YAPL is bad (was: Re: Backlog assistance?)

[Rob Myers]

on 24/9/01 7:55 am, Rick Moen at rick at linuxmafia.com wrote:

> One possible addition to the OSD, to deal with this matter, might be
> as follows:
> 
> 10. The Licence Must Not Violate Privacy of Individuals or Organisations
> 
> The licence must not attach any obligations to usage of the covered code
> that is entirely internal to the non-public affairs of the individual or
> organisation using it.

To clarify my opinion (IANAL):
If this clause was added it would give organizations one less thing
(exposure of information regarding private affairs) to worry about in
adopting open source licenses, and so seems very desireable.
It does however clash with many existing licenses that assume acceptance of
the license by usage of the code and give a general offer of distribution on
this basis.
It also requires a fair amount of legalese to clarify "public" and
"non-public" usage, and very careful auditing.
Finally, I believe that it requires licenses to build in a back door for the
closing off of open source code, one that unscrupulous organizations will
eagerly exploit.

- Rob.

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