[License-review] License-review Digest, Vol 119, Issue 8

Tue Aug 22 10:25:36 UTC 2023

Sorry, this is really difficult, if not impossible, to follow. 

Also, I have put forward additional questions that seem unanswered. Since they map to possible incompatibility with OSD, I think that also they need to be addressed, please. Such as the different positions between authors, licensor, licensee and contributors, which seems to discriminate categories of rightsholders.

In addition, please also remove Art. 5. However well-meaning, they are directly against #5 and  #6 (see several discussions on "do no harm" or "do not violate law X" or "be no evil"). I haven't spotted it earlier, Josh has. Also, I don't understand how you can claim to have removed the problems with Art. 3. Maybe this depends on our insufficient understanding of the underlying technology, we would therefore need more clarification.

Procedurally: if you edit the text of a license, you should recant the earlier version and submit a new one. And since I have assisted with the review of licenses, I think it is inappropriate to submit licenses by only providing a link. What guarantees (it has happened) that the text is not changed at liberty? The OSI text must be the canonical text for any approved licenses. It would be appropriate, in addition, to have a marked up version to spot the differences, possibly with comments on what addresses which comment. 

I am not sure this is sufficiently clear stated in the current instructions, but we need to be sure on something that the community can control in the long run which text has been submitted and approved, and this implies that the text must be in the submission, clearly marked with a version number and any subsequent version has a separate version number, so that the discussion only concentrates on one single, current version. 

Finally, you are requested to collect ALL input, process ALL input and question and THEN decide whether filing a new version is the appropriate action, as opposed to insist on the current text, explaining what the critics got wrong, or to retire the submission entirely. That is quite clearly stated in the instructions. And I quote: 

> There will often be suggestions made for changes to the license. Suggestions are only that; the license submitter should not feel obligated to change the license, although it might be wise to do so if comments are pointing out a reason why the license is unlikely to be approved. However, a license cannot be changed while it is being considered. 

> If the license submitter would like to change the language of the license, the current version of the license should be withdrawn from review and an updated version submitted. We recommend that, if changes are going to be made, that the license submitter wait and collect all the desired changes in a single new submission rather than withdrawing and resubmitting the same license several times. 

Therefore, please consider to retire the current submission and start one anew, if you don't receive more feedback in a few days, providing the text within the submission, for future reference. Also, please consider to retain the help of an expert in open source licensing to streamline and make the text more readable and consistent and complement it with some reference material to understand the unexpressed references.

With best regards, 

Carlo

----- Messaggio originale -----
> Da: "Legal Desk" <legal at muellners.org>
> A: "license-review at lists.opensource.org" <license-review at lists.opensource.org>, "carlo at piana.eu" <carlo at piana.eu>
> Inviato: Martedì, 22 agosto 2023 11:25:55
> Oggetto: Re: License-review Digest, Vol 119, Issue 8

> Thanks for your feedback, and constructive critical view.

> There are also numerous (i) callouts in the license. It is not clear
> whether these are part of the license text, or are intended to be
> explanatory.
>>>Callouts are Hint Texts which explain the Article but are not the legal text.
>>>The PLAIN TEXT License Copy is available for ready reference [
> >>https://license.openconstitution.us/license-copy-eng |  here ] .

> ''I'll note that overall, this license seems to have been created by
> incrementally editing your prior terms of service, without a review to
> ensure that the resulting document was internally consistent and clear.''

>>> Yes, the License creation process is inspired by the visualisation of the Open
>>> Constitution AI network (see a diagram [
>>> https://docs.muellners.info/oc-network/network-diagram | here ] ). This review
>>> process is helping us further delink the License from the case study of the
>>> Open Constitution network and make the license attributable to any digital IP
> >> in AI systems.
> Based on your suggestions, we have set up a Live Editor copy to bring edits to
> one place, during this review.
> On this page, one can also leave a comment or a question directly next to any
> Article, wherever any explanation is deemed required by the esteemed members of
> the list.
> [ https://license.openconstitution.us/public-review-copy |
> https://license.openconstitution.us/public-review-copy ]

> The summary of edits is below;
> A.
> ''Article 1 section b is somewhat poorly drafted, but in any case requires
> > that a 'derivative work' comply with a third party's "Acceptable Usage
>> Conditions". This is clearly not compatible with OSD 5 and 6,
>> ............................................. Article 5 is also incompatible
> > with OSD 5 and 6.

> Licenses cannot include, by implication, external terms and
> conditions. Such conditions must be part of the license, and they must
> comply with the OSD.''

> >>EDITS:
> Article 1: Remove dependence on external documents maintained elsewhere-
> removing Acceptable Usage Conditions in 1b by rewriting Article 1.
> Article 5: Rewritten to remove dependence on external doc Global Statutes:
> Non-acceptable Usage or Exclusion Rights modelled on No harm, Security measures
> & Data integrity.

> B.
> >>EDITS:
> Article 2: Rewritten for clarity on ''rationale for the Source Object to be
> publicly available''

> C.
> ''Article 3: Tokenization: this seems to say that licensees must have some
> kind of specific electronic ID token to be licensees?
> .................................... This seems to be
> intended to be in support of Article 4, which would be related to the
> open sourcing of AI data models, but the language is not at all clear.''

> >> EDITS:
> Article 3: Rewritten for clarity on ''what is authenticated and authorized in
> the context of, any access to Source Object.''

> D.
> >>EDITS
> Article 11 edits to make the jurisdiction independent for litigation due to
> interpretation b/w other parties.
> E.
> >>EDITS in Definitions:
> Removed definition of “Open Source” and added the write-up as a Help Text for
> open sourcing an IP ... subjective nature of the term used in the context of AI
> systems, added definitions to Tokenization, Network.

> Please let us know if there are questions.

> On Fri, Aug 18, 2023 at 2:00 PM < [
> mailto:license-review-request at lists.opensource.org |
> license-review-request at lists.opensource.org ] > wrote:

>> Send License-review mailing list submissions to
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>> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
>> than "Re: Contents of License-review digest..."

>> Today's Topics:

>> 1. Re: Request for Open Constitution License v1 for Approval
>> (Kevin P. Fleming)
>> 2. Re: Request for Legacy Approval for the ICU License (as used
>> by ICU 1.8.1 to ICU 57.1) (Josh Berkus)
>> 3. Re: Request for Open Constitution License v1 for Approval
>> (Josh Berkus)

>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------

>> Message: 1
>> Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2023 13:38:34 -0400
>> From: "Kevin P. Fleming" < [ mailto:lists.osi-license-review at kevin.km6g.us |
>> lists.osi-license-review at kevin.km6g.us ] >
>> To: License-review < [ mailto:license-review at lists.opensource.org |
>> license-review at lists.opensource.org ] >
>> Subject: Re: [License-review] Request for Open Constitution License v1
>> for Approval
>> Message-ID: < [ mailto:df3234f9-b157-4be3-950b-d0fa243f4bb6 at app.fastmail.com |
>> df3234f9-b157-4be3-950b-d0fa243f4bb6 at app.fastmail.com ] >
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

>> On Wed, Aug 16, 2023, at 17:00, Legal Desk via License-review wrote:
>> > **Rationale f*or a new license*

>> > **

>>> The Open Constitution License (OCL) < [
>>> https://license.openconstitution.us/open-constitution-license-v1 |
>>> https://license.openconstitution.us/open-constitution-license-v1 ] > is a novel
>>> open-source license that grants intellectual property rights to source code
>>> hosted on an Artificial Intelligence network. It sets rules for data integrity,
>>> authorization, and redistribution of IP through a publicly accessible network.
>>> The license considers factors such as open data principles, copyrightability of
>>> AI/ML systems, data privacy, fair competition, and responsibility in
>> > AI/ML-driven decisions.

>>> OCL **differs from other open-source licenses** in its focus on AI and its
>>> specific provisions for data protection, international law, and the role of the
>> > public network.

>>> It introduces General Public Tokenization, and electronic persons in the context
>> > of open source IPR.

>>> OCL establishes a chain of authorship **similar to** EUPL-1.2 or a restriction
>>> on the Licensee for data integrity performance when redistributing to a
>> > beneficiary,* s*imilar to **CAL1.0,

>> > PLAIN TEXT COPY OF THE LICENSE

>>> _ [ https://license.openconstitution.us/license-copy-eng_ |
>> > https://license.openconstitution.us/license-copy-eng_ ]

>> This license contains a definition of "Open Source" which is not based on the
>> OSD. It seems highly unlikely that the OSI would approve a license containing a
>> conflicting definition of this fundamental term.

>> Article 1 section b is somewhat poorly drafted, but in any case requires that a
>> 'derivative work' comply with a third party's "Acceptable Usage Conditions".
>> This is clearly not compatible with OSD 5 and 6, which disallow discrimination
>> against person(s) or group(s), and against fields of endeavor. Article 5 is
>> also incompatible with OSD 5 and 6.

>> Article 2.1 is not compatible with OSD 10; the license cannot dictate any
>> specific technological mechanisms.
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>> ------------------------------

>> Message: 2
>> Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2023 17:45:29 -0700
>> From: Josh Berkus < [ mailto:josh at berkus.org | josh at berkus.org ] >
>> To: License submissions for OSI review
>> < [ mailto:license-review at lists.opensource.org |
>> license-review at lists.opensource.org ] >, Jeff Johnson < [
>> mailto:trnsz at pobox.com | trnsz at pobox.com ] >
>> Subject: Re: [License-review] Request for Legacy Approval for the ICU
>> License (as used by ICU 1.8.1 to ICU 57.1)
>> Message-ID: < [ mailto:6425fc40-fa75-408f-a073-2c89c8e567a1 at berkus.org |
>> 6425fc40-fa75-408f-a073-2c89c8e567a1 at berkus.org ] >
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed

>> On 8/16/23 01:25, Jeff Johnson wrote:
>> > I'm requesting that the ICU License be considered for Legacy approval as
>> > an OSI-approved license.

>> My vote, from a developer perspective:

>> +1 to approve, with eventual tagging of "redundant with more popular
>> licenses" or whatever our equivalent ends up being.

>> --
>> Josh Berkus

>> ------------------------------

>> Message: 3
>> Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2023 18:04:39 -0700
>> From: Josh Berkus < [ mailto:josh at berkus.org | josh at berkus.org ] >
>> To: License submissions for OSI review
>> < [ mailto:license-review at lists.opensource.org |
>> license-review at lists.opensource.org ] >, "Kevin P. Fleming"
>> < [ mailto:lists.osi-license-review at kevin.km6g.us |
>> lists.osi-license-review at kevin.km6g.us ] >
>> Subject: Re: [License-review] Request for Open Constitution License v1
>> for Approval
>> Message-ID: < [ mailto:522257a5-b18c-4e1c-94a7-09f233916f02 at berkus.org |
>> 522257a5-b18c-4e1c-94a7-09f233916f02 at berkus.org ] >
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed

>> Thanks for submitting this! We appreciate the effort to create a
>> license specifically in the AI realm.

>> I'll note that overall, this license seems to have been created by
>> incrementally editing your prior terms of service, without a review to
>> ensure that the resulting document was internally consistent and clear.
>> The suggestions below are in pursuit of improving this license to the
>> point where it can be acceptable.

>> There are also numerous (i) callouts in the license. It is not clear
>> whether these are part of the license text, or are intended to be
>> explanitory. The text in many of these callouts directly contradicts
>> text elsewhere.

>> On 8/17/23 10:38, Kevin P. Fleming wrote:

>> > This license contains a definition of "Open Source" which is not based
>> > on the OSD. It seems highly unlikely that the OSI would approve a
>> > license containing a conflicting definition of this fundamental term.

>> > Article 1 section b is somewhat poorly drafted, but in any case requires
>> > that a 'derivative work' comply with a third party's "Acceptable Usage
>> > Conditions". This is clearly not compatible with OSD 5 and 6, which
>> > disallow discrimination against person(s) or group(s), and against
>> > fields of endeavor. Article 5 is also incompatible with OSD 5 and 6.

>> Yes, this. Licenses cannot include, by implication, external terms and
>> conditions. Such conditions must be part of the license, and they must
>> comply with the OSD.

>> > Article 2.1 is not compatible with OSD 10; the license cannot dictate
>> > any specific technological mechanisms.

>> Also, 2.1 conflicts directly with the subsection "Open Constitution
>> License Is technology-neutral." And with the very next paragraph under 2.1.

>> Also, the whole business of machine vs. human-readable source objects
>> very hard to understand, and I suspect the result of further edit conflicts.

>> Article 3: Tokenization: this seems to say that licensees must have some
>> kind of specific electronic ID token to be licensees? Is this an
>> AI-specific thing? Because as a general software dev, it's completely
>> unclear to me what this section is getting at. This seems to be
>> intended to be in support of Article 4, which would be related to the
>> open sourcing of AI data models, but the language is not at all clear.

>> Article 5: This makes it clear that the idea is for Acceptable Usage
>> Conditions to be something that any licensor can do for their individual
>> source object. This isn't going to work, not if you want this to be
>> open source. It's also unenforceable and impossible to comply with.

>> It also adds a dependancy on yet another external document, the Global
>> Statutes of the Open Constitution Network, which isn't going to work for
>> the reasons explained above.

>> So, interesting first draft, hopefully we can edit this into a place
>> where it's actually open source.

>> --
>> Josh Berkus

>> ------------------------------

>> Subject: Digest Footer

>> _______________________________________________
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>> ------------------------------

>> End of License-review Digest, Vol 119, Issue 8
>> **********************************************

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> Legal Desk
> Muellners Foundation

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