[License-discuss] A new kind of badgeware license?

[Richard Fontana]

On Mon, Jul 14, 2025 at 6:03 AM Kevin P. Fleming
<lists.osi-license-discuss at kevin.km6g.us> wrote:
>
> On Mon, Jul 14, 2025, at 05:39, Stefano Maffulli wrote:
> >     Our only modification part is that, if the Software (or any
> >     derivative works
> >     thereof) is used for any of your commercial products or services
> >     that have
> >     more than 100 million monthly active users, or more than 20 million
> >     US dollars
> >     (or equivalent in other currencies) in monthly revenue, you shall
> >     prominently
> >     display "Kimi K2" on the user interface of such product or service.
>
> I consider this a violation of OSD 6 and/or OSD 10, as it assumes the presence of a 'user interface' and that is required in order to comply with the license. If the clause was written in such a way to have this requirement only apply if the product or service has a user interface, then it would not be a violation.

My general intuition is that it's OSD-nonconformant.

One basic problem is that I don't know what it means to say "the
Software . . . is used for any of your commercial products or
services". I don't think that's idiomatic English, particularly the
"for", so it's inherently confusing.

Also, given the problematic legacy of badgeware licenses, I don't know
how to read the requirement to 'prominently display "Kimi K2"'. Does
that include prominently saying "We used Kimi K2 'for' this product"?
Or are you just expected to apply "Kimi K2" as though it were your
brand?

I'm not sure whether a badgeware requirement with the qualifications
suggested by Kevin but still discriminating against a certain class of
big powerful company should be treated as OSD-conformant rather than a
violation of OSD 5/6 (let's assume this clause was revised to make
clear what situations it applied to). Some kinds of differential
treatment are clearly OK (for example, GPLv2 has an additional option
for "noncommercial distribution" when meeting the complete
corresponding source requirement).

Richard