OVPL summary

[Chuck Swiger]

Brian C wrote:
[ ... ]
> So perhaps the OVPL presents a more specific question to OSI: Is a
> license that grants greater rights to an initial developer than it
> grants to other licensees consistent with OSI's principles, in
> particular, does it constitute "discrimination against persons or groups"?

No.  The author of the software generally has significant additional rights on 
the original software beyond what a proposed license grants to other people, by 
virtue of common law where that applies ("droit d'auteur"), having the right to 
release under a different license, etc.

So long as people can continue to modify and redistribute the software openly, 
asking people who want to make proprietary modifications to grant the original 
developer the right to reuse and redistribute such modifications for themselves 
is OK.  However, part of granting full Open Source rights to everyone means 
that the software has to be feasible for others to redistribute, even if the 
original developer disagrees or no longer exists.

-- 
-Chuck