[License-discuss] Questions Regarding Open Source Hardware Licenses

Fri Mar 6 20:38:49 UTC 2020

You probably want to direct  your questions to the Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA) https://www.oshwa.org/

They have bulletin boards similar to this mailing list: https://community.oshwa.org/

From: License-discuss <license-discuss-bounces at lists.opensource.org> On Behalf Of Michael Bretti
Sent: Wednesday, March 4, 2020 11:30 AM
To: license-discuss at lists.opensource.org
Subject: [License-discuss] Questions Regarding Open Source Hardware Licenses

To The Open Source License Discussion Group,

I was recently referred to this mailing group by a member of the Open Research Institute, who has been a fantastic help and resource regarding my questions and concerns about open source approaches in general. As some background, I am currently the only person (as far as I am aware) developing and testing open source ion and plasma propulsion systems for nanosatellites (like PocketQubes and Cubesats), which I do completely out of home. I currently run Applied Ion Systems, which originally started as purely hobby, sharing my projects on various social media, but has gained support enough in the maker and space communities that I have transitioned to an official business. I currently have 2 openly developed thrusters onboard the AMSAT-Spain GENESIS PocketQubes scheduled for launch later this year, that is a joint collaboration between them, myself, Fossa Systems, and the Libre Space Foundation with more collaborations down the road to further advance the relatively untouched field of open source satellite hardware. I am actively promoting open development of electric propulsion systems for satellites to radically lower the barrier of entry and cost for them, working on a very small out-of-pocket budget with available resources to the average maker vs. traditional multi-million dollar academic and research company efforts, and taking on the field in a way that has never been done before.

As I progress into more high performance and potentially innovative systems however, I increasingly need to worry about protecting myself and my work from competition, being open-source in a highly closed and competitive field. From prior discussions, it sounds like I need to start to apply open source hardware licenses (lots of people telling me I need to patent, but there is no way I can remotely afford that route). However, there seems to be little information about this, as well as disagreement between various people I have spoken with on the subject. As such, I was hoping to get some guidance on the subject, with the following questions below:

1. What are the main advantages/disadvantages of each of the OSH licenses available? I know there are several like CERN OHL 1.2 and TAPR OHL, but I don't know if there are other approved licenses, and which would be best to apply for my application, or if there is one that is particularly favored by the community.

2. Should a license be applied to each and every system worked on, or is there some way to apply a blanket license (for example, apply one license for everything that falls under Applied Ion Systems)? Once a license is in place, is it permanent, or can it be changed? 

3. How can a for-profit open source hardware entity stay competitive and protect itself in the market? Do open source hardware licenses offer necessary protections, or is there more that is needed? I already have information that there is at least one competitor in Europe already looking to possibly try and take and leverage my designs themselves. Considering everyone else in the field has essentially millions of dollars in backing, and I am working out of home with pocket change and small donations from the community, in some sense it feels like I am giving away designs and expertise to direct competitors while barely scraping by myself, and can't be sustainable against mega-funded powerhouses. My key advantage over everyone is that I can develop the tech faster and cheaper than anyone else by orders of magnitude, and am completely transparent in my work publicly and with the community, but at the end of the day I need to be sustainable.

4. How can open source innovation be protected? Especially in my case were I am working on very high-tech systems in a highly competitive, and normally very secretive and non-transparent field, how can I make sure that I get credit, or protect myself from others patenting my designs, and ultimately using them against me, or worst case, completely legally locking me out of working on them myself?

5. Finally, is there a hard line that defines open source in regards to hardware? Up until now I have released everything with 100% transparency, including circuitry, BoMs, CAD, PCB design, test reports, R&D, etc. However, depending who I talk to, there is disagreement about what it means to be "officially" open source. Some of the more strict members of the community I have talked to have said that until I apply licenses, I am not actually open source. However, others consider my work open source since I have openly released and shared everything for them, and actively engage the community and provide info and support how others can do it themselves. Is there a hard line between being open source, and is that gated purely by licensing? If so, since I have not yet figured out licensing, does that invalidate all the work I have done prior as open source? Until now, I have thought that my work is open source, and it seems unusual that the difference between being open source and not is a single license, despite everything being openly available, and what I have provided so far would not change other than applying such a license. However, I am not sure if there is some official vetting process by the community to be considered truly open source.

I still plan on forging ahead on this path and continuing to openly share my developments, but there seems to be little information regarding open source hardware licenses, how this can protect open source hardware developers, as well as figuring out how to survive as the only open source hardware developer in the electric space propulsion field.

I just want to thank you ahead of time for any suggestions or recommendations you can provide, and greatly appreciate your time.

Sincerely,

Michael Bretti

Founder/Engineer

Applied Ion Systems <http://appliedionsystems.com/> 

  <http://appliedionsystems.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/AIS-Logo-Resized-Small.png> 

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