Licenses A Legal Necessity Copyright © 2015 – Curt Hill

Licenses

A Legal Necessity

Copyright © 2015 – Curt Hill


Preamble

• As a user of software you have been required to accept a license agreement– Many times

• As a developer of software you will need to know what sort of license you will use– Provided you distribute your creation

Licenses• A binding agreement between two

parties, that is a contract• Usually about an item that one of

the parties has created and the other intends to use

• It specifies what each party may and may not do– It grants rights and limits actions to

each of the parties– It also dictates liabilities


Software Copyright

• Software is subject to copyright laws as well– All software not in public domain is

copyright


Several kinds• Only interested in the kinds of

licenses relevant to software• These include:

– Public domain– Two GPLs– MIT– BSD– Proprietary– Among many others

• Each of these protects the rights of the licensee or licenser to various degrees


Public Domain• The non-license• Material in the public domain has

no restrictions– It belongs to everyone

• Most documents/software/processes produced by the U. S. Government are in the public domain

• Anyone may use and then modify


Derivative Works• A person may take something in the

public domain and modify it• They may then apply any license

they choose to the resulting work– However, this only effects the new item,

the original is still in the public domain

• In general this true for any derivative work– The modifications and original may have

completely different licenses


Proprietary• The opposite of public domain• Each one is different but they

typically have several common features:– Ownership is reserved to developing

company– The product may not be sold or given

to anyone else– Number of machines and copies is

strictly limited– May not be modified, disassembled,

reverse engineered etc. Copyright © 2015 – Curt Hill

Free Software Foundation

• Sponsor of GNU and the GPL licenses

• Mission is to: … preserve, protect and promote the freedom to use, study, copy, modify and redistribute computer software, and to defend the rights of free software users

• Started in 1984


GNU

• Originally to promote and develop free UNIX like operating sytems– BSD and LINUX derivatives– UNIX developed by Bell Labs

• One of their goals is to keep the software free– Consequence of the UNIX story

• Name is now a recursive acronym GNU’s Not UNIX


Problems• Many projects had started with

public domain or other free software and applied modifications

• These were then licensed with a proprietary style license

• This is not illegal, but is it immoral?– The extreme case is take a complex

software make a small modification, then sell with a proprietary license

• Thus, the advent of copyleft in the GPL


Freedom• GNU believes in four freedoms

– Use software for any purpose– Change the software in any way– Share the software – Share your changes to the software

• This is what constitutes free software to GNU– Contrast this with free apps on smart

phones

• Unlike most licenses it preserves future deriver’s rights and freedoms


General Public License• The software must remain free

– Including software that uses it

• The source must be available even if not universally distributed with the object or executable – Does not require distribution of the

object or executable, but if it is the source must be available

• The most unusual stipulation is that no license more restrictive than the GPL can be applied to derivative works


GNU Lesser Public License• Solves a problem with the GPL:

– GPL covered code cannot be mixed with any more restrictive license

– The entire software must be free

• The Lesser license allows the software to be used with more restrictive licenses– Typically used with libraries that have

general use or programs that use libraries with more restrictive license

– The software itself is still free in the GNU sense


Example• Suppose I write a program that does

something• I will use GPL covered libraries • I cannot donate this to the public

domain because of GPL– Nor should I use anything but the GPL– This still protects my intellectual

property rights from being exploited by someone else

• If I choose a library without copyleft then I should choose the Lesser GPL


BSD Licenses• Berkely Software Distribution use

their own license• It allows use, modification,

redistribution• It originally required notification that

the original copyright holder is the Regents of the University of California– This notice had to be maintained in

advertising as well– This clause was later removed

• Not a copyleft form, but not very restrictive


MIT Licenses

• Similar to BSD, a series of licenses• Prohibits using MIT’s name or

copyright in advertising• Also not a copyleft

– A derived product can be proprietarily licensed


Observations• Wikipedia lists 43 free and open

source licenses• Each of these has a different set of

terms• In our case we need to be aware of the

terms since we will start with an existing software package and make modifications

• Since not everything is free software we need to be aware of what we can and cannot do


Assignment• We will now examine the End User

License Agreement, which is at:https://account.mojang.com/documents/minecraft_eula

• You are to prepare a one page executive summary that answers:– What you can do?– What you cannot do?– Penalties for breaking the terms?– How does this compare with other

EULAs?


https://account.mojang.com/documents/minecraft_eula

https://account.mojang.com/documents/minecraft_eula

Documents

Licenses A Legal Necessity Copyright © 2015 – Curt Hill