Please add "Public Domain" to "license" list

David A. Wheeler david_a_wheeler at yahoo.com
Sun Mar 16 21:45:23 UTC 2003


--- 'Rick Moen' <rick at linuxmafia.com> wrote:
> Quoting David A. Wheeler (dwheeler at dwheeler.com):
> 
> > All I'm looking for a clear statement from the OSI that
> > public domain source code is open source software. 
> 
> I'm not sure this is the OSI's problem.  Think about process, and
> what the OSI actually _does_, and I think you'll see this.

The OSI examines the conditions of software releases, to determine
if they meet the open source definition.  I've provided a release
situation that I believe meets the open source definition, and am
asking the OSI to publicly state that the release conditions meet
the OSD.  It's not a traditional license, but in 1984 the GPL
wasn't a traditional license either :-).


> > Are you saying that US government software released to the software
> > cannot be used as open source software? 
> 
> Of course not.  I believe I've already said the contrary.

And I very much appreciate it.  What I want is a PUBLIC statement
from the OSI that this is true.




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