<div dir="ltr">Pamela brings up an important issue that I don't believe the OSI has been willing to deal with.<div><br></div><div>The amateur approaching the development of a license is sort of like someone who has just learned their first programming language applying to develop microcode for CPUs. There is a lot about it the neophyte isn't aware of yet. We're supposed to be welcoming on this list, which I failed to do with one recent neophyte, and obviously Pamela said as much as she could within the conduct boundaries.</div><div><br></div><div>But IMO there should be some sort of gateway.</div><div><br></div><div> Thanks</div><div><br></div><div> Bruce</div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Sat, Oct 5, 2024 at 6:52 AM Pamela Chestek <<a href="mailto:pamela@chesteklegal.com">pamela@chesteklegal.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><u></u>
<div>
<p>I have not read these licenses in detail because the are
extremely long, approximately 4500 words, appear from the
definitions alone to have way more detail than a typical open
source license, and are not understandable, e.g., this paragraph:</p>
<p>
</p><blockquote type="cite">Should the Covenant is under version
controlled; except when a valid and specific<br>
version is explicitly reproduced either through the locally
available Covenant Notice file<br>
or declared and reproduced by the Product itself in which that
version shall be enforced;<br>
the latest and greatest version of the entire Covenant of its
understanding, proposals,<br>
representations, and warranties relating to the subject matter
shall, with prejudice,<br>
prevail, be enforced, and superseding all previous versions.</blockquote>
"Should ... is under ... controlled" is not grammatically correct
and therefore the meaning isn't clear. A term like "latest and
greatest" cannot be construed - what if the latest version isn't
also the "greatest" version, and "greatest" on what vector? It is
unnecessarily verbose - "understanding, proposals,
representations, and warranties," "prevail, be enforced, and
superseding." <br>
<p></p>
<p>That is just the first operative paragraph and a brief scan shows
that the clarity does not improve from there. <br>
</p>
<p>The licenses include "services," but open source licenses are for
software, not for services. There also appear to be other areas
covered that are inappropriate for a software-only license, such
as personal information.</p>
<p>Your license does not grant rights to trade secrets; this would
likely be considered not compliant with the OSD. It also doesn't
make sense for an open source license - what possible trade secret
can there be in published code?<br>
</p>
<p>Writing licenses, and particularly open source licenses, is a
highly specialized skill. In my opinion, these licenses would not
be approved in their present form and would also require a great
deal of work by a skilled open source lawyer before approaching
anything that might be acceptable. I don't think it would be
worthwhile even to try to edit them, it would be simpler to start
from scratch.</p>
<p><br>
Pamela S. Chestek (in my personal capacity)<br>
Chestek Legal<br>
300 Fayetteville St.<br>
Unit 2492<br>
Raleigh, NC 27602<br>
+1 919-800-8033<br>
pamela@chesteklegal<br>
<a href="http://www.chesteklegal.com" target="_blank">www.chesteklegal.com</a><br>
</p>
<div>On 9/30/2024 2:58 AM, (Holloway) Chew,
Kean Ho via License-discuss wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:verdana,sans-serif">
<div class="gmail_default">Hi all,</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Wish you a lovely day. Complying
to <a href="https://opensource.org/licenses/review-process" target="_blank">https://opensource.org/licenses/review-process</a> process,
I wish to invite everyone here to discuss and pre-review my
newly drafted open-source licenses not just for software but
also general intellectual properties usage before submitting
to license-review mailing list.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">The main goal is to create a new
set of license frameworks which does not require issuing
multiple outbound licenses (e.g. Apache 2.0 for software,
CC-BY-ND for images, CC-BY-SA for video, ...) for a single
project repository and picked up the latest updates in the
market implementations.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">What was mainly updated:</div>
<div class="gmail_default">
<ol>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Changed Software to Product
so that the license can be expanded to non-software
product licensing usage (e.g. graphics, video,
manufacturing design, audio, etc) without needing to
spin multiple outbound licenses; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added license assignment,
ratification, and tenure section to specify when and how
is the license applied; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added version controlled
clauses for which version shall be in effect by default;
AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added artificial intelligence
training dataset usage clauses; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added Sensitive Data warranty
and liability coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added global vendors (e.g.
datacenter) Sensitive Data limitation of liability; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added force manjure
limitation of liability; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added global vendors (e.g.
datacenter) Sensitive Data limitation of liability; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added judiciary minimal
damage values limitation of liability; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Expanded grant clauses into
Creative Commons' rights categories;</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">AND Added geographical
indicator coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added protected geographical
indicator coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added protected designation
indicator coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added industrial design use
coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added integrated circuit
layout design use coverage; AND</li>
<li style="margin-left:15px">Added trade secret use
coverage.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">----</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">There are 4 sets of licenses (3 are
open-source):</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">(1) chewkeanho-rlos</div>
<div class="gmail_default">A libre-like license similar to
BSD3-Clear but reserves registered IPs (patent, etc) back to
the owner.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Primary license source: <a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13777226" target="_blank">https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13777226</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default">Backup license source: <a href="https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-rlos" target="_blank">https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-rlos</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">(2) chewkeanho-cos</div>
<div class="gmail_default">An Apache 2.0-like license where
registered IPs are granting use licenses by default.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Primary license source: <a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13788522" target="_blank">https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13788522</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default">Backup license source: <a href="https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-cos" target="_blank">https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-cos</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">(3) chewkeanho-gpos</div>
<div class="gmail_default">A GPLv2-like general public
license. Functions like a backhole open-source that makes
everything general public and forcing upstream. Copyleft
boundaries designations (where its effects shall stop) are
included and warning notice is on the cover page in case of
excited junior executives.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Primary license source: <a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13825030" target="_blank">https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13825030</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default">Backup license source: <a href="https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-gpos" target="_blank">https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-gpos</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">(4) chewkeanho-proprietary</div>
<div class="gmail_default">A fallback, safety first, designed
specifically for junior executives in case of mishaps. The
goal is that, when a project is generated, this shall be the
default license (where everything is locked up). Just in
case a junior accidentally "open" the project, the
proprietary license effect is still there where any senior /
legal executive can fire-fight the situation. The project
can be re-licensed into the other open-source licenses once
the embargo is cleared by the business unit.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">IMPORTANT: This is not an
open-source license but is listed here for reference as the
other licenses are inter-relate with each other. </div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Primary license source: <a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13767361" target="_blank">https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13767361</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default">Backup license source: <a href="https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-proprietary" target="_blank">https://github.com/ChewKeanHo/license-proprietary</a></div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">----</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Proposed SPDX identifier:</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Recommended: **chewkeanho-Xos** (X
is the type like c, gp, rl) since there is a version control
clause so the stewards can update the primary license
without backfiring the older versions.</div>
<div class="gmail_default">If version locked is required:
**chewkeanho-Xos-5-and-above** (where version 5 is reserved
and shall includes the feedback from OSI)</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Supported languages: English</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Available file formats: (1) PDF -
for legal folks; AND (2) RTF - for Microsoft MSI packager;
(3) TXT - for Unix packager (e.g. debian package)</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Source redundancies: (1) Zenodo -
in the EU that issued the common DOI; AND (2) GitHub, in the
US.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">----</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Feedbacks & amendments are
welcome. Version 4 is reserved for OSI feedback and
improvement for externals.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Site-note: if possible, please let
me issue PDF for each iteration. the TXT requires manual
formatting (to make it human readable friendly) which is
very time consuming. If possible, I would like the
TXT formatting to be done only after finalization.</div>
<div class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_default">Thank you for your time.</div>
</div>
<div>
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature">
<div dir="ltr">
<div style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><font face="verdana, sans-serif"><br>
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<div style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><font face="verdana, sans-serif"><br>
</font></div>
<div style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><font face="verdana, sans-serif">Regards,</font></div>
<div><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0)"><font face="verdana, sans-serif">(Holloway) Chew, Kean Ho</font></span></div>
<div><font face="verdana, sans-serif"><font color="#000000"><i>Justus Dominus</i></font><br>
</font></div>
<div><font face="verdana, sans-serif"><font color="#000000">202403160286 (003613489-T)</font><br>
</font></div>
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</font></div>
<div><font face="verdana, sans-serif">E:<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);white-space:pre-wrap"> </span><a href="mailto:me@hollowaykeanho.com" target="_blank">me@hollowaykeanho.com</a> | <a href="mailto:hollowaykeanho@gmail.com" target="_blank">hollowaykeanho@gmail.com</a></font></div>
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<fieldset></fieldset>
<pre>_______________________________________________
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</blockquote></div><br clear="all"><div><br></div><span class="gmail_signature_prefix">-- </span><br><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div>Bruce Perens K6BP</div></div></div></div>