This is a **draft**, probably will be controversial, definitely needs
wordsmithing.
Fixes#380 "No clear message on why to choose an open source license"
-- added line under heading
Fixes#335 "Feedback from John Sullivan talk on license choosers"
-- remaining items were (roughly) to not surface patents at this
level, and to surface choice between allowing proprirary/closed
source or not
Fixes#239 "Consider discussing ecosystems with an already predominant
license" (well, it doesn't *discuss* but there's a page for that,
unlinked til now) and makes the default recommendation of just about
everyone -- use exisitng project/community's license if applicable
-- prominent on the site
Closes#48 "Proposed modified workflow: make permissive/copyleft
and patents orthogonal" though probably not in way submitter would
favor. I could be convinced that Apache-2.0 should be featured
rather than MIT because of the former's express patent grant, but
as it stands I'm not sure the complexity of Apache-2.0 (and for a
weak grant, relative to GPLv3) is worth it relative to MIT. There's
some value in the first license a user looks at being really easy
to understand. The continued popularity of MIT and simialar ISC and
BSD-2/3 seems to indicate people want that simplicity. And where
are the holdups based on patents supposedly infringed by open source
projects under licenses without an express patent grant that could
not have happened had those projects been under Apache-2.0? Please
educate me! :)
Any and all feedback most welcome.
"[D]oesn't have to be scary" is hardly non-judgmental nor inviting
for anyone whose first encounter with open source licensing is this
site. I've also never heard anyone other than this site claim that
choosing an open source license can be scary. Confusing or extremely
boring, yes. Choosing to go open source, yes that can be scary.
Choosing among open source licenses, no.
- remove descrption of v2 v3 difference
- add to description v3 express patent grant
- update example projects to only include v3 ones
- move v2 projects to gplv2 license using property
partially addresses feedback in #335
- add a 3rd example (.NET Core) for MIT
- replace SVN & NuGet with more more modern and well-known examples
(Swift, Docker) for Apache:
- Add a GPLv3 project to examples.
- add a 3rd example (.NET Core) for MIT
- replace SVN & NuGet with more more modern and well-known examples
(Swift, Docker) for Apache:
- Add a GPLv3 project to examples.
The GPL v3 is an improvement over v2 fixing several issues and
increasing compatibility with other free software licenses. As such
there is no reason to feature v2 prominently rather than v3. See
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/rms-why-gplv3.en.html for more rationale.
Jake Jarvis