[License-review] Submitting CC0 for OSI approval

[Lawrence Rosen]

Henrik Ingo wrote:
> The MPEG patent pool perhaps was a very easy example
> to discuss as their actively practiced business model is precisely
> what we want to avoid with open source.

As I understand the situation, most manufacturers of commercial products
(e.g., Android phone manufacturers) already license the MPEG patent pool.
Why should distributors of software intended for those products need to
worry about those MPEG patents?

Speaking more generally, there are at least three common situations:

1. A patent is owned or licensable by the distributor of the software. Most
mature FOSS licenses explicitly make those patent claims available along
with the software. In others (BSD, MIT, CC0?) licenses to patent claims are
implied (and there is possibly an unfortunate assumption by some here that
implied patent licenses are enforceable in all jurisdictions). 

2. As with the MPEG patent pool, necessary patent claims may be available
from third parties so that the software distributor need not worry about
them. This is also true for many patent claims that read on industry
standards. FOSS licenses can do nothing about these patent claims, nor do
they need to.

3. In perhaps many cases, patent claims are owned by third parties and all
we can do is wish for them or ignore them.

/Larry


> -----Original Message-----
> From: license-review-bounces at opensource.org [mailto:license-review-
> bounces at opensource.org] On Behalf Of Henrik Ingo
> Sent: Monday, February 20, 2012 12:37 AM
> To: license-review at opensource.org
> Subject: Re: [License-review] Submitting CC0 for OSI approval
> 
> Thanks Richard
> 
> While I was not active with the SPI in 2009, that decision is in line
> with what I would expect from the OSI "as a customer" of the open
> source licenses. The MPEG patent pool perhaps was a very easy example
> to discuss as their actively practiced business model is precisely
> what we want to avoid with open source. Nevertheless, we should then
> not create an opportunity for them to use CC0 to meet their goals
> either.
> 
> henrik
> 
> On Mon, Feb 20, 2012 at 12:37 AM, Richard Fontana <rfontana at redhat.com>
> wrote:
> > In considering certain of the issues that have been raised regarding
> > the submission of CC0 for OSI approval, I would call attention to
> > something that may have been forgotten, which is Carlo Piana's
> > unsuccessful effort to obtain OSI approval for the "MXM Public
> > License" in April 2009.
> >
> > The thread may be viewed at:
> > http://www.crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?17:iis:770:201002 ("For
> > Approval: MXM Public License", with some offshoot threads)
> >
> > - RF
> >
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> review
> 
> 
> 
> --
> henrik.ingo at avoinelama.fi
> +358-40-8211286 skype: henrik.ingo irc: hingo
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> 
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