Can anyone say his or her software is open source?

[Tina Gasperson]

Does a license have to comply with the published requirements 
(http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.html) in order for the distributor 
or creator of the software to call it open source?

ACARA (http://www.openchannelsoftware.com/projects/ACARA) is a program 
originally developed by NASA. ACARA is now being handled by the Open Channel 
Foundation (http://www.openchannelsoftware.com). ACARA's license terms 
(http://www.openchannelsoftware.com/project/view_license.php?group_id=129&license_id=20) 
violate at least three points of the Open Source definition (AFAIK, IANAL), 
yet the Open Channel Foundation claims all of the software it distributes is 
open source.

Is this OK from a legal standpoint? 

disclaimer: This is a possible NewsForge story; if you don't want to be 
quoted please say so in your reply.

Tina Gasperson
editor
NewsForge.com

--
license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3