an increasing number of 
people asking on list to be unsubscribed (not here, that I've noticed), 
and, in combination with GUI user agents, with poor quoting support, 
bottom quoting of the whole of a long thread is becoming the norm.)


(Unsubribe me requests tend to come out in batches, so people seem to 
grin and bare it for a long time first.  It seems that a lot of people 
fail to realise that they subscribed to a public list, and almost accuse 
the list administrator of spamming them!)



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Re: [License-discuss] List moderation and CoC enforcement [was Re: proposal for revising (and making relevant) the code of conduct]

[David Woolley]

John Cowan wrote:



I would like the "direct contact" option placed third and last, where
hopefully most people will not even reach it.



All the netiquette guides I remember seeing say that going on list 
should be last, or never.


I know of one list where the official policy is that all complaints 
should go through the moderator, particularly accusations of being off 
topic.  That particular list has posting guidelines that allow loosely 
related articles, but a number of people who will attack posters, on and 
off list, for anything not very tightly connected to he product.  Most 
really off topic posts there are actually people violating the policy 
about off topic complaints!


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Re: [License-discuss] License which requires watermarking? (Attribution Provision)

[David Woolley]

Eitan Adler wrote:

On 24 December 2012 22:10, ldr ldr  wrote:

John: I'd be happy with proprietary forks, as long as the Attribution
provision would hold.

E.g.: if they sell it to other people, those other people still are
aware of my original project and have a link to it


Aren't you looking for something similar to the 4-BSD license?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses#4-clause_license_.28original_.22BSD_License.22.29


And are you aware why no-one uses it any longer?

(It makes it difficult to create derivative works based on many 
different components with advertising clauses.  One of the main freedoms 
in open source is to be able to use parts of someone else's code without 
reproducing their whole application.  A lot of people searching for 
licences seem to think only in terms of their whole application, or 
forks that only differ slightly.)


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Re: [License-discuss] Permissive but anti-patent license

[David Woolley]

John Funnell wrote:


I would like to take this one step further so that the anti-patent
clause covers use as well as distribution. I propose the license
below, a BSD derivative.



My understanding is that US copyright law doesn't restrict use of 
software (UK law does).  If that is correct, you will need to form a 
contract at the time of supply of the software, that imposes this 
constraint.


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Re: [License-discuss] APPROVAL: Universal Public License Agreement v1

[David Woolley]

BIRGUL KARAMIZRAK wrote:


Signing of the Contract

The license will take effect upon signing personally by the license provider
and the licensee. The signature owner is required to be authorized to sign on
behalf of the legal person.  



This conflicts with the use of the term "public" in the name of the 
licence.  I agree with the other reasons why this is not Open Source.



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Re: [License-discuss] CC v3 artwork with GPLv3

[David Woolley]

Ilia Ternovich wrote:

Hi!

I'm building Open Source project based on GPLv3 license. I'm using
artwork from several independent artists and their artwork is licensed
under CC Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivate 3.0.

Additionally I've got in touch with artists directly and gained
approve to use their artwork in my project. Can I distribute artwork
alognside my project binaries/source code? How should I notify end
user that artwork is not GPLv3?
Assuming the artwork is part of the user interface, not just sample 
data, you need to provide the program in a perfectly usable form using 
artwork that is GPL compatible, then provide the additional artwork 
separately.


It is important that the program is completely usable without the 
no-commercial use artwork.  It also assumes that the artwork isn't a 
derivative work of the program.


This is based on my understanding of the spirit behind the GPL.  It 
doesn't say when the artwork becomes a derivative work, although artwork 
that is meaningful outside of the context of the particular program will 
be safer, and it doesn't define how separate separately has to be, 
although I would suggest that there needs to be an active step involved 
in installing the restricted artwork, that happens after a fully 
functional program is installed, so that no reasonable user could 
install it by mistake.




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Re: [License-discuss] [License-review] CC withdrawl of CC0 from OSI process

[David Woolley]

Bruce Perens wrote:

The structure of laws, courts, and contracts is indeed a machine that 
executes statements of rules. That it does so /fuzzily/ and through 
human rather than machine elements is not necessarily a /flaw /of the 
system, in that it is invariably asked to handle unforseen problems, and 
extends itself by doing so.


Where I would see a particular advantage in a machine processable 
language, would in handling ANDs, ORs and the scope of particular 
conditions.  There was a recent example of UK secondary legislation that 
made an AND/OR/negation type of mistake, in the wording of a statutory 
notice that was supposed to summarise primary legislation. As a result, 
it appeared to imply that certain sorts of debts to a landlord could 
never be recovered.




A machine-executed language for legal rule sets is a frequently 
expressed, unachieved dream. But any program in such a language would 
necessarily be closed in its capabilities, and would need to fall back 
on humans for those unforseen problems. So, you wouldn't lose the courts 
or the arguing over what something "really means".



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Re: [License-discuss] [License-review] CC withdrawl of CC0 from OSI process

[David Woolley]

Bruce Perens wrote:

The problem with your software, Chad, is that it's much too complicated 


The software analogy is flawed in that software has to be understood by 
a machine and is written in a language with very precisely defined 
semantics.  Legal documents are written to be interpreted by a human 
and, unfortunately, legal language is not a simple formal language 
(although I suspect that creating one would avoid a lot of problems with 
legislation).



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Re: [License-discuss] [License-review] CC withdrawl of CC0 from OSI process

[David Woolley]

Rick Moen wrote:


It's called 'realism'.   The reason well written licences have an
irreducible complexity about them is that they are obliged to deal with
real legal issues, e.g., the way warranty disclaimers are required to be


The reality is that the people who have to comply with licences are not 
professional lawyers.  If they are presented with lots of legalese, they 
are likely to ignore it, as most people do with shrink wrap licence 
agreements, or the legal stuff hidden in low contrast, small font links 
at the bottom of web pages, which the designers would rather not have 
there at all.


I suspect that licences with lots of legalese discriminate against 
medium size enterprises.  Very small ones, and individuals, are not 
worth suing, and very big one have bigger lawyers than yours.  The 
medium sized enterprise is not going to want to bring in a lawyer every 
time a design specification is reviewed, so, if their management cannot 
understand the licence, they may just play safe by looking for different 
solutions.



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Re: [License-discuss] Golan v. Holder

[David Woolley]

John Cowan wrote:

EULAs are not copyright licenses: they do not grant the right to 
copy, distribute, publicly display, publicly perform, or prepare

derivative works.

Whilst that is largely true, it is country dependent.  They grant a 
right to copy within the computer, which is subject to a specific 
exemption in the US.  In the UK the actual right that is infringed is to 
use the software.


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Re: [License-discuss] GPL and non-GPL binaries in one distribution

[David Woolley]

Henrik Ingo wrote:



Yes. However, when referring to the GPL FAQ, I actually believe it
represents the common understanding of a rather large portion of the
FOSS community, not just the understanding of Stallman or perhaps
Moglen. (Granted, for many it is just that they accept whatever the


Whilst Rick takes the view that the law doesn't allow the FSF to achieve 
its objectives, and there is a bias amongst people enquiring here 
towards people who want to leverage GPLed code without revealing their 
proprietary code.  My impression is that most people who use the GPL to 
protect their own intellectual creations actually tend to believe that 
the GPL protects against commercial exploitation even more than the FSF 
states, or would want it to do so.



FSF says, for others it might be they don't want to argue with the
FSF, but even so, their acceptance then contributes to the common
understanding.) Hence I find it a useful though not legally
authoritative document.




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Re: [License-discuss] TCPDF license: LGPLv3 + a special clause: is this still considered "Open Source"?

[David Woolley]

Marc Laporte wrote:



It is LGPL v3 +  "Additionally,  YOU CAN'T REMOVE ANY TCPDF COPYRIGHT
NOTICE OR LINK FROM THE GENERATED PDF DOCUMENTS."
http://www.tcpdf.org/license.php

What do you think?



I'd say the licence was void as it attempts to impose an additional 
restriction.  I would not use it.


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Re: [License-discuss] Looking for a license agreement.

[David Woolley]

John Cowan wrote:

David Woolley scripsit:


Database copyrights are not like patents.  As long as you obtain the
fact independently, you can publish them.  Telephone directories and
maps have bogus entries to help detect whether a competing compilation
is truly independent.


Maps, I hasten to say, are copyrightable in the U.S., although facts in
the maps (like "London is in England") and about the maps ("Anytown USA"
is in grid square N1 on such-and-such a map") are not.  The map itself,
however, requires the selection of which facts to present and the choice
of a manner of presentation, and as such is more than creative enough to
be an object of copyright.

Rather worrying and rather relevant to this, thread, an American company 
is suing the (American) individual who maintains the timezone data used 
in Linux and other open source and proprietary software, for alleged 
infringement of their copyright on the historic timezone data, which 
they allege that  he has copied from their publication and has 
attributed that publication as source.


http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/10/06/1743226/civil-suit-filed-involving-the-time-zone-database


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Re: [License-discuss] Looking for a license agreement.

[David Woolley]

Chad Perrin wrote:
someone else. 


This may be a touch off-topic for this list, but . . . why would you want
to grant someone the ability to prohibit others from using *facts* by the
simple expedient of (for instance) alphabetizing a list of facts?  That's
insane.  In a time when even the ability to maintain a monopoly over
things that have been *created* is becoming controversial, someone
asserting a monopoly over information that has been *found* seems quite
regressive and, frankly, harmful.



Database copyrights are not like patents.  As long as you obtain the 
fact independently, you can publish them.  Telephone directories and 
maps have bogus entries to help detect whether a competing compilation 
is truly independent.


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Re: [License-discuss] Looking for a license agreement.

[David Woolley]

John Cowan wrote:


You can't restrict how people use copyrighted works by reason of the
copyright alone: you can only control how they copy, distribute, or
modify them.



I believe that may be true in the USA.  Running a computer program is 
restricted under UK copyright law.



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Re: [License-discuss] Looking for a license agreement.

[David Woolley]

Rudy Lippan wrote:



There may not be intellectual property in the components; however, there is work
involved in their creation.  As such, I think it would be fair to be able to
attribute the creator some level of control over the use use of the product.
License may be the wrong term here, but the idea is the same. 



That's why the UK recognizes database copyrights.  However, if no such 
statute applies, you must create a contract with every transfer or copy 
of the components, and as part of that contract, require the receiving 
party to treat them as confidential.  I'm not sure that is compatible 
with open source.


Creating a contract where no money changes hands can be difficult.

You are creating the opposite of a licence; you are imposing 
restrictions where none previously existed.


IANAL TINLA.


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Re: [License-discuss] Looking for a license agreement.

[David Woolley]

Rudy Lippan wrote:


So what I would like to do is tie the license of the software to the user
of the software respecting the licenses of the community-distributed components
they use, whether or not the individual component is eligible for copyright
protection.



You can't have a licence unless some rights are restricted without it. 
If there really is no intellectual property in the components you 
mention, they don't need, and can't have a licence.


Also note that, in the UK, some of your examples would be protected by 
copyright law (database copyrights).



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Re: The OSD and commercial use

[David Woolley]

> Imagine if you went to a store and say a display of chairs. Imagine the
> price 
> tag said "Non-commercial sitters: free; commercial sitters: $100". Imagine

I'm sure I could find counters to even this, point, although they tend
to involve the fact that commercial buyers buy through different 
channels.  It can work both ways - some things are almost impossible
to buy as a consumer, at least in sensible quantities.

As a slightly more software like case, technical journals often have
higher subscription rates for businesses and, possibly, even more for
libraries.  Some  use the use of a personal cheque to detect non-businesses.

However the most software like example I think of is the public transport
in London.  A transport ticket basically represents a licence to travel
and (like commercial software in its entirety, and the author's rights
for open source software) often remains the property of the transport
operation).  As well as point to point tickets, one sort of ticket that
you can buy is a one day ticket that allows unlimited journeys, but is
licensed only to one person.  Whilst there are technical measures to
frustrate people who pass tickets back over the barriers to a friend,
these tickets are anonymous and compliance is not possible to check,
except where a handover to another person is seen by the revenue
protection people.

Like software, a lot of people don't really see handing a ticket they have
finished with to someone else at a suburban station, but it is still fraud.
At some of the major termini, career criminals act as ticket touts and buy
used tickets to resell to other people.  They get arrested from time to 
time, but any fines are an occupational hazard.  These are the equivalents of
software pirates.

Moreover, certain classes of people, like the over sixties, can get annual
tickets that allow completely free (off peak?) travel.  These are tied to
a photograph, but visual inspections of tickets are rare (on trains) and
the automatic barriers cannot check the photograph.  This is done partly
because such people are considered less able to afford the tickets (they
are an analogy to the non-business software user), but also, probably,
to reduce vandalism by keeping transport occupied at non-peak times.
I suspect, at least for over-sixties, there probably isn't much fraud,
but the point is there is still very little positive enforcement.  (I think
that they have a ticket for the automatic barriers, although there is
usually a member of staff present when the barriers are operating.)

(One can also buy photographically authenticated annual tickets.)

Children get cheaper tickets, and there almost certainly is fraud there;
the barriers can be set to sound an alarm when a child ticket is used.
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Re: Approval Requested for AFL 1.2 and OSL 1.1

[David Woolley]

> think the terms of the OSL are different, or will be interpreted
> differently, in those other countries?  It is true that the OSL -- and

The fact that you said that the choice of law was determined by the
licensor; if it is unlikely to change, there will be less uncertainty
for licensees if it is fixed as, say US law.

As I see it, the only reason to need to specify that the law is defined
by the licensor is that the interpretation *can* differ for different
licensors (of which one program may have many).
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Re: Approval Requested for AFL 1.2 and OSL 1.1

[David Woolley]

> You are obligated under two licenses, one from the licensor in Taiwan
> and the other from the licensor in France.  Nothing unusual here with
> respect to the OSL.  

Two licenses with different effective terms; there is not one OSL, but
one for each of the 100+ countries in the world.  It means you need to 
know whose bit of the code you are actually modifying, something that,
in real life, is likely to be difficult to do, unless the licence requires
that derivative works only be distributed as patches to the virgin
code.
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RE: Approval Requested for AFL 1.2 and OSL 1.1

[David Woolley]

> If you are the licensee, you can demand your rights in a jurisdiction
> where the licensor resides or has its primary business.  So if you want

What happens if you, in the USA, prepare a derivative work based on
two OSL licensed pieces of code, one from, say, Taiwan, and the other
from France.
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Re: Copyright

[David Woolley]

> This is a great question.  I look forward to the group's response on this
> one.

This is an off topic question, as the GPL has already been accepted.

In Europe, I believe this would normally be covered by "moral rights".

However, the Red Hat licence attempts to require that you remove all 
references to Red Hat, even if you distribute an otherwise unmodified 
version, presumably to protect CD sales of their branded product.

IANAL.
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Re: Is the "Guile" license OSI approved?

[David Woolley]

David Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Not at all. The exception only means that the license does not apply to 
> certain works. It does not say that those works cannot have any license at 

Which means that there are no copyright permissions for the library,
and therefore those works, as derived works of the library, or at least
further copying of them is a breach of the copyright on the library.
Licences give permissions to do things that are otherwise illegal.
No licence, no permission.

I know what they are trying to do, but I suspect, if it ever went to court
that there are two possible interpretations, which are at two extremes of
the spectrum:

1) as I've given above - unless the library copyright owner decides to
  renege on their original intentions, using the poor drafting to
  their advantage, this is more of a fear uncertainty and doubt issue
  (i.e. lawyers of companies thinking of using the code may tell them
  that the licence is unsafe) - "free" software authors have been known
  to renege in the past;

2) the assumed intent of the paragraph, rather than its letter, are used,
   in which case it might be possible to defend the use of a token 
   application which exposes all the functionality of the library, but
   makes the result closed source.   Also, in this case, the warranty
   waiver seems no longer to apply, so the library's author might be
   sued for consequential loss.

The licence needs to:

1) define, as precisely as possible, what is NOT covered by the exception.

2) state the terms of the licence to the library code that applies when
   the exception does apply, either by a complete alternative licence
   (maybe BSD like) or by enumerating the GPL clauses that no longer apply
   (probably has to be down to phrase level).

IANAL

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Re: Is the "Guile" license OSI approved?

[David Woolley]

Martin Wolters [[EMAIL PROTECTED]]  wrote:

 > You can find a few open source projects on the web that use the so
 > called "guile license" which is the GPL + the following paragraph:


 > > As a special exception, if you link this library with other files
 > > to produce an executable, this library does not by itself cause
 > > the resulting executable to be covered by the GNU General Public

I'm not a lawyer, but, if this quote is correct, I believe it is badly 
drafted,
as it appears to leave such derivative works without any licence at all and
therefore illegal.  I think theiy are missing the point that licences give
permissions, even though licence agreements may impose restrictions
in consideration for those permissions.

I would say that it should not be accepted until it is redrafted to state
what permissions do apply to such derivative works (probably also
making it clear where the boundary lies between a trivial wrapper to
try and negate the licenec conditions, and a complete program in the
sense they intended).

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Re: OSD compliant shareware

[David Woolley]

David Johnson wrote:

 > As long as I obey the law with regards to copyright, then it is 
impossible
 > for me to violate the GPL. Thus I am safe in not agreeing to it.

That means that you never download the software
from a distribution site, or copy it off borrowed media,
and never redistribute it yourself,
and that your suppliers are breaching the license by not
imposing its terms on you when they provide you with the
copy.

(The argument he is making is that the acceptance clause of
the GPL is ineffective because use of a sofware copy that
you own is permitted in US law.)

IANAL; this represents a personal opinion and not that of any
organisation involved in the transmission of this message.

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