[License-discuss] For Public Comment: The Libre Source License

Fri Aug 23 17:27:49 UTC 2019

Russell McOrmond wrote:
> Guesses about license interpretation by courts, and unintended consequences from that interpretation of licenses, is entirely on-topic for this forum.

That is very true. Just don't expect our guesses to convince a court that existing law is (or should be) of no effect. We're stuck with the law as courts interpret it. For current example, look at the exception we seek for copyright of APIs.... Let us pray....

/Larry

From: Russell McOrmond <russellmcormond at gmail.com> 
Sent: Friday, August 23, 2019 6:01 AM
To: Lawrence Rosen <lrosen at rosenlaw.com>; license-discuss at lists.opensource.org
Subject: Re: [License-discuss] For Public Comment: The Libre Source License

On Wed, Aug 21, 2019 at 11:35 PM Lawrence Rosen <lrosen at rosenlaw.com <mailto:lrosen at rosenlaw.com> > wrote:

I appreciate your discussion of preferred policies, but that has nothing to do with license-discuss at .

I'll clarify why I disagree, since the conversion has gone off in some interesting directions.

a) Drawing a line between the interests of software proprietors vs software users is in fact the purpose of the OSD and license-discuss, so discussions towards clarifying that line have everything to do with this list.  I say software proprietors very deliberately, as it is most often large transnational corporations who hold these rights, and thus it is not automatically in the interests of software authors when proprietor rights are embraced in "open source" licenses.

b) The reason why it is important to have lawyers like yourself involved in this forum and the OSI in general is because these licenses might be interpreted by courts (and in more than one country), and that will set precedent.  Guesses about license interpretation by courts, and unintended consequences from that interpretation of licenses, is entirely on-topic for this forum.

Russell suggested:

a) Work to amend the law in their jurisdiction such that private uses are a limitation or exception to copyright

b) Avoid using proprietary software licensed to regulate private uses

c) Advocate for the OSI and FSF to reject licenses which regulate private uses to avoid confusion with those which do not.

d) if (c) fails, work with others to create a fork of the FSF or OSI for those of us who want to work with organizations that don't cross that "bridge too far" into allegedly protecting software freedom through regulating private uses.

Write a law review article somewhere and propose what you desire. Or create a fork of FSF or OSI for your purposes. But please don't change our law or our licenses without permission.

Obviously I'm not politically influential enough to change any law or license alone, with or without anyone's permission.

What I will continue to do is try to create discussions within the FSF and OSI about where they draw the line between the interests of software proprietors and software users, and to encourage that to guide what licenses they then give their stamp of approval to.  In this forum it isn't about changing anything other than peoples minds about what these organisations should permit.

On Fri, Aug 23, 2019 at 1:34 AM Roger Fujii <rmf at lookhere.com <mailto:rmf at lookhere.com> > wrote:

Now I'm confused.    Are you saying there is no "fair use" when the target is software?   While one can weaken"fair use" via the license, is this a good idea for OSI to support this?

I also find this conversation confusing.

I've always considered private modification of works to be part of research and private study (freedom 1, using language from the Canadian copyright act), and if not clearly covered by "fair use" or "fair dealing" (Canada is under a less liberal regime than the US) then at least something that should be protected by the FSF and OSI as part of their license approval process.

There has been a general belief expressed in the sector (promoted by Apple, Microsoft, IBM and others over the decades) that the limitations and exceptions to copyright shouldn't apply as much to software as to other creative works.  While I expect that from these large proprietary software vendors, I am always surprised when I hear the same arguments being made by people who self-identify as part of the Free Software and/or Open Source software sector.   It has been interesting to watch Microsoft and IBM move towards being less proprietor focused, and the FSF and OSI move more towards being proprietor focused -- I wonder if they will ever cross paths....

The move of the FSF and OSI to approve/promote licenses which demand disclosure of private modifications (or disclosure of modifications to anyone who didn't otherwise receive the software in any other form), or that trigger on mere use of interfaces (network or otherwise) shouldn't be taken lightly.  This is a radical departure from what the movement was about back in the 1980/1990's.

If this type of thinking existed in the past, especially as it relates to interfaces, it would have made things like LibreOffice, Samba, and other critical tools impossible as it would have been considered acceptable for the vendors of software to dictate terms to the licensees about their relationships with third parties (such as other software vendors, etc).

-- 

Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/>

Please help us tell the Canadian Parliament to protect our property rights as owners of Information Technology. Sign the petition! http://l.c11.ca/ict/

"The government, lobbied by legacy copyright holders and hardware manufacturers, can pry my camcorder, computer, home theatre, or portable media player from my cold dead hands!" http://c11.ca/own

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