[License-discuss] Linkumori Free License, Version 1.0 – Submission for OSI Review

[subham mahesh]

That was a very old draft, shared inadvertently. As I previously stated, in
jurisdictions outside the USA, where moral rights provisions exist and
cannot be waived, a dedicated clause is required to address this matter.

On Tue, 23 Jun, 2026, 9:40 pm Pamela Chestek, <pamela at chesteklegal.com>
wrote:

> Please do not ask for review until you have finalized your work. The
> people who review these licenses are doing it out of the goodness of their
> heart, taking time away from their other activities to help. I spent
> several hours on my last review, only to find out that you were still
> substantially revising the license. Let us know when you have a final draft.
>
> That said, your license seems to be undergoing substantial mission creep.
> You originally said it was to address the problem of attribution in a
> web-based context, but now you have added moral rights, a secondary license
> clause, and I don't know what else. It is now 3888 words, longer than the
> GPLv3. It is excessively wordy and proscriptive. These qualities mean that
> no one other than you will ever use this license, so it does not seem to be
> a good candidate for approval.
>
> Pam
>
> Pamela S. Chestek
> Chestek Legal
> 4641 Post St.
> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
> Unit 4316
> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
> El Dorado Hills, CA 95762
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> +1 919-800-8033
> pamela at chesteklegal.com
> www.chesteklegal.com
>
> On 6/23/2026 3:12 AM, subham mahesh wrote:
>
> Subject: Linkumori Free License v1.0 — Updated Draft (Secondary License
> Clause Added)
>
> Hi
>
> Attached is the latest draft of the Linkumori Free License, Version 1.0,
> in both HTML and plain text.
>
> A few notes on what's changed from the earlier draft:
>
> 1. Moral Rights (Section 9). Going through the previous draft, I flagged
> the moral rights language as needing tighter drafting. Wanted to call this
> out specifically so it gets a closer look before we treat this version as
> final.
>
> 2. Secondary License clause (Section 11(b)). Section 4 requires a visible
> attribution notice for the Work when it's redistributed via a website (a
> footer/credits notice plus a stable URL hosting the full license text).
> That requirement doesn't sit well with GNU/FSF-style copyleft licenses
> (GPL, LGPL, AGPL) — their terms aren't built to accommodate an added
> attribution condition like that, which made combining the Work with
> GPL-licensed code legally awkward. To resolve this, I added a Secondary
> License mechanism modeled on the MPL's approach: when the Work is combined
> with a GPL/LGPL/AGPL-licensed work into a Larger Work, the distributor may
> additionally offer the Work under that Secondary License. This gives
> downstream recipients the choice of complying with our license or the
> Secondary License, which clears the compatibility problem without watering
> down Section 4 for everyone else.
>
> 3. Warranty, Liability, and Governing Law restructured (Sections 12–15).
> The disclaimer and limitation of liability were previously combined in a
> single section; they're now split, following the Apache License 2.0
> structure, into Section 12 (Disclaimer of Warranty), Section 13 (Limitation
> of Liability), and Section 14 (Accepting Warranty or Additional Liability,
> covering a distributor who chooses to offer support or indemnity on their
> own behalf). The Governing Law and Venue clause is now Section 15.
>
> 4. Section 3 (Redistributions in Source Code Form). Added an explicit
> requirement that You must give any other recipients of the Work or
> Derivative Works a copy of this License.
>
> Let me know your thoughts, especially on the moral rights section, before
> we lock this version in.
>
> Sincerely,
> Subham Mahesh
> Law Student, CPJ College of Higher Studies & School of Law
> Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Narela, Delhi
> BA Social Science, Ambedkar University Delhi
>
> DISCLAIMER: This submission and any statements made herein do not
> constitute legal advice and should not be relied upon as such. The analysis
> provided reflects the personal academic views of the submitter and is
> intended solely for the purpose of OSI license review. Individuals and
> organizations seeking guidance on licensing matters are encouraged to
> consult a qualified legal professional.
>
> Linkumori Free License
>
> Version 1.0, June 2026
>
> Copyright 2026 Linkumori
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> before that termination.
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> counter-claims.
> ------------------------------
> Appendix: How to Apply the Linkumori Free License to Your Work
>
> The copyright notice at the top of this document applies only to the text
> of the License itself. It does not govern any Work You choose to release
> under this License. To apply the Linkumori Free License to Your own Work,
> attach the following notice to each file, replacing the bracketed fields
> with Your own information. Do not include the brackets.
>
> Copyright [YEAR] [YOUR NAME OR ORGANIZATION]
>
> Licensed under the Linkumori Free License, Version 1.0 (the "License");
> you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
> You may obtain a copy of the License at:
>
>     [URL WHERE YOU HOST THE LICENSE TEXT]
>
> Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, the Work
> distributed under the License is provided on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT
> WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the
> License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations
> under the License.
>
> For source files, place this notice at the top of each file.
>
> For binary distributions (non-web), reproduce this notice in the
> documentation or other materials provided with the distribution, as
> required by Section 5 of the License.
>
> For web distributions, place the visible notice required by Section 4(b)
> of the License in the rendered content of Your website or web application,
> and make the full text required by Section 4(c) available at a stable URL
> You Control. A dedicated /licenses or /credits page is a common and
> acceptable location for the full text. If that URL ever becomes
> unavailable, Section 4(e) gives You a fixed thirty-day window after notice
> to state why and either restore it or publish a replacement — a brief
> outage is not itself a breach. Section 4(f) also lets You respond to that
> notice with Your own specific restoration date, which then controls in
> place of the thirty-day window, so long as it falls within the thirty days
> (or later, if the Contributor who gave notice agrees in writing).
>
> If Your Work has multiple copyright owners (for example, where
> Contributors have added to the original), each owner’s copyright should be
> listed on a separate line:
>
> Copyright [YEAR] [ORIGINAL AUTHOR]
> Copyright [YEAR] [CONTRIBUTOR NAME]
>
> Licensed under the Linkumori Free License, Version 1.0 (the "License");
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>
>
>
> On Mon, 22 Jun 2026 at 22:52, Richard Fontana <fontana at sharpeleven.org>
> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Jun 22, 2026 at 12:35 AM Pamela Chestek <pamela at chesteklegal.com>
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > You've changed some of the original Apache words to words that, in my
>> opinion, are worse. What is the reason for changing "copyright owner" to
>> "copyright holder"? I don't know what a "holder" is but I do know what an
>> "owner" is. Is a non-exclusive licensee a "holder"? And you haven't changed
>> it consistently throughout, which means you're creating an argument that
>> there is some difference between a "copyright holder" and a "copyright
>> owner."
>>
>> This may now be moot (in the American English sense) because the
>> submitter has apparently revised the license to consistently use
>> "copyright owner", but it seems "copyright holder" is a fairly widely
>> used alternative to "copyright owner" (the terms seem to be synonymous
>> when looking at evidence of existing use) including in some
>> governmental materials. In FOSS rhetoric/documents, it has been my
>> casual observation that "copyright holder" seems to be preferred over
>> "copyright owner", I think perhaps due to the influence of Richard
>> Stallman and the Free Software Foundation (where, I'd hypothesize, the
>> preference in FOSS, if there is one, originally arose). As to *why*
>> that preference exists in FOSS, or at least in the part of it that is
>> close to the FSF, I'd speculate that it's because of some discomfort
>> in using more direct "ownership" rhetoric, as perhaps that seems to
>> legitimize so-called intellectual property, especially in a context
>> where the copyright owner is playing a neutral-to-positive role (from
>> a free software/copyleft perspective).
>>
>> Richard
>>
>
>
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