[License-review] ModelGo Attribution License, Version 2.0 FINAL CALL FOR COMMENTS

Wed Sep 23 16:05:08 UTC 2026

Hi McCoy,

My fault. I was in a meeting and had not updated the text yet.

I have now updated the MG-BY-2.0 license text on GitHub:

-MG-BY
https://github.com/Xtra-Computing/ModelGo/blob/main/MGL/V2/MG-BY/LICENSE

- MG0 does not contain a patent-assertion termination provision, so it has
not been changed, FYI,
https://github.com/Xtra-Computing/ModelGo/blob/main/MGL/V2/MG0/LICENSE

*(Please disregard the text currently served from the ids.nus.edu.sg
<http://ids.nus.edu.sg> URL.**That copy is hosted on a university server, *
*and updating it requires approval from the project manager. **I will
update it later.)*

Best,
Moming

McCoy Smith <mccoy at lexpan.law> 于2026年9月23日周三 22:09写道：

> Dr. Duan:
>
> Are you going to update ModelGo-BY-2.0 to reflect the new termination
> language below, and would that be the version of the license that you  are
> asking to be approved by OSI? The proposal below, which changes just the
> termination provision, seems to be consistent with the other licenses which
> I highlighted previously that have non-discriminatory patent assertion
> termination clauses, and may address what may be the last concern that has
> been expressed on this particular license.
>
> I looked at the GitHub and the website for ModelGo and I hadn't seen that
> this revision had been made to the canonical versions of the license (which
> is what, ultimately, OSI needs to be able to see in order to ensure we know
> what it is is being approved/disapproved).
>
> McCoy
> On 9/22/2026 10:56 PM, Moming Duan wrote:
>
> Hi Pam,
>
>
> Here is the revised TERMINATION:
>
> 5. TERMINATION
>
>
> This License shall terminate immediately if You breach any material term
> and/or condition of this License. *The patent license granted to You
> under this License shall terminate immediately if You initiate any legal
> action against any person or entity alleging that the Licensed Materials
> infringe any patent worldwide.* Sections 3, 4 and 6 shall survive the
> termination of this License.
>
>
> This keeps the existing rule that a material breach terminates the whole
> License. For patent litigation, it removes Derivative Materials as a
> trigger, applies regardless of who is sued, and ends only the patent
> license.
> I believe this revision strikes a better balance and may make the license
> more attractive to potential adopters. The ModelGo licenses would not be
> what they are today without the feedback from everyone in the OSI
> community. Those discussions have also helped me continue to refine my
> understanding of Open Source, and I’m sincerely grateful for that.
>
>
> Best,
> Moming
>
> Pamela Chestek <pamela at chesteklegal.com> 于2026年9月23日周三 01:46写道：
>
>> Hi Moming,
>>
>> Your response is quite troubling to me. I read it as saying that the
>> disparate treatment of copyright owners versus mere users of the software
>> is intentional.  As Joshua Gay described in the OpenMDW thread, the motive
>> for the patent termination provision was because patents threatened the
>> singular goal of the open source license, which is unfettered freedom to
>> use the software. In other words, the open source license grants virtually
>> unlimited right to use the software, but a patent aggressor can stop that
>> use with a patent claim. The response was to withdraw the patent
>> aggressor's patent (and sometimes copyright) license to use the software.
>> So I find the intentional maintenance of the ability to sue a user
>> troubling, given the historical basis for the patent termination clause.
>>
>> I also note that the one of the requirements for new licenses
>> <https://opensource.org/licenses/review-process> is "The license does
>> not have terms that structurally put the licensor in a more favored
>> position than any licensee." This does put the licensor in a more favored
>> position than a licensee.
>>
>> I also don't understand why you are characterizing this license as a
>> "single-grantor license" and distinguish it from Apache on that basis. All
>> licenses are "single grantor," Apache included, that is, a single
>> contributor is granting a license to their own contribution. If you are
>> saying that the Apache license may be a grant from multiple licensors
>> because it may be sublicensing from inbound licensors, the same is true of
>> the ModelGo Attribution License, which is also sublicensable. So I'm not
>> following why you think that your situation is, can be, or should be
>> different from how the Apache license works.
>>
>> Pam
>>
>> Pamela S. Chestek
>> Chestek Legal
>> 4641 Post St.
>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>> Unit 4316
>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>
>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>> El Dorado Hills, CA 95762
>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>
>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>+1
>> 919-800-8033 <(919)%20800-8033>
>> pamela at chesteklegal.com
>> www.chesteklegal.com
>>
>> On 9/21/2026 3:31 AM, Moming Duan wrote:
>>
>> Hi Pam and All,
>>
>>
>> Thank you for walking through the scenarios. Let me try again with your
>> own examples, and please tell me if I get any of this wrong.
>>
>> On my earlier point: that was my reading of the definitions (I'm not a
>> lawyer), and I may have stretched it. I think your reading is the better
>> one. Licensor is the rights owner whose grant is in Section 2.1. This also
>> settles "the" versus "a" for me: for this clause there is one counterparty.
>> This license has no mechanism for a distributor to pass on patent rights of
>> its own; every patent right it grants comes from the Licensor. If someone
>> downstream has patented their improvement, that grant happens outside this
>> license. So far as this clause is concerned, there really is just the one.
>>
>> Your three cases, exactly as they operate:
>>
>> - C sues User A, who only runs the model: C keeps the license.
>> - C sues User B, a distributor: C keeps the license.
>> - C sues the Licensor: C loses the license.
>>
>> The license is one grant from one grantor, and the exchange inside it is
>> bilateral. The Licensor grants the practice of the Licensed Materials and,
>> by 2.1(a)(iii), of Derivative Materials too. The licensee's side of the
>> exchange is not to turn a patent claim against the grantor. When the clause
>> fires, the Licensor takes back the one thing that was given, from the one
>> party who took it and then attacked the giver with it. The Derivative
>> Materials part follows from the same place: 2.1(a)(iii) puts their practice
>> inside the grant, so a claim that a Derivative infringes is a claim that
>> the granted practice is unlawful.
>>
>> Apache-2.0 looks different because its shape is different. Its patent
>> licenses come from many contributors, and any claim about the work, against
>> anyone, even a cross-claim, ends the patent licenses You hold. A
>> single-grantor license has no such machinery, so we chose the narrower
>> trigger. You lose the license only by suing the grantor; nobody loses
>> anything for enforcing a patent against another user. Under OpenMDW-1.1,
>> termination can follow a copyright claim, a suit you voluntarily joined
>> rather than started, or a claim brought against anyone at all. Under MG-BY,
>> the clause fires on one thing only: a patent suit you yourself initiate
>> against the Licensor. It reaches nothing beyond what our own grant covers.
>>
>> On OSD 5 itself. Everyone who holds the license holds it on the same
>> terms and loses it the same way. I can't find a licensee who gets less than
>> another licensee. The Licensor is not a licensee; it gives the license
>> rather than holds it. Apache has the same asymmetry between a Contributor,
>> who grants patent rights and can have them taken back, and a plain
>> recipient, who grants nothing and so has nothing to lose. I haven't seen
>> anyone call that discrimination. Our clause has that shape with one giver
>> instead of many, and I don't see a classification of persons in it, which
>> is what I understand OSD 5 to be about.
>>
>> To press one point, respectfully: I am not aware that OSI has ever held
>> that a patent-termination shield must protect everyone to satisfy OSD 5.
>> That would be a new principle, and if the review establishes it, I will
>> revise the clause accordingly. Thanks.
>>
>>
>> Best,
>> Moming
>>
>> Pamela Chestek <pamela at chesteklegal.com> 于2026年9月21日周一 11:44写道：
>>
>>> Moming,
>>>
>>> I'm not following what you're saying. As I understand McCoy's point, it
>>> is this:
>>>
>>> - Licensor is any contributor who added copyrightable content;
>>>
>>> - User A is someone who is using Licensor's version of the software but
>>> has not contributed any copyrightable content and is not distributing the
>>> software;
>>>
>>> -User B is someone who is using Licensor's version of the software, has
>>> not contributed any copyrightable content, but is distributing the
>>> software, who you are characterizing as a sublicensor of Licensor's rights;
>>>
>>> - User C is the person who owns the allegedly infringed patent.
>>>
>>> ===============
>>>
>>> User C sues a Licensor for patent infringement - the license terminates.
>>>
>>> User C sues User A for for patent infringement - the license does not
>>> terminate because User A is not a Licensor of anything, they are just using
>>> the software.
>>>
>>> User C sues User B for patent infringement - the license does not
>>> terminate. First, characterizing User B as a sublicensor may not be a
>>> correct assumption - why wouldn't User C say "no, I'm not a sublicensee of
>>> User B, I'm a direct licensee of Licensor who I haven't sued, so the
>>> license doesn't terminate"? But even assuming User B is a sublicensor, it
>>> doesn't terminate the license. User B is a sublicensor, not *"the *Licensor,"
>>> i.e., the "rights owner" per your definition, so the license doesn't
>>> terminate.
>>>
>>> That is the discrimination that I understand McCoy to be describing. The
>>> license only terminates if User C sues someone who contributed
>>> copyrightable content, because those are the only people (or companies) who
>>> have a license that can be terminated. Everyone else can still be sued for
>>> copyright infringement.
>>>
>>> The use of the word "the" in "the Licensor" in the termination section
>>> is problematic for another reason. The corpus may have many licensors. I
>>> think the more natural reading is that only the license from the person
>>> being sued terminates, not all of them. If it said "any legal action
>>> against *_a_* Licensor alleging that the Licensed Materials and/or
>>> Derivative Materials infringe any patent worldwide" would terminate all of
>>> them. But that doesn't solve the problem described above with mere users,
>>> not contributors, being the defendant in the patent suit.
>>>
>>> Pam
>>> Pamela S. Chestek
>>> Chestek Legal
>>> 4641 Post St.
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>>
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> Unit 4316
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>>
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++Unit%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++El%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> El Dorado Hills, CA 95762
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post+St.+%0D%0A++++++Unit+4316+%0D%0A++++++El+Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> +1 919-800-8033 <(919)%20800-8033>
>>>
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/4641+Post%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++St.+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++Unit%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++4316+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++El%0D%0A++++++++++++++++++++++++Dorado+Hills,+CA+95762?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> pamela at chesteklegal.com
>>> www.chesteklegal.com
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9/18/2026 2:58 AM, Moming Duan wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi McCoy and all,
>>>
>>>
>>> OSD 5 says the license must not discriminate against any person or group
>>> of persons. Here, Licensor is a role in the license, not a person. And the
>>> license itself says how the role moves. The Section 2.1 grant is
>>> sublicensable, and 2.2(a)(i) requires a copy of this License to travel with
>>> every Distribution. Even the definition of "Licensed Materials", things
>>> "Distributed by the Licensor", only really works if each distributor is the
>>> Licensor for what it distributes. So a licensee who passes the model or a
>>> Derivative Material on is granting the license onward. It stands as
>>> Licensor to the people it supplied, and a patent claim by those people does
>>> trigger termination.
>>>
>>> About your May 2025 conclusion, I want to be precise. You wrote then
>>> that this termination provision was not an OSD violation but an uptake
>>> issue, and that conclusion was about the Derivative Materials part, which
>>> is your Q4:
>>> https://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review_lists.opensource.org/2025-May/005764.html
>>> The OSD 5 question, whether the trigger should reach beyond the
>>> Licensor, is new in this final call, and you yourself put it as "arguably".
>>> So I read it as an open question rather than a settled one, and not
>>> something to concede on my own.
>>>
>>> It's true that a user who never distributed anything, and sues another
>>> licensee, does not lose the license. That is deliberate. The patent grant
>>> has one source, and the promise not to assert runs to that source. A
>>> dispute between two people who never granted each other anything is outside
>>> that exchange.
>>>
>>> So my reading is that the clause, as written, does not discriminate
>>> against any person or group, and I'd like to keep the current wording.
>>>
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> Moming
>>>
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>>
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>
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