[License-review] Sublicensing

[Lawrence Rosen]

Hi Pam,

 

You raise a good point. Why would we encourage sublicensing then, if there
is no privity by which to enforce the covenants in the FOSS license?

 

FOSS licenses are direct from the copyright owner to the ultimate licensee.
For example, GPLv3 § 10 expressly avoids sublicensing: "Each time you convey
a covered work, the recipient automatically receives a license from the
original licensors, to run, modify and propagate that work, subject to this
License." [Emphasis added.]

 

That give the licensor all the privity he needs to enforce his license
against each and every licensee. No intermediary commercial distributor can
then interfere with the freedoms or the obligations (conditions or
covenants) associated with that license.

 

IOW, sublicensing hurts. It doesn't help anyone except an intermediary
distributor who can distribute commercial software with hidden FOSS
components.

 

/Larry

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Pamela Chestek [mailto:pamela at chesteklegal.com] 
Sent: Thursday, September 11, 2014 6:22 AM
To: license-review at opensource.org
Subject: Re: [License-review] Sublicensing

 

Changing subject line ...

 

On 9/9/2014 5:04 PM, Lawrence Rosen wrote:

> Once we agree on those basic principles, then it is fair to ask 

> whether "sublicensing" actually provides anything different or whether 

> it is an ancient commercial licensing word that was thrown into the 

> MIT and other licenses among the 17 USC 106 "copyright rights"

> actually being licensed for no important purpose.

 

I believe the difference will be whether the downstream recipient is obliged
to satisfy the covenants of the license versus the conditions.

One can only sublicense the rights one has, so if the original grant has
conditions on the grant, then the sublicensee will also be obliged to
satisfy the same conditions. However, to the extent the license has
covenants, those are a creature of contract only, and since there is no
privity between the original licensor and sublicensee, the sublicensee
wouldn't be obliged to satisfy the covenants.

 

Pam

 

Pamela S. Chestek, Esq.

Chestek Legal

PO Box 2492

Raleigh, NC 27602

919-800-8033

 <mailto:pamela at chesteklegal.com> pamela at chesteklegal.com

 <http://www.chesteklegal.com> www.chesteklegal.com

PGP key 246A430A

 

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