Zeratec Public License

[Pat St. Jean]

On Tue, 13 Jul 1999, Mark Wells wrote:

>I think Bruce mis-stated his point to some extent, but he's right.  A 
>license written in terms of 'understandings' rather than specific
>assignment of permissions to the licensee is ambiguous.  This makes it
>both harder for the end user (as opposed to the lawyers) to understand
>*and* harder to enforce.  When Bruce said that "the license is meant to be
>executed by programmers, not attorneys", I think he meant that attorneys
>would know the legal significance of an 'understanding' in a contract,
>but programmers wouldn't, so to be safe they'd have to hire an attorney.
>It's one of the effects of ambiguity.

Ahhh...  That helps, it makes more sense now...

>I didn't have to have my attorney read the GPL before I agreed to it,
>because the GPL is unambiguous.  It says, "You are allowed to use, modify,
>and redistribute in original or modified form."  It doesn't say anything
>is 'understood'.  It assumes the end user understands nothing at all, and
>then proceeds to spell it out.

Yep, definitely a well written license.  I don't agree with some of it,
but that's a MUCH different discussion...

>That's why it's important for the license to be unambiguous.  You don't
>want the individual programmer who downloads your code and thinks of a new
>feature to add to have to hire an attorney at $200 per hour to read the
>license and make sure it would be legal for him to redistribute his
>modifications under the GPL.

$200/hr?!?!?!  You're getting off cheap!  Seriously.

But look at it this way.  If there is doubt, even $400 an hour is better
than the judgement you're likely to have to pay if you do violate the
terms...

I agree with what Bruce said earlier, a LEGALLY clear and unabiguous
license SHOULD be easy for a normal person to read.  That's the best of
all worlds, and working to get that is a Good Thing.  But if you're in
doubt, communicate with the other party.  In writing, e-mail isn't
admissable everywhere.  It never hurts to ask questions.

Regards,
  Pat

-- 
Patrick St. Jean              '97 XLH 883                psj at cgmlarson.com
Programmer & Systems Administrator                    +1 713-977-4177 x115
Larson Software Technology                        http://www.cgmlarson.com