For approval: MXM Public license

[Matthew Flaschen]

Carlo wrote:
> If the answer is "in order to be OSI certified the license should grant
> -- explicitly or implicitly -- the right to use the patented stuff in
> it", then the discussion is over because the avoidance of such licensing
> has been chartered to the license since the beginning

There is no way to produce a FOSS license that explicitly denies patent
rights.

> I remain skeptical, though, about the notion that the BSD provides a
> patent license at all, leave alone a "solid" implicit patent license. I
> think I am not alone in this, as some distinguished expert like Dan
> Ravicher, or those who have conceived the Clear BSD license, have
> different opinions. Maybe this is beyond the point, but I don't buy this
> argument at face value. If the BSD remains silent, then at least it
> allows a great deal of ambiguity.

Even if it were true that BSD is ambiguous, your license is worse than
ambiguous because it explicitly denies the needed rights.  As far as
Clear BSD (http://labs.metacarta.com/license-explanation.html), it's
obvious that their license is not motivated by a desire for clarity, but
rather a desire to avoid a commonly-understood interpretation of the
actual BSD license.

If it were true that "it is widely understood that the BSD probably does
not grant patent rights anyway", there would be no point to Clear BSD!
Their argument is self-defeating.

> Of course my position is that software patents should not exist *at
> all*, and that all Free and Open Source Software License should have
> software patents anti-bodies insofar and until software patents exist.

Your stated position is not particularly relevant.  What is relevant is
the text of the license, which by your own admission does not follow
your declared principles.

Matt Flaschen