Relicencing the core to LGPLv3 instead of GPLv3.

[irungentoo]

Does everyone agree?

[drewcrawford]

IANAL, but I have a great deal of practical experience with App Store licensing matters.

1. Neither the GPL nor LGPL code can trivially ship on the iOS App Store, for reasons of substance. There are ways to carve out exceptions (see: VLC) but they are very very complicated and require Actual Lawyers, and the exceptions you need are (in some people's view) not in the spirit of the GPL. The FSF will tell you that App Stores are the enemy of freedom, for example, and you can't really fix the GPL without compromising their ideals. So if some contributors are card-carrying members of the FSF, you could be at an impasse there.
2. IANAL, but after reading the MPL and Apache v2, the two alternatives suggested in this thread, I believe both of them to be compatible, although it seems several contributors object to them on matters of substance.
3. A substantially unanswered question in this thread is: who do you intend to be shipping this to the app store? Do you intend to organize, form a legal/taxable entity, and execute the contracts with Apple? Are you going to find somebody already in the habit of doing that to distribute it for you under the Tox brand? Do you intend other developers to incorporate Tox-core into apps branded under their own names? If there's no real plan for where you're trying to go, there's no obvious first step to get there. Really the contributors need to achieve some consensus on the question of where they are trying to go before the question of licensing makes any sense.

[bakagirl]

From my reading of the thread, it seems like most camps at this point want some form of copyleft license for overall freedom of the project, but also want a piece of the proprietary cake (via Apple-appification) as well for notoriety. LGPL seems fine for this as does MPLv2, however, I would like also suggest looking into licensing it under the Ruby license (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_license) as it also provides a strong copyleft and also an 'out' for anyone wanting to use the core of Tox in non-free markets with its dual-clause wording.

/two cents...but at this point this seems all sort of moot anyhow since its already GPLv3.

[rodneyrod]

@nfkd I understand, however parallel licensing also doesn't address the issue of marketing in restrictive environments outside of the Apple App Store. For example, if you had both the GPLv3 and an App Store license, you would still be unable to push it to the Windows Marketplace, Blackberry App World or potential future App Store platforms unless you contact each developer and obtain their permission to do so, unless you have all current and future developers sign some sort of CLA. The MPLv2 would solve this problem, while remaining copyleft and *GPLv2+ compatible and without the need for copyright assignment.

[ghost]

Windows Phone is dead but doesn't know it yet. Blackberry relies on corporate and government contracts (which is bad for them now that Apple is DoD certified now).

iOS and Android are really the only mobile platforms worth worrying about for now.

On Monday, July 29, 2013 at 18:38, rodneyrod wrote:

@nfkd (https://github.com/nfkd)
I understand, however parallel licensing also doesn't address the issue of marketing in restrictive environments outside of the Apple App Store. For example, if you had both the GPLv3 and an App Store license, you would still be unable to push it to the Windows Marketplace, Blackberry App World or potential future App Store platforms unless you contact each developer and obtain their permission to do so, unless you have all current and future developers sign some sort of CLA. The MPLv2 would solve this problem, while remaining copyleft and *GPLv2+ compatible and without the need for copyright assignment.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21759937).

[drewcrawford]

@nfkd There are some other problems, but the biggest one is this has the effect of allowing proprietary developers to incorporate Tox-core in their proprietary product as long as they are targeting a restricted environment, but not if they aren't. Is that what you intend, to allow proprietary use over here but not over there?

[rodneyrod]

@nfkd I don't know if such statement would stand up legally in court, plus you're adding in a massive double standard by encouraging proprietary development in those environments. Shipping Tox under the MPLv2 offers the same protections as the GPL while being GPL compatible, and it's a much neater solution than having different licenses for different environments. @TheAustinHowell May be the case today, may not be the case tomorrow. You can't be sure if another proprietary platform or GPL incompatible platform surpasses iOS in the future.

[joehillen]

I really hate that Apple makes you guys have this discussion. This is exactly what Apple wants. They want you to compromise your users' freedoms just to use their restrictive store. Sad times.

[ghost]

@drewcrawford Your third point. That's important. All you folks start discussing that, or this conversation is useless.

[hellekin]

The GNU GPL defends freedom for the program's users.

Apple seeks to deny users this freedom; Apple imposes censorship through the app store and bans free apps. Apple's refusal of the GPL is one aspect of Apple's fight with users' freedom.

You're in the middle of the fight. Apple will punish you for standing by your users. But your users will thank you.

Please stand firm and don't give Apple what it wants.

[rodneyrod]

@hellekin Freedom is something that should be treasured and protected, however I don't believe that preventing easy access to those who (unwittingly) use restricted devices should be punished as a result.

I've posted the specifics of the MPLv2 and Copyleft-Next in this discussion that deals with copyleft, and both can only be used in projects licensed under their own license and the GPL family. Both offer the same freedoms as the GPL while also allowing users on restricted platform to use the program without having to exploit their system.

[hellekin]

@rodneyrod I don't believe punishing victims is exactly the idea behind protecting users' freedom.

When you open the door to uncooperative companies who provide freedom-restricting products, not only you're saying to their users that it's fine to use those products, you're also telling free users that they might compromise their own privacy, and their own freedom, by using your software that might communicate with bugged devices.

In other words, with the righteous intention of including all users, you would contradict the very purpose of replacing Skype: instead of providing software that protects users' privacy by design, you would welcome privacy-defeating and freedom-restricting devices to threaten those you're willing to protect.

Your argument to refute the GPL on the ground that people would have to jailbreak their device, combined with the mention of CopyLeft.Next, lead me to believe you might be trolling. If anything, jailbreaking evil devices should be encouraged as a form of resistance, and won't prevent people wittingly breaking their chains from running the software.

@drewcrawford I hope your attempt to opt out of that discussion on a critical point of the future of software, and denigrating it as a licensing flamewar will fail.

For the technicalities of using MPLv2 and the GPL, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#MPL-2.0

For your consideration, a coalition led by Microsoft, Nokia, Oracle, is trying to outlaw free software in the European Union, by accusing Google of practicing "predatory pricing" by distributing their gratis Android platform.

[untitaker]

@hellekin Nobody is in a position to tell the user on which platform he may use the software.

[joehillen]

@untitaker It's the other way around. The platform is deciding what software the user may use.

[untitaker]

@joehillen And by choosing a non-permissive such as the GPL you are preventing the user from making compromises, which are currently neccessary.

[hellekin]

I believe the OGG case is different from the Tox case.

I think that if Tox is successful, and remains free from contagion from iOS, Apple will have more difficulties selling their next device. In the meantime, Ubuntu Mobile and Firefox Mobile will have reached the market, and iOS share will drop.

But if you choose to go with iOS, then you will be more successful in the short term, and also, as you're sustaining iOS, its share will continue to grow, and impede the free mobile OSes from growing as much as they could. As a consequence, other free software applications won't be as successful as they can.

Of course, there's a non-null probability that you spark a jailbreaking market if you stick to GPL.

[joehillen]

@untitaker The GPL is a permissive license. You can do anything you want with it so long as you release the source code. Anything else is an external restriction. Do not shift blame to the GPL because the systems of control are the ones inventing the restrictions.

@all I propose you all stick with the GPL and let someone else with no hangups about Apple write a client for iOS under their own license. Tox is a protocol. It is not necessary to use the code from the core to communicate with the network.

[untitaker]

@hellekin Who are you kidding, you think users will stop buying iPhone just because tox is not available?

[volb]

Compromises ARE necessary. Show me evidence that iOS and Android are broken systems. FUD is not the way to go. Just because some of you wish to be zealots and hurt the project through flawed idealism, doesn't mean we should listen.

Last I checked, both 4chan and GitHub weren't Free Software, and if you believe in the AGPL, you shouldn't be using these sites.

[hellekin]

No @untitaker, you're saying that not releasing Tox on the AppStore makes it unavailable on the iPhone. But that's not true. Jailbroken devices can still use it. What if instead of supporting Apple, you were supporting helping people jailbreak their iPhone?

@m3hr attacking people is not a decent way to discuss. There are various points of views expressed, and some come with rational argumentation. Yours clearly does not.

[volb]

Fine. Do as you please; I actually like the GPL. But I don't think we stand a chance without supporting iOS. I made rational arguments prior (I hope), but the same things are being said over and over.

[ghost]

Listen, people turn down phones for not having Facebook and WhatsApp. We're not those companies.

On Tuesday, July 30, 2013 at 13:03, Markus Unterwaditzer wrote:

@hellekin (https://github.com/hellekin) Who are you kidding, you think users will stop buying iPhone just because tox is not available?

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21810114).

[ghost]

I want you to imagine the following situation... Suzy McRottenCrotch: Hey Billy! We should Skype™ or Facetime™ each other! Free as in Freedom Billy: No thank you, Skype™ and Facetime™ are enemies of our freedom. You should use Tox! Suzy McRottenCrotch: Oh...OK, I can't find Tox in the App store. How do I install it. Free as in Freedom Billy: First you must hope that an untethered jailbreak solution has been released for your exact version of iOS, bear in mind that this will void your warranty and your Daddy will be pissed if he ever finds out. Afterwards, you must add a repo to Cydia. Suzy McRottenCrotch: ...that's OK Billy...   Congrats, Free as in Freedom Billy is going to die alone and it's all your fault. I hope you're satisified with yourself you monster.   Seriously though, the normies don't get jailbreaking and reciting the is ought fallacy isn't going to make it any different.     on Jul 30, 2013, hellekin notifications@github.com wrote: No @untitaker, you're saying that not releasing Tox on the AppStore makes it unavailable on the iPhone. But that's not true. Jailbroken devices can still use it. What if instead of supporting Apple, you were supporting helping people jailbreak their iPhone? @m3hr attacking people is not a decent way to discuss. There are various points of views expressed, and some come with rational argumentation. Yours clearly does not. —Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub.

 

[ghost]

I just want to say I agree with hellekin. It's Apple that violates our license, not the other way around. I don't think App-Store compatibility is even slightly worth moving away from the GPL.

TheAustinHowl I don't think Suzie and Billy were going to be very good friends anyway. I see no point in supporting iOS later down the line. The platform itself is breaking privacy, security, and even the free-ness of the software. The App Store can go to hell.

[dsschnau]

Thirding with kebertx. Its not worth going out of the way for iOS.

[ghost]

Every mobile platform and most nonfree operating systems violate your privacy and if they don't your telecom company does. Life sucks like that.

I can understand the impulse to stand your ground against unjust policies but realistically swapping the licenses won't hurt Tox.

If Tox is excluded from less than free software repositories it'll become yet another niche tool like Retroshare and Bitmessage. Is that what we really want?

On Tuesday, July 30, 2013 at 14:40, kebertx wrote:

I just want to say I agree with hellekin. It's Apple that violates our license, not the other way around. I don't think App-Store compatibility is even slightly worth moving away from the GPL. TheAustinHowl I don't think Suzie and Billy were going to be very good friends anyway. I see no point in supporting iOS later down the line. The platform itself is breaking privacy, security, and even the free-ness of the software. The App Store can go to hell.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21816979).

[ProMcTagonist]

I'm not a dev, so you can ignore me if you like. But I really think we should stick with the GPL.

Many, many more people are jailbreaking now than ever before. The process is just getting easier. You can always restore if you need to take it in for service, and often, the Apple Store employees don't mind even if you don't, because they're jailbroken too at home. Even people that aren't too into technology have their friends do it for them, because they're craving freedom.

Tox has already been on Germany's biggest tech site. It's spreading like wildfire. If we apply Tox for the App Store and they deny it, it'll be a news article. We can encourage even more people to jailbreak, and eventually move away from Apple. Under no circumstances should we move away from the GPL simply to satisfy Apple.

There's my opinion. You guys are doing great. Thank you.

[ghost]

It's not a matter of excluding it from "less than free software repositories" it's a matter of choosing to keep it free, despite the existence of a repository that impose anti-freedom rules on the user, and the application itself once it is hosted in that repository.

"You acknowledge that Products contain security technology that limits your usage of Products to the following applicable Usage Rules, and, whether or not Products are limited by security technology, you agree to use Products in compliance with the applicable Usage Rules."

I would not re-license. I have no desire to abide by that.

[untitaker]

Assuming a company starts using tox's code for a proprietary product, while tox is published under the GPL. How would anybody notice the licence violation?

Also: http://lucumr.pocoo.org/2013/7/23/licensing/

[untitaker]

Listen, people turn down phones for not having Facebook and WhatsApp. We're not those companies.

@TheAustinHowell Were you replying to me? Because what you said was actually my point.

[ghost]

Sorry, that statement was no directed at you.

On Tuesday, July 30, 2013 at 15:02, Markus Unterwaditzer wrote:

Listen, people turn down phones for not having Facebook and WhatsApp. We're not those companies.

@TheAustinHowell (https://github.com/TheAustinHowell) Were you replying to me? Because what you said was actually my point.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21818490).

[ghost]

@untitaker

http://lucumr.pocoo.org/2013/7/23/licensing/ That is horribly flawed, and if I didn't know better I'd say it's deliberately misleading in most places.

[untitaker]

@kebertx That's just your opinion. And not even with arguments.

[ghost]

@untitaker It's more like a fair warning to the next person who reads it. I think it reeks of tabloid journalism, actually. I'm not arguing with it, simply stating that it's bad. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License <- Makes for a much better and more informative read.

[hellekin]

@TheAustinHowell: ...but realistically swapping the licenses won't hurt Tox. No, maybe not. It will hurt users, certainly.

yet another niche tool like Retroshare and Bitmessage. Is that what we really want? As far as I know, RetroShare is one of the two current implementations that can stand the proof of time, because of its uncompromising approach. It went a long way into looking right for Windows users and provides one of the safest clickodrome peer-to-peer GUI for people who don't understand anything about peer-to-peer nor about encryption. The fact that it's not as successful as you'd like to imagine can be easily understood: 1) it's a young software (it's only v0.5.4e at this time, even if it's 4 years old); 2) it doesn't get any special marketing, and its team is pretty small. (Consider that it's 6 times smaller than the number of participants in this dicussion!)

I can't imagine Tox, with the attention it gets, falling into oblivion. Moreover, I can easily imagine the project being strongly supported by a large number of visible influencers, especially if it dares to stand by its license against the pressure of the corporations. Consider that we're living in a world where NSA's PRISM is a public venture, and there's momentum to provide support for privacy-supportive software.

[ghost]

This might be a stupid idea and this may have already been thought of, but why not just use a client for iOS that is not GPL, kind of like the 3rd party facebook apps that are not made by facebook but still work with it (if I'm not mistaken)

[rodneyrod]

@hellekin I don't see how transitioning to the MPLv2, which is copyleft, would erode a user's freedoms as it offers exactly the same things as the GPLv3, minus the Tivoisation clause, with the added benefit that it's also compatible with the GPLv2 in case anyone wanted to release a Tox related project under that license. Again, I don't see how this would 'hurt users' if their freedoms are being preserved through this software in mostly the same way as the GPL, and I assure you that I am not trolling.

[DashingMike]

Some developers are adamant on keeping the license for freedom, but others offer legit reasons as to why it should be changed: giving users of any platform the possibility of easily trading their current proprietary VoIP / IM client for Tox.

Why don't you ask the FSF for their opinion? Maybe they can offer further insight. I'm sure the GPLv3 supporters would listen.

[untitaker]

It's already wrong to assume the FSF is a moral authority in this topic. Of course they're going to endorse the GPL wherever possible.

[christopherdbull]

Excluding iOS users who want privacy because they refuse to jailbreak is the height of arrogance and seems to be a pointless exercise against the desire to create a widespread, secure skype replacement.

Whatever bubble people are in that they think the average user is prepared to jailbreak is completely blinkered. The average user would use this if it "Just Works", they won't use it (thus the project will forever be niche) if it doesn't.

There's a lot of non-lawyers (myself included) weighing in here, what's the process for getting a legal opinion about how Tox can exist in both GPL and "non-free" worlds?

Seems like a complete waste of a good project if it can't be on the most prominent mobile device.

[ghost]

I'd like to add to Christopher's point that a rather large chunk of "geeks" already know how to secure their communications between each other. What's the point of having another product that only crypto-anarchists will use?

On Tuesday, July 30, 2013 at 18:53, Christopher Bull wrote:

Excluding iOS users who want privacy because they refuse to jailbreak is the height of arrogance and seems to be a pointless exercise against the desire to create a widespread, secure skype replacement.
Whatever bubble people are in that they think the average user is prepared to jailbreak is completely blinkered. The average user would use this if it "Just Works", they won't use it (thus the project will forever be niche) if it doesn't. There's a lot of non-lawyers (myself included) weighing in here, what's the process for getting a legal opinion about how Tox can exist in both GPL and "non-free" worlds. Seems like a complete waste of a good project if it can't be on the most prominent mobile device.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21831593).

[Zanthas]

I think that Parallel Licensing would be a good idea for Tox. Tox could stay GPLv3 for all but then for the use in Apple's AppStore (and other places!) can be a under a copy left license that is permitted. The video and articles that @nfkd has posted in this thread shows that Dual Licensing ( or Parallel Licensing whatever you want to call it) can be done and still be ethical. I stress that whatever free license is used for the appstore, that is a copy left one, so that people won't be able to make proprietary versions of Tox. RMS stated in the video @nfkd linked that dual licensing can be used for companies so they can make free software and sell it to others, but this is not what we're trying to do. We just need a free copyleft license that Apple accepts. I think if the AppStore accepted GPL software that this wouldn't be an issue in the slightest, and everyone would be fine with the GPL. But unfortunately this is not the case, since Tox is intended to be a Skype replacement, Project Tox can't ignore Apple's iPhone as a potential market of users.

[markwinter]

Just some food for thought: 7.5k of vists to the website were from a Mac Computer (2nd most used OS), and 5k were from iPhone/iPad (700 short of android). It may be a bit much to assume those who own a Mac, would also own an iPhone/iPad, but if we did assume this, it would be a large portion of current interest that wouldn't be served should we not release on iOS. Screenshot of stats: http://i.imgur.com/h9Ull4Q.png

[ghost]

Parallel licensing does seem like the best solution, then. +1 for @Zanthas

[volb]

Apache is a better choice than MIT, according to the FSF. Is it better for us here? I'm glad we have come to what I think is a reasonable solution.

[rodneyrod]

@Astonex Would the GPL and (other FOSS copyleft) license be in sync with the master GIT branch, or would you prefer to only have it in sync every major release (putting any potential forks not based off the GPL'd master branch at a slight disadvantage)? If you would want to go down this path, you would have to draw up some sort of copyright agreement, and I would highly recommend getting a professional lawyer to look it over.

[ghost]

@rodneyrod. I doubt anyone here can afford a lawyer.

On Wednesday, July 31, 2013 at 1:28, rodneyrod wrote:

@Astonex (https://github.com/Astonex) Would the GPL and (other FOSS copyleft) license be in sync with the master GIT branch, or would you prefer to only have it in sync every major release (putting any potential forks not based off the GPL'd master branch at a slight disadvantage)? If you would want to go down this path, you would have to draw up some sort of copyright agreement, and I would highly recommend getting a professional lawyer to look it over.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub (https://github.com/irungentoo/ProjectTox-Core/issues/58#issuecomment-21842726).

[untitaker]

@m3hr WHY would it be a better choice?

[volb]

According to the FSF:

In these special situations where copyleft is not appropriate, we recommend the Apache License 2.0. This is a permissive, non-protective software license that has terms to prevent contributors and distributors from suing for patent infringement. This doesn't make the software immune to threats from patents, but it does prevent patent holders from setting up a “bait and switch” where they release the software under free terms, but require recipients to agree to royalties or other nonfree terms in a patent license.

[Zanthas]

@m3hr Why a permissive license? Does the AppStore not accept /any/ copy left licenses? I thought this was an issue with the GPL and not copyleft.

Surely if there is a suitable copyleft license available wouldn't it be better to use that to ensure Tox stays free as in freedom?

[bbqsrc]

Lots of speculation here.

If I understand the issue being discussed it is that GPL is not accepted in various app stores. A potential solution is to get consent from all the contributors to simply use a custom license that does not require exposing the source code for that store, while still keeping all of that code as GPL in your repository. Parallel licensing: it's allowed if all the contributors agree.

If you're going to be attempting to wrangle code into binary app stores, you're probably going to want to consider forming an association and having all code contributions assigned to that association to simplify the licensing arrangements, otherwise you're going to have a hard time dealing with the next new app store issue when it appears.

Something worth noting about licenses such as MIT and BSD: I can fork an MIT/BSD/Apache project and relicense it GPL. If I then contribute to my own repo that is GPL, you may not reuse the code in your MIT/BSD/Apache codebase, but I may take any code from your MIT/BSD/Apache project and put it into mine . This has happened with a few projects historically (See OpenOffice.org vs LibreOffice). If you dual license with MIT, you're just opening Tox up to closed source forks, which as I understand is not what the project wants at this stage.

Perhaps the project developers could prepare a document of their proposed focuses for this project so people can better assess what's best for the project instead of just opining.

:)