Help with license decision for "cluster" of similar projects

[Christopher D. Coppola]

I am a member of the leadership group for an open source project that
produces ePortfolio software for education institutions. This project and a
few others are leading the way for a movement in higher education toward
adoption of open source software. The projects all have independent
leadership with similar objectives and many of the same people are involved
in multiple projects.

Our project (the Open Source Portfolio Initiative - OSPI) created a license
called the OSPI License 1.0
(http://www.theospi.org/modules/cjaycontent/index.php?id=8) based on the
Jabber license. We submitted the license for OSI certification last year and
have recently received advice that we collaborate with Jabber to establish a
common license rather than two that only really differ because the project
name is embedded in the license. We are now re-evaluating our licensing
strategy and as we have, we recognize great value in adopting a common
license among the dozen or so similar projects all creating software for
education institutions. We also recognize that OSI certification lends
credibility and the review process will produce a license with the benefit
of OSI's collective knowledge and experience.

My question, finally, is what advice can anyone on this list offer with
regard to:

1.	Choosing a license such as OSL 2.0 or Academic Free License 2.0 VS.
creating a license of our own or adopting one such as the Sakai license
(below) among as many of our projects as possible.
2.	Our objectives are to foster commercial involvement in these
projects, develop a vital community of users and contributors, and make
adoption easy for schools that would use the software and/or contribute to
it. How does a copyleft provision either help or hurt these objectives?
3.	How does the length of the license impact the project? My personal
observation is that the shorter licenses create ambiguity, the longer ones
generally get confusing, and there seems to be some middle ground (like the
OSL 2.0) that strike a good balance. Is anyone aware of a very simple
license causing problems because it wasn't clear enough? How about a longer
license inhibiting use because it was too complex for many people to
understand?

Each of the initiatives I've been talking about has a license, some have
copyleft provisions, others do not, and they vary significantly in how much
detail the license provides. Also, 3 projects have already consolidated
under the Sakai license. A few examples:

OSPI
http://www.theospi.org/modules/cjaycontent/index.php?id=8

Sakai
http://www.sakaiproject.org/license.html

uPortal
http://mis105.mis.udel.edu/ja-sig/uportal/license.html

Thanks for any help,

Chris Coppola


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