BSD-like licenses and the OSI approval process

[Chris Travers]

On 10/15/07, Zac Bowling <zac at zacbowling.com> wrote:
> The problem isn't that those licenses are in use. That is fine and thats life.
>
> The problem is that the number permissive licenses out there is huge
> and most of these license variations make trivial modifications for
> the needs of that particular project. They still fit the commonly
> accepted definition of permissive and do not add any new novel ideas
> over the existing approved permissive licenses.

Which is *exactly* why I have asked to postpone the approval of the
PostgreSQL BSD license.  You are right, and everyone is better served
by a *mass* approval of all qualifying licenses along the line of Mr
Tiemann's proposal.

The point is that this is a problem and that OSI cannot do both these
things at once:
1)  Put pressure on vendors to only call software open source if it is
licensed under OSI-approved licenses.
2)  Take a stand against license proliferation

My business has a valid stake in this question.  So I proposed
approving the license while reserving the right to ask for other
dependencies' licenses to be approved as we add them.

As I have stated before you posted your point the first time, I want
to postpone the question of approving any of these licenses until
after we decide whether to do a mass permissive license approval.
That would meet my needs and would avoid being, as you put it,
disrputive.
>
> I highly doubt anyone would have a case that the license being used
> wasn't truly free and open source software. Perhaps maybe not a "OSI
> approved Open Source license" so you can use the cute little logo on
> your homepage, but its still open source.

That is *not* the impression I have gotten from some communications
from OSI board members.  In fact if this were the policy of the OSI, I
wouldn't have to worry about it, would I?

In fact, if that were the policy I wouldn't even have had to propose it.
>
> Yes, each version permissive may have some significant user base, but
> trying to debate over each and every one gains us very little in the
> end and trying to only hurts the OSI and the license approval process
> in the end.

Then let us approve them en masse and get it over with.  No
supposition that one has to agree as a community on specific wording.
If we simply say "All licenses meeting these criteria are hereby
approved so no new approval proceedings need to be made for them" then
the problem goes away, doesn't it?

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers