[License-discuss] Shortest copyleft licence

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Maxthon Chan (xcvista at me.com):

> How to use CC in software licensing then? Or do we need a specific CC
> variant or addendum for code?

The CC licences have been skillfully crafted for a different problem
space (culural/artistic works), so I'd say that would be generally a bad
idea.  Broadly speaking, Creative Commons set out to encourage authors
of written works, music, and similar copyright-eligible works to accept
the concept of remixing and third-party redistribution to create
derivative works, by publishing a diverse set of licences, some
proprietary and others not, with differing degrees of control about
commercial use, attribution requirements, and making of derivative works
-- so as to maximise the commons.

Software has special problems that CC's classes of licences don't need
to address.  I have no problem reverse-engineering the construction of a
novel to determine how to write my own.  (There cannot be a proprietary 
secret sauce, no unavailable or obscured source code.)  There are no
patent minefields in the way of novels.   (I know:  I just challenged
the Internet to conjure up a counter-example.)

-- 
Cheers,           I'm ashamed at how often I use a thesaurus.  I mean bashful. 
Rick Moen         Embarrassed!  Wait--humiliated.  Repentant.  Chagrined!  Sh*t!
rick at linuxmafia.com                                        -- @cinemasins
McQ! (4x80)