[License-review] [license review] Mulan PSL V1

[Carlo]

On 06/12/19 01:23, Josh Berkus wrote:
> On 12/4/19 1:31 AM, zhou minghui wrote:
>> As for your criticism, I totally understand your angle. However, you may
>> understand we did that for a reason. We intended to make it easier for
>> Chinese developers to read and understand, not inducing legal issues
>> they don't want.  After all, we have about ten million developers in
>> China, who are desperate to develop their software in open source
>> fashion.  And they represent thousands of companies that may boost the
>> Internet technologies.  They are not against English at all (we are in
>> the same earth village, and we are applying for OSI approval here), but
>> a Chinese version make them understand what they are licensed and
>> license to. 
> I think Carlo was arguing that this license should state that the
> Chinese version is authoritative.  Certainly that would make sense to me.
>
Thanks Josh for spotting the point. Pretty much so. **One** version
should be authoritative, IMHO. Which one, that's up to the author of the
license to decide.

Suppose one contributor picks the English and another, for an unrelated
project, the Chinese, and the two differ substantially due to a glitch
in the translation. And a third party combines them. It's a minor hiccup
here, as it's no copyleft, yet it's unnecessary added entropy. Which one
applies? You would have two inbound and most of all two outbound
licenses in a superstate, with the same name and different legal
consequences.

Again, not a big issue, rather a matter of elegance and "ecology".

Carlo