license change

[apotheon]

Would it be possible to replace the current Zlib License with a very similar, copyfree-certified license? The Zlib License has been rejected for copyfree certification because of what appears to be a bookkeeping clause:

Zlib License restriction 2 contains the requirement "Altered source versions must be plainly marked as such," which could reasonably be interpreted by the courts in a manner that violates Copyfree Standard Definition point 3. Free Modification and Derivation. Alternatively, it may be interpreted as merely requiring that a derivative or modified work be renamed, given the concluding clause, "must not be misrepresented as being the original software." Until such issues are clarified, particularly as to the intent of the license authors and the legal applicability of these terms as explained by relevant legal professionals, the Zlib License must be regarded as contrary in some respects to the requirements of the Copyfree Standard Definition.

The most similar copyfree-certified licenses appear to be the General Attribution License and the Software Attribution License. The two are almost identical, with the exception that the SAL very specifically mentions "software" and "source", while the GAL is . . . well, more general, and probably preferable overall.

[merwok]

I’ve never heard of GAL and SAL. If a change is needed, I’d go for the well established BSD/MIT, or one of the free CC, or GPL.

[apotheon]

Godawd, please don't go in the direction of any CC licenses except possibly CC0 (which, by the way, is the only CC license that CC endorses for software use), and please no GPL. My intention was to make the license less problematic for reuse, not more so -- and the GPL's software-specific focus is even more problematic for the non-software content in this project than most software-focused licenses. I haven't any complaints about the major BSD licenses (Simplified BSD License or Revised BSD License) or the MIT/X11 License -- I just mentioned GAL and SAL because I thought you might have chosen the Zlib License for its (essentially meaningless, legally, as far as I'm aware) misrepresentation clauses, and those licenses approximate the same measures without the restrictions of the Zlib License's second restriction clause.

As far as software-specific licenses go, the MIT/X11 License is pretty clearly one of the best. If you're considering that option, I offer my encouragement.

[treyhunner]

I vote for CC0 (for ultimate reuse/relicense allowance).

All existing contributors would need to sign off on a license change.

[apotheon]

A fairly organic approach for something like this, where there are not necessarily legal license conflict problems as there would be with the GPL, is to relicense all code it's easy to relicense (send an email to the dev mailing list, for instance, to get buy-in from contributors, and apply license change to all code/content from their contributions), accept all new contributions under the new license, and just include a note in licensing documentation about the old license applying to some code and content. Look for opportunities to change the license or replace the code/content for the remaining stuff, but don't sweat it too hard, and let time sort it out.

[econchick]

I just sent an email to all the contributors (via their git email address) about changing from zlib to MIT. Once an agreement is reached, I'll switch over the license.

[merwok]

I agree to the relicensing.

[helenst]

Agreed.

[hynek]

agreed

[econchick]

Ping @avinassh - I don't think I have a proper email address. Have to ask since you've contributed to the project - are you okay if I switch the license from zlib to MIT?

[esacteksab]

Agreed.

[avinassh]

@econchick I have no issues with the relicensing :smile: (and just in case, my email is avinashsajjan@gmail.com)

[econchick]

Hi folks - if you're tagged, please let me know via email or posting here that you're okay with changing the license from zlib to MIT (or let me know if you have any questiosn regarding this):

@beroe @aklapcin @widnyana @Nihdez @talam @rodney757 @Lazar-T @dsimandl @CheriPai @ironfroggy @bmwasaru

[bmwasaru]

Agreed.

[talam]

Yea, that's fine by me. Thanks for asking!

On Tue, Jan 27, 2015 at 2:33 PM, Lynn Root notifications@github.com wrote:

Hi folks - if you're tagged, please let me know via email or posting here that you're okay with changing the license from zlib to MIT (or let me know if you have any questiosn regarding this):

@beroe https://github.com/beroe @aklapcin https://github.com/aklapcin @widnyana https://github.com/widnyana @Nihdez https://github.com/Nihdez @talam https://github.com/talam @rodney757 https://github.com/rodney757 @Lazar-T https://github.com/Lazar-T @dsimandl https://github.com/dsimandl @CheriPai https://github.com/CheriPai @ironfroggy https://github.com/ironfroggy @bmwasaru https://github.com/bmwasaru

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71712168.

-Tanvir Alam

[aklapcin]

Agreed

On Tuesday, January 27, 2015, Tanvir Alam notifications@github.com wrote:

Yea, that's fine by me. Thanks for asking!

On Tue, Jan 27, 2015 at 2:33 PM, Lynn Root <notifications@github.com javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','notifications@github.com');> wrote:

Hi folks - if you're tagged, please let me know via email or posting here that you're okay with changing the license from zlib to MIT (or let me know if you have any questiosn regarding this):

@beroe https://github.com/beroe @aklapcin https://github.com/aklapcin

@widnyana https://github.com/widnyana @Nihdez https://github.com/Nihdez @talam https://github.com/talam @rodney757 https://github.com/rodney757 @Lazar-T https://github.com/Lazar-T @dsimandl https://github.com/dsimandl @CheriPai https://github.com/CheriPai @ironfroggy https://github.com/ironfroggy

@bmwasaru https://github.com/bmwasaru

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71712168.

-Tanvir Alam

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71724266.

Aleksandra Kłapcińska

[dsimandl]

Ok with me!

On Tue, Jan 27, 2015 at 4:47 PM, Aleksandra Kłapcińska < notifications@github.com> wrote:

Agreed

On Tuesday, January 27, 2015, Tanvir Alam notifications@github.com wrote:

Yea, that's fine by me. Thanks for asking!

On Tue, Jan 27, 2015 at 2:33 PM, Lynn Root <notifications@github.com javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','notifications@github.com');> wrote:

Hi folks - if you're tagged, please let me know via email or posting here that you're okay with changing the license from zlib to MIT (or let me know if you have any questiosn regarding this):

@beroe https://github.com/beroe @aklapcin < https://github.com/aklapcin>

@widnyana https://github.com/widnyana @Nihdez https://github.com/Nihdez @talam https://github.com/talam @rodney757 https://github.com/rodney757 @Lazar-T https://github.com/Lazar-T @dsimandl https://github.com/dsimandl @CheriPai https://github.com/CheriPai @ironfroggy < https://github.com/ironfroggy>

@bmwasaru https://github.com/bmwasaru

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub < https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71712168>.

-Tanvir Alam

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71724266.

Aleksandra Kłapcińska

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71734601.

[widnyana]

agreed

[Lazar-T]

Agreed.

On Thu, Jan 29, 2015 at 3:11 AM, Widnyana Putra notifications@github.com wrote:

agreed

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/econchick/new-coder/issues/69#issuecomment-71956739.

[apotheon]

Has there been any more movement on this issue? I noticed it's still open, and the LICENSE file has not changed.

[econchick]

@apotheon I haven't received 100% of contributors' agreement on this - probably more like 90% have agreed, and 10% I haven't been able to reach. Unsure of what to do, but perhaps "best effort" may be good enough...