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<p>A few minor comments on this license, which otherwise looks OK to
me:</p>
<p>1. The disclaimers are not made "conspicuous" as that term is
defined in UCC 2-316: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/2/2-316">https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/2/2-316</a> That
has been interpreted as requiring something like ALL CAPS or bold,
or a different color, or a box (although the criteria changed in
2022). This isn't necessarily a flaw (whether UCC is relevant to
open source licenses is an interesting question) but the practice
seems to be that most newer open source licenses try to adhere to
this requirement (most by using ALL CAPS since that tends to be
the only way to do this with .txt files or ASCII -- which
non-lawyers tend to dislike because they interpret it as screaming
without understanding why it's done that way).</p>
<p>2. I find the way the grants are structured sub-optimal in the
way that it handles the right of performance under copyright law.
Rather than being in the grant, it is subsumed into the definition
of "Distribution/Distribute" and then grants a right to
Distribute. All rights are granted (which is good, that way you
don't have to rely on implied grants) but you do need to dig into
the definitions to get there.</p>
<p>Otherwise no comments from me on this one.</p>
<p>McCoy</p>
<p>[in personal capacity and not as board member]</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 7/10/2025 1:03 AM, Moming Duan
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:8A9BD46F-D954-4073-8967-0B5161277005@gmail.com">
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<span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Dear
all,</span>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">I\u2019d
like to make a quick fix to the definition of Licensed Materials
based on Josh\u2019s suggestion. Thanks.</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">
<div
style="caret-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
<blockquote type="cite">
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">On
3 Jul 2025, at 4:43\u202fAM, Josh Berkus
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:josh@berkus.org"><josh@berkus.org></a> wrote:</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline"
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Moming,<br>
<br>
Just a clairity in wording suggestion:<br>
<br>
"For the avoidance of doubt, the Licensed Materials do not
include any datasets used for pretraining, training,
adapting, or evaluating the Model."<br>
<br>
Suggestion:<br>
<br>
"The Licensed Materials do not include any datasets used
for pretraining, training, adapting, or evaluating the
Model, which may or may not be made available under a
separate license."<br>
<br>
Reason:<br>
<br>
First, the phrase "for the avoidance of doubt" is awkward
and not really necessary. Second, this rephrase makes it
clear that this license takes no stance on the licensing
of datasets, it's just stating that they are not included
under this license.<br>
<br>
-- <br>
Josh Berkus</div>
</blockquote>
</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Best,</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Moming</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<br>
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<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div>On 18 Jun 2025, at 5:31\u202fPM, Moming Duan
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:duanmoming@gmail.com"><duanmoming@gmail.com></a> wrote:</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
<div>
<meta http-equiv="content-type"
content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<div
style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;">Dear
OSI Community,
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Following our previous discussions in May, I have
made further revisions to the ModelGo Zero License
(MG0-2.0). I am submitting this updated version for OSI
review via this email. The license text is attached.</div>
<div><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</span></div>
<div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><font
color="#ff8700">\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014 Major Updates to Previous
Submission</font></div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><font
color="#ff8700"><br>
</font></div>
<div>
<ul class="MailOutline">
<li><span style="color: rgb(255, 152, 0);">Removes
restrictions on model output and the requirement
to provide a copy of the license, making it
truly free of obligations or conditions. </span></li>
<li><span style="color: rgb(255, 152, 0);">Adds more
explicit granting of rights in Section 2.1. </span></li>
<li><span style="color: rgb(255, 152, 0);">Narrows
the definition of \u201cDerivative Materials\u201d by
including the phrase: \u201cin order to replicate,
approximate, or otherwise achieve functional
behavior that is similar to the Model.\u201d </span></li>
<li><span style="color: rgb(255, 152, 0);">Removes
\u201cDerivative Materials\u201d in Section 5: \u201cNothing in
this License permits You to modify this License
as applied to the Licensed Materials.\u201d </span></li>
<li><span style="color: rgb(255, 152, 0);">Fixes
typos and formatting issues.</span></li>
</ul>
</div>
<div style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
</div>
<div><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014 </span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">License </span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Introduction</span></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>License Name</b>:<span class="Apple-tab-span"
style="white-space: pre;"> </span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">ModelGo Zero
License</span></div>
<div><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><b>Version</b>: <span
class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>2.0</span></div>
<div><font><b>Short Identifier: <span
class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></b>MG0-2.0</font></div>
<div><b style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Copyleft:</b><span
class="Apple-tab-span"
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; white-space: pre;"> </span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">No</span></div>
<div><b>Legacy or New</b>: <span class="Apple-tab-span"
style="white-space: pre;"> </span>New License</div>
<div><b>Drafted By Lawyer</b>: <span
class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Yes, Rajah
& Tann Singapore LLP</div>
<div><b>Approved or <span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Used</span> by
Projects</b>: <span class="Apple-tab-span"
style="white-space: pre;"> </span>No</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>License URL</b>:<span class="Apple-tab-span"
style="white-space: pre;"> </span><a
href="https://ids.nus.edu.sg/modelgo-mg0.html"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://ids.nus.edu.sg/modelgo-mg0.html</a></div>
<div><b>Introduction and Video</b>:<span
class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><a
href="https://www.modelgo.li/" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://www.modelgo.li/</a></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>Overview</b>:</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>ModelGo Zero License Version 2.0 (MG0-2.0) is a new
license designed for publishing models (typically neural
networks like Llama2, DeepSeek). It is one of the
variants in the ModelGo License family. MG0-2.0 is the
most permissive license in the ModelGo family, requiring
only that the original license be provided when
distributing the original Licensed Materials or
Derivative Materials (<span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Licensed Materials
and </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Derivative
Materials are</span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span>defined in
Clause 1).</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>Complies with OSD:</b></div>
<div><b><br>
</b></div>
<div>OSD 3 Derived Works \u2014 MG0-2.0 <span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"> </span><span
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Clause 2.1 (a)
grants copyright and patent rights to create
derivatives.</span></div>
<div>OSD 5 and OSD 6 \u2014 No discrimination clause is
included in MG0-2.0.</div>
<div>OSD 9 License Must Not Restrict Other Software \u2014 No
such restriction is included in MG0-2.0.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>The Gap to Fill:</b></div>
<div>Model sharing is very common on the web, with over
1.4 million models currently listed on Hugging Face (<a
href="https://huggingface.co/models"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://huggingface.co/models</a>).
However, most of these models are not properly licensed.
When publishing their models, developers typically
choose from three main options (as seen in the model
license tags on the Hugging Face website):</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>
<ul class="MailOutline">
<li>OSS licenses, e.g., Apache-2.0, MIT</li>
<li>Open responsible AI licenses (OpenRAILs),
e.g., CreativeML-OpenRAIL-M, OpenRAIL++</li>
<li>Proprietary Licenses, e.g., Llama2, Llama3</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>However, not all licenses are well-suited for model
publishing.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>Why not use OSS licenses? </b></div>
<div>Traditional OSS licenses lack clear definitions
regarding machine learning concepts, such as Models,
Output, and Derivatives created through knowledge
transfer. This ambiguity can result in certain ML
activities (e.g., Distillation, Mix-of-Expert) being
beyond the control of the model owner.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>Why not use OpenRAILs? </b></div>
<div>Recently, Responsible AI Licenses (<a
href="https://www.licenses.ai/" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://www.licenses.ai/</a>)
have been widely advocated to govern AI technologies,
aiming to restrict unlawful and unethical uses of
models. While I acknowledge the growing need for such
governance, these copyleft-style restrictions do not
comply with the OSD and may cause incompatibility with
licenses like GPL-3.0. Another concern is that these
behavioral restrictions may proliferate within the AI
model ecosystem, increasing the risk of license
breaches.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Why not use
Llama2 or Llama3 Licenses?</b></div>
<div><font>These licenses are proprietary licenses that
are not reusable. </font>Furthermore, they include
exclusive terms such as "You will not use the Llama
Materials or any output or results of the Llama
Materials to improve any other large language model" and
copyleft-style behavioral restrictions.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>In fact, the dilemma in current model publishing is
the lack of a general-purpose license for model
developers. Additionally, since no single license meets
diverse model publishing needs, some developers resort
to using CC licenses with different elements. However,
CC licenses are ill-suited for this purpose as they do
not grant patent rights. This motivated the drafting of
ModelGo License family, which provides different
licensing elements similar to CC but specifically
designed for model publishing.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><b>Comparison with Existing OSI-Approved Licenses:</b></div>
<div>Since I could not find an OSI-approved model license,
I can only compare MG0-2.0 with one similar OSS license
\u2014 Apache-2.0</div>
<div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>
<li style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">MG0-2.0 defines
licensed materials and derivative works differently
from Apache-2.0, tailoring them to models.</li>
<li style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">MG0-2.0 can
govern the remote access (e.g., chatbot) scenario.</li>
<li style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">MG0-2.0 does
not require retaining attribution or stating
modifications when redistributing derivatives.</li>
</div>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>If further comparisons or supporting evidence are
needed to strengthen my claims, please let me know. I am
more than willing to engage in further discussions with
the OSI community about this license and contribute to
promoting standardized model publishing. \U0001f917</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Best,</div>
<div>Moming</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline"
style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">
</div>
<span id="cid:8750D18F-05A8-4354-8E1D-1B416D7CD7CF"><MG0-2.0.txt></span>
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content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</div>
</blockquote>
</div>
<br>
<br>
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<pre wrap="" class="moz-quote-pre">_______________________________________________
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</pre>
</blockquote>
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