free Re: Dual licensing

Chris F Clark cfc at TheWorld.com
Mon Jun 7 20:10:18 UTC 2004


What part of OSD#6 prevents someone for charging to license the
software to one group and give the software away for free to another
as long as the same open source license is made available to both?

Actually, as long as the license is OSI compatible--meaning
effectively that some recipient could give the software to the party
to which one does not wish to sell, is there any reason that a
developer could not sell open source software only to a select group
of people?

For example, consider the following possible strawmen:

Strawman 1:
1) Developer A creates software.  

2a) Developer A creates a web site and offers the software for
gratis distribution to non-commercial users via a web site.

2b) Said developer offers for sale (but not gratis) direct
distribution to commercial users.

3) Developer A ships the software to said users under the GPL.

4) Non-commercial user B gets a copy of said software and gives (or
   sells) it to commercial enity B (under the terms of the GPL)

5a) Can developer A, say that they have complied with the OSI
definition?

5b) What if they indicate that such "circumvention" is legal--but
"discouraged" at the web site?

Strawman 2, same as one, but substitute for 2a/b

2a) Developer A creates a web site and offers the software for
sale to non-commercial users via a web site.

2b) Said developer refuses to sell (directly, i.e. themselves) to
commercial users.

-Chris

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



More information about the License-discuss mailing list