[License-review] For Approval: Convertible Free Software License, Version 1.1 (C-FSL v1.1)

[Simon Phipps]

For the list's convenience, and in the absence of similar diligence by the
author, I have attempted to accumulate the open issues. My apologies if I
have missed or misunderstood any. They would probably benefit from a
further digest.

I believe a minimum of a revised license with the drafting issues addressed
will be required to progress, although I believe the stated issues related
to OSD #3 and OSD #5 also need serious attention. As it stands I would not
vote to approve although naturally I can't speak for the full Board on this.

S.


*Carlo Piano on 26-Sep-18:*
"I remain quite puzzled by the main feature of the license, namely, the
right of *some* copyright holders in the initial work to decide on the
licensing of the *other* follow-on developers who are also copyright
holders. Isn't it a sort of discrimination, therefore against #5? My
initial and non meditated reaction is that this license should be rejected
as long as Section 7 is concerned." *(issue addressed with opinion)*
"restricting others from doing something that the initial developers can
do, siphoning in the formers' code and copyright, that does not seem
acceptable." (issue not addressed)
"The "Original contributor" language exposes a kind of fallacy, that the
contribute by the originator is more "important" than the one of the other
contributors." *(issue accepted by author but not remedied)*

*Bruce Perens on 26-Sep-18:*
"The main reason to reject is that this license allows an arbitrarily
chosen group (the original licensors are not necessarily the ones who do
the most work, etc.) to take the work of others private and release it
under a non-open-source licence, without using the more legally sound
process of a contributor license agreement." *(issue addressed with opinion
without resolution)*
"Despite the stated involvement of an attorney in _evaluating_ the license,
the language construction is sometimes vague and contradictory. Perhaps
this is due to an effort to make it simpler for non-attorneys. But it is
not clear to me that this is a work of authorship of a lawyer, or is that
an attorney, understanding the other tools available, would have felt this
licence is necessary." *(issue not addressed)*

*Brendan Hickey on 26-Sep-18:*
"the entire choice of law clause is farcical. It enables some very
adventurous jurisdiction shopping." *(issue rejected without sufficient
rationale by author)*

*Rick Moen on 02-Oct-18:*
"Wildly developed different forks are always inherently permitted by open
source licensing (OSD #3).  Given that you apparently wish to prevent forks
you disapprove of, I would suggest that you basically prefer proprietary
development."* (issue not understood by author)*
"The problems in C-FSL 1.1 are IMO so vast one scarce knows where to begin
-- perhaps with its many odd, convoluted, and poorly defined turns of
phrase.  As a copyeditor, I was so struck with the need to  red-pencil
(among many others) the section 5 phrase 'there only needs to be one marker
by the party which is at the end of the chain as long as that chain remains
to be documented in some place where it is shipped with your software' that
I only barely noticed that the crucial term 'marker' is completely unclear,
even though the preceding sentence purports to define it." *(Issue not
addressed)*

-- 
Simon Phipps*, President, The Open Source Initiative*
www.opensource.org
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