[License-review] Submitting CC0 for OSI approval

[Christopher Allan Webber]

Richard Fontana <rfontana at redhat.com> writes:

> On Fri, Feb 17, 2012 at 10:03:37PM +0000, Thorsten Glaser wrote:
>> Richard Fontana dixit:
>> 
>> >I am not sure whether there is precedent for an OSI-approved license
>> >(at least, one that is, today, widely used) that explicitly reserves
>> >all patent rights.
>> 
>> I think OSI approves copyright licences. CC0 is merely explicit in
>> not granting one, whereas others explicitly grant one or can be
>> constructed (or not) to do that implicitly.
>> 
>> So, while this question is not without interest, it’s not relevant here.
>
> OK. I would just like the OSI to confirm that this provision of the
> Open Source Definition
>
>   7. Distribution of License
>
>   The rights attached to the program must apply to all to whom the
>   program is redistributed without the need for execution of an
>   additional license by those parties.
>
>   Rationale: This clause is intended to forbid closing up software by
>   indirect means such as requiring a non-disclosure agreement.
>
> is not in conflict with the provision of CC0 I quoted. (In which case,
> I would be interested in understanding what that plank of the OSD
> actually means. Perhaps Mr. Perens can shed some light. :)
>
> - Richard

Does it reserve patent rights, or does it declare that out of scope of
the license?  The actual bit of the license text says:

> 4. Limitations and Disclaimers.
> 
>   No trademark or patent rights held by Affirmer are waived,
>   abandoned, surrendered, licensed or otherwise affected by this
>   document.

Let's consider that *most* OSI approved licenses actually effectively
are the same, but without explicit statement.  Patent provisions are out
of scope of MIT, BSD, and almost every non-apache non-*GPL license tool.

What's being said here isn't "there's a patent license over here that
you need to sign onto" but "this is a public domain document, it's about
the waiver of copyright, so these other things don't apply".  And as a
general purpose public domain tool, it makes sense that patent issues
are not directly attached.

To re-quote that statement of the OSD:

>   The rights attached to the program must apply to all to whom the
>   program is redistributed without the need for execution of an
>   additional license by those parties.

I think the license does do this... again, the purpose of this section
is to say "these issues are out of scope".  They're out of scope of
*most* free software licenses also, since they're not mentioned at all.

So we should reframe this question:

  "Does explicitly stating that software patents are out of scope of a
  software license (or public domain tool), as in CC0 1.0, create a
  greater software patent threat than if it was never mentioned at all,
  but still remained out of scope, as in MIT and BSD?  And if so, by
  what mechanism does that happen?"

Thanks!
 - Chris