Change ot topic, back to OVPL

[Chris F Clark]

As an interested developer and one who is likely to influence the
choice of "Open Source" software license for some proprietary code to
be re-released as open source, I would like to further inquire as to
the status of the OVPL.  It is the license we would most like to use
for some software we wish to [re-]release.  (The software is currently
released only under a closed source license.)

However, it is kind of hard to release software under a non-finalized
license.  If we release it under the OVPL and the OVPL changes,
perhaps to make it OSI-compliant, then what do we call the license our
software is released under.   I mean the software is released and thee
is text of the license which is associated with that software, but
that text isn't the OVPL, and may not be compatible with the OVPL, so
in effect it is an "orphan" license.

So, until the license board rules on the OVPL, we cannot release our
software under it, since we anticipate the OVPL changing.  Not the
state of affairs we wish to be under.

So, can we return to the discussion of the OVPL and what it would
take to make it acceptable as an OSI-approved license? It has
relevance, especially to the charter of this list....

Note, I am specificly interested in the asymetric properties of the
OVPL, the properties which allow the software to be re-released by the
"initial developer" under other license terms, but do not extend that
right to other developers.  While we don't intend to "take advantage"
of those terms of the license (in that we intend to get specific
assignments of copyright for any code we wish to include in subsequent
releases), having the concept in writing in the license aids our
transperancy, since it makes it clear to downstream developers how we
intend to operate.

-Chris (Clark)