The NetBSD Foundation Moves to a Two Clause BSD License
NetBSD has moved from BSD-3 to BSD-2 style licenses. A similar default for the Haskell community probably also makes sense (removing the 'endorsement' clause, which doesn't make much sense in the modern software industry). The new BSD2 license is below: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ /*- * Copyright (c) 2008 The NetBSD Foundation, Inc. * All rights reserved. * * This code is derived from software contributed to The NetBSD Foundation * by * * Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without * modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions * are met: * * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. * * 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the * documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. * * THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE NETBSD FOUNDATION, INC. AND CONTRIBUTORS * ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED * TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR * PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE FOUNDATION OR CONTRIBUTORS * BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR * CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF * SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS * INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN * CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) * ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE * POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. */
As I mentioned on irc, I think it's probably best to wait for other groups like debian-legal, OSI etc to ponder it. I should also point out that this now looks very much like the MIT license which is already somewhat popular amongst haskell packages on hackage, is popular in the wider free/open software community and which we've already proposed to add to Distribution.Version. It makes sense for NetBSD to go from BSD3 to BSD2 given its historical connection with the BSD license but perhaps other projects are better off with the MIT license if they do not like the 3rd clause in the BSD3 license. Duncan On Fri, 2008-06-20 at 14:17 -0700, Don Stewart wrote:
NetBSD has moved from BSD-3 to BSD-2 style licenses. A similar default for the Haskell community probably also makes sense (removing the 'endorsement' clause, which doesn't make much sense in the modern software industry).
The new BSD2 license is below:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
/*- * Copyright (c) 2008 The NetBSD Foundation, Inc. * All rights reserved. * * This code is derived from software contributed to The NetBSD Foundation * by * * Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without * modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions * are met: * * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. * * 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the * documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. * * THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE NETBSD FOUNDATION, INC. AND CONTRIBUTORS * ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED * TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR * PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE FOUNDATION OR CONTRIBUTORS * BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR * CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF * SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS * INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN * CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) * ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE * POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. */
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On 2008-06-20 23:44 +0100 (Fri), Duncan Coutts wrote:
It makes sense for NetBSD to go from BSD3 to BSD2 given its historical connection with the BSD license but perhaps other projects are better off with the MIT license if they do not like the 3rd clause in the BSD3 license.
As a NetBSD developer, I was involved in the voting on this issue. There
seemed to be several reasons why we did things this way:
1. There were several options on the table for what clauses we should
remove, some of which would have brought us to "MIT-equivalant" status
and some of which would not have done so.
2. Staying with BSD meant that some licenses that we could not change
(becuase The NetBSD Foundation doesn't own copyright to the code) would
"become standard," as it were, because they already happened to have the
same number of clauses that we decided on.
3. And yes, there is the historical thing, too.
Also, propsoing a wholesale license away from the BSD license would
likely have initiated a flamewar on the developer list of unbelievable
proportions. :-)
Personally, even though I've been a BSD developer for more than ten
years, and a BSD user for close to twenty-five, I picked MIT license for
my recent open source projects. It just seemed simpler than deciding
which clauses I wanted. So I'm all in favour of that.
cjs
--
Curt Sampson
On Mon, 2008-07-21 at 13:35 +0900, Curt Sampson wrote:
On 2008-06-20 23:44 +0100 (Fri), Duncan Coutts wrote:
It makes sense for NetBSD to go from BSD3 to BSD2 given its historical connection with the BSD license but perhaps other projects are better off with the MIT license if they do not like the 3rd clause in the BSD3 license.
As a NetBSD developer, I was involved in the voting on this issue. There seemed to be several reasons why we did things this way:
1. There were several options on the table for what clauses we should remove, some of which would have brought us to "MIT-equivalant" status and some of which would not have done so.
2. Staying with BSD meant that some licenses that we could not change (becuase The NetBSD Foundation doesn't own copyright to the code) would "become standard," as it were, because they already happened to have the same number of clauses that we decided on.
3. And yes, there is the historical thing, too.
Also, propsoing a wholesale license away from the BSD license would likely have initiated a flamewar on the developer list of unbelievable proportions. :-)
Personally, even though I've been a BSD developer for more than ten years, and a BSD user for close to twenty-five, I picked MIT license for my recent open source projects. It just seemed simpler than deciding which clauses I wanted. So I'm all in favour of that.
Thanks Curt, that was enlightening. Duncan
participants (3)
-
Curt Sampson -
Don Stewart -
Duncan Coutts