License Question

[Shawn Garbett]

I am working on an interesting project. I work for
Centerstone [http://www.centerstone.org], a large
medical health provider in Tennessee. The CEO is
committed to building community resources, and would
like to develop an open source electronic client
record. The goal is to make such a resource available
free to any mental health care provider in the world.
This is an enterprise wide application, and no small
undertaking. The current system has 400,000 loc.

The open source will be modular and allow any number
of additional modules to be added to the base system. 

He is open to a GPL like license, but has the
following additional restrictions he would like on the
licensing of the code.

1) Not only can an individual or corporation share the
modified code in a GPL like fashion, but it is
REQUIRED. Since this is an Enterprise wide
application, most will require installations will
require customizations. The goal is that eventually a
set of commonly available modules will be available
such that an organization can pick and chose to fit
their needs. But using the code will require sharing.

The GPL FAQ states "The GPL does not require you to
release your modified version. You are free to make
modifications and use them privately, without ever
releasing them." This is in direct conflict with the
goal of this effort. The number of users of this
system will be small compared to the number of users
of Apache. Most will be large enterprise wide users.
Participation will require sharing if the greater good
is to be served. It's simply a different dynamic.
There will probably be user group meetings annually if
the effort succeeds (hopefully places like Hawaii if I
get a say...)

2) The client medical record data collected in the
system must be made available for research purposes in
anonymized format. If adoption of the system occurs on
a broader scale, then a much larger volume of
consistently collected data will be available for
research purposes. The goal is that this research
leads to better treatment protocols for mental
illness.

I'm not familar with any licenses that require data
sharing.

Any existing open source licenses that are GPL-like
but have these addition restrictions?

Shawn Garbett



	
		
__________________________________ 
Do you Yahoo!? 
Yahoo! Mail - You care about security. So do we. 
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail