bethard
commented
9 years ago Comment #1 originally posted by ClearTK on 2011-01-14T22:35:05.000Z:
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Open bethard opened 9 years ago
bethard
commented
9 years ago Comment #1 originally posted by ClearTK on 2011-01-14T22:35:05.000Z:
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bethard
commented
9 years ago Comment #2 originally posted by ClearTK on 2012-07-24T18:02:00.000Z:
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Original issue 195 created by ClearTK on 2011-01-07T17:28:18.000Z:
I am interested in releasing ClearTK under ASL 2.0 and had the following discussion with the tech-transfer office. This issue serves as a way of documenting the discussion and so we can discuss this possibility.
[Philip]
As we get closer to a 1.0 release, I wanted to raise again the issue of the open-source license being used for the project. I think I remember pretty clearly why we chose the BSD license over ASL and so I don't feel any need to re-hash that. At one point, though, you mentioned the possibility of setting up a foundation of some sort that could take ownership/copyright of the code - and then it could release the code using ASL. My memory is a bit foggy on what we discussed about this but I think this is roughly what was said. So, my questions are - is this type of scenario still possible (i.e. would you allow it?) And, what would be involved to make this happen?
I can live with the BSD license and I don't want to cause too much trouble. However, in commercial settings it seems pretty clear to me that there is a preference (even if slight) for ASL. Additionally, it seems to be the license of choice in the UIMA world where I work.
[TTO]
Just to re-hash a little bit, my concern with ASL is that it has a patent grant clause that would apply to the entire University of Colorado if CU were to release it ASL, but if a separate entity like a foundation released it under ASL, CU would not have to grant any patent rights along with it. The way to do this is to set up a non-profit or for profit company. The company would receive ClearTK under the BSD license since CU released it BSD and then the company would release ClearTK under ASL, since the BSD allows the company to do that. In addition to the hassles of setting up the entity, the only other problem is that you would have this BSD version out there from CU in addition to the ASL version from the company/foundation.
[Philip] Is there a transfer of copyright ownership? It seems like I couldn't just slap an ASL license on the source code files and take out the BSD license without having the explicit right to remove the BSD license granted by CU. Also, it seems like you would want the CU copyright to be removed from any files that contain an ASL license. It's this sentence that confuses me:
The company would receive ClearTK under the BSD license since CU released it BSD and then the company would release ClearTK under ASL, since the BSD allows the company to do that.
This implies that I could set up a company and release it under an ASL license without coordinating with you (i.e. CU) at all because the BSD permits that and that is all that I need. Is that right? It doesn't sound right - my understanding of BSD is that the only restriction is that you can't remove the BSD license statement.
[TTO]
You should not take out the BSD verbiage. Here's an article on how you can do this if you were to include BSD software in a GPL release. Just think of ASL 2.0 as GPL.
http://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/2007/gpl-non-gpl-collaboration. html
So, you include the BSD language in the files, but you add ASL 2.0 on top of it so that whoever is getting the whole package from the company is actually subject to the ASL 2.0 (although they would also have to retain the BSD language as well). The BSD allows this, and no coordination with CU is necessary.
Rather than giving up the copyright to the company, another way we could do it is that CU could grant permission to your company to release it under ASL 2.0 without the BSD, but I'm not inclined to do that because the BSD copyright statement at least provides a little bit of advertising for CU and also includes the no warranty language which provides additional protection.