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Subject: Development of Creative Commons licenses

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  • From: "Emerson Clarke" <emerson.clarke AT gmail.com>
  • To: "Discussion on the Creative Commons license drafts" <cc-licenses AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [cc-licenses] open source non commercial license
  • Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2007 04:05:59 +0000

> I "freely" admit to being confused, i wouldnt have started this
> discussion if i wasnt, so thanks for your input...

If you want to start getting the thinking behind the GPL, I suggest you go to
the FSF site and read some of RMS's writings. You seem very ignorant as to
the history of copyleft and the GPL. I am perhpas guilty of assuming too
much. It is easy to ignorant in so many areas. My ignorance keeps being
brought to light around here.

I prefer to use the term "open minded". I have read some of the
writings of RMS, and even attended a talk or two but that does not
pass for understanding.

> > There is no non-commercial use clause in the license. The whole license
> > is designed to prevent the software licensed under it from being used as
> > non-free software under the terms of the license. Commercial is fine,
> > non-libre is not.
>
> Ok, so heres the bit i don't get. The GPL is designed to propagate
> and protect the notion of free software by forcing derivative software
> to share the same license.
>
> Surely this means that people got togeather and decided that it wasnt
> enough to simply expect people to contribute back to the community,
> rather they needed gentle encouragement, or a firm push in the way of
> the GPL.

Nope. That's not how it happened according to "legend."

Well, i guess the must have been some other reason...

> Personally i think the assumption is wrong, and i dont think that
> forced compliance with any license helps open source. It can only
> diminish its uptake. And i also disagree with the notion that people
> will not willingly contribute code unless such a license exists. In
> fact i doubt there are very many open source projects at all which
> exist soley becuase of the propagation clauses in the GPL.

And personally, I think about the reverse. There is ample evidence that people
do not willingly coptribute code unless such a license exists.

http://gpl-violations.org/

Again, though, we need evidence.

I think my point was that the propagation clauses in the GPL were not
the motivation behind major and succesful open source projects. I may
be alone in thinking that projects which violate the GPL are neither
major nor succesful.

Have you personally released any of your own works with a free license or
contributed to any of the free software you use?

Yes, of course. Most of the time in the form of bug reports or fixes,
but occasionally with a port or some sample code or test cases. And
when i do so it is becuase i have found the software useful and i wish
to give something back or improve it. Interestingly most of the time
i prefer projects which are BSD style licensed becuase they fit with
the commercial aspects of my work.

> True freedom comes when you let go completely, and that can only come
> when you have no license restrictions.

Although in a different realm, this is fairly parallel to: you are not legally
free unless you are legally free to become a slave. Personally, I am OK with
that legal restriction on my freedom especially in light of the protection we
all get from the restriction.

Are you somehow implying that BSD style licenses equate with slavery ?

Of course your not, but i think what your trying to say is that the
GPL gives you some form of protection. Against what ? ... i think it
gives control, not proection.


> I get what your saying about it not really being a commercial use
> restriction, but then why does it not extend to all software developed
> in all contexts. Why are companies allowed to develop software using
> GPL licensed code behind closed doors and never contribute anything
> back to the community whilst they clearly make millions from it. How
> does this support the notion of "libre" ?

Because of privacy reasons. Do you have any examples that concern you where
companies are making millions from GPL software that they are using behind
closed doors?

Yes, every company ive ever worked for. All companies use open source
software. How about Google as a prime example, not all the code that
they write or modify becomes open source. Id be willing to bet theyve
made modifications to hundreds of projects internally. And they make
billions from it...

> As i said above, i dont see how the wording of the GPL nor the
> restrictions it uses actually directly benefit the open source
> community.

Well, lots of us in the Free Software community see how it benefits us.

> They do prevent commercial explotation to some extent
> (though only the highly visible forms) but i dont see how they foster
> greater involvement in the open source community.

It is simple. You have expressed the motivations yourself.

With free software, you can have copyleft or non-copyleft free software.

With copyleftfree software, if some company or individual wants to distribute
a derivative of my software, it has to be copyleft and thus I can most likely
get my hands on a copy and if I do, I can legally do with thier derivative
what they have done with my original.

Thats not creating involvement, thats giving you control over your
software by forcing them to make their changes available. It doesnt
mean that they will in any way be involved in the community.

And in any case, i know i keep throwing this statistic around but i
think 90% of companies who use your code will be using it in such a
way that they do not have to make it available to you...

Having access to changes to code doesnt necessarily benefit the
community. Code is not magic sauce, it takes other things like
people, and documentation to make a sucesful project. And what about
the forking issues ? ..sometimes contributions create more trouble
for projects by duluting the focus. Look at all the problems caused
in the recent Apple/KDE collaboration with KHTML and WebKit.

WebKit ended up as a separate project, Apple gained, Nokie gained, KDE
got some exposure, and a lot of mess to clean up and they now have a
bunch more work to do to try to keep updates and fixes merged.

Im just playing devils advocate...

With non-copyleft free software, that same company can take my software, make
a derivative, put the derivative under an all rights reserved copyright plan
and now they take away my freedom with respect to the derivative that I gave
them with my original. And they can do this without paying me either.

They can do this with the GPL also, just not in the form of an off the
shelf software product.

But they dont take away your freedom, only your control as mentioned
before. They exploit your software and your work without giving you
anything in return.

Those are the basic options with Free Software. Can anyone think of any
others.

Take your pick or forget about Free Software. If you are still interested in
Free Software, and prefer the copyleft option but don't like the GPL, can you
formulate a better copyleft license?

For me GPL or BSD is part philosopical desicion and part political.
Theres nothing wrong with the GPL, though i would question some of its
values. Politically the GPL is always the better choice. Everyone
benefits from having consistent licensing, not the least because it
removes the confusion.


> I think perhaps it has something to do with the need for control, and
> i struggle with it too. But i do belive the BSD style licenses are
> more true to the notion of free.

No, nothing to do with control in the first instance. I prefer that my work
not get locked up to where I lose legal access to it.

Right, so you dont want to loose access to your work... but it has
nothing to do with control. OK.

Quickly from sourceforge:

Registered Projects: 140,417

GPL 1 - 10 of 58169 Results
BSD 1 - 10 of 6507 Results

This might be a controversial thing to say, but a lot of those
projects are probably either dead or utter crap. When i mentioned the
BSD projects, i said they were pervasive. I think its more useful to
look at which bits of code are actually out there being used under all
conditions, both commercial and non commercial.

Theres always more too it than people think, like that crazy japanese
operating system called TRON which no one has ever heard off. Its
actually the most used piece of software in the world or something.


> > If you do not want to look for the examples yourself, shoot my an email
> > directly.
>
> Conssider yourself shot... :)

I will see what I can do for you though I am not a hugh fan of the dual
license play.

Ok, thanks... the only one i really know of is QT.




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