[License-discuss] [DISCUSS] PUWL v1.0 – P-EADCA Universal Waiver License

[Bruce Perens]

A "crayon license" is a license obviously produced by a
non-legal-professional, which has obvious faults that a legal professional
would know to avoid. The name comes from a Monty Python sketch in which a
man presents a cat license which is a dog license with the word dog crossed
out and "cat" written in, in crayon. This license is unique in that it is
not only a crayon license, but includes a concatenation of other crayon
licenses, along with some that have legal solidity.

The problem with producing licenses this way is that the sole purpose of a
license is to be enforced in court, either by the licensor in a complaint,
or, more likely for this one: by the recipient in their defense. The
amateur nature of the license text means that the recipient can not count
on the court parsing the license as they would expect. Thus, the creators
of such licenses do a disservice to the community.

For the good of the community, please always involve a legal professional
in license formation. IMO it would be best if you would withdraw this
version and come back with a professional formulation.

    Thanks

    Bruce

On Wed, Oct 1, 2025 at 6:01 AM Balázs Hámorszky <balihb at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello everyone,
>
> I’m Balázs Hamorszky, the author of a new license called the
> P-EADCA Universal Waiver License (PUWL v1.0)
>
> PUWL is a permissive / waiver-style license that aims to:
>   • Waive all rights that can legally be waived, in all jurisdictions,
>   • Disclaim all liability,
>   • Provide a universal fallback where full waiver is not recognized,
>   • Combine several existing public-domain-style approaches into a single
> text
>
> The full text and README (with philosophy and usage instructions) are here:
>   → https://github.com/balihb/PUWL
>
> My intent is to first ask for informal feedback, before submitting it
> to the formal license-review process.
> I’d appreciate any comments or concerns you may have.
>
> Thank you for your time.
>
> Best regards,
> Balázs Hamorszky
>
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-- 
Bruce Perens K6BP
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