[copyleft-next] exceptions/additional-permissions & weak copyleft

Richard Fontana fontana at sharpeleven.org
Fri Aug 3 00:42:16 UTC 2012


On 08/02/2012 05:48 PM, Bradley M. Kuhn wrote:
> Richard Fontana wrote at 22:50 (EDT) on Wednesday:
>> Essentially the problem is that you are ignoring the complexity cost
>> (real, perceived or both) that accompanies use of additional
>> permissions.
> 
> Constitutions are complex things.  A license isn't a "token", as you
> said, IMO.  A license is a Constitution of a community.

I never really liked that phrase, but I accept that it has some
validity. However, I"m not so sure it's the precise terms of the
license that are functioning as the constitution.

> And, every
> community should have the right to draft their own *but* that runs into
> the compatibility problem.  GPLv3 additional permission sets handle both
> things at once.

So you agree with the view (which I've heard before) that the
additional permissions scheme of GPLv3 allows GPLv3 to become the
license to end all licenses? Again, sounds nice, but it doesn't work
out in reality. Ignoring the fact that you can't fully express
GPLv3-incompatible licenses by using GPLv3 + additional permissions [+
allowed additional restrictions](try it!), there is just a
psychological difference between, say, the ISC license and (GPLv3 +
lots of additional permissions [+ allowed additional restrictions] to
make GPLv3 equivalent to ISC). One's a *really* long, complicated
license. The other is a really short, (seemingly) simple license. They
are perceived completely differently by human beings even if there is
some argument that they are legally equivalent.

In any case, this vision of GPLv3 as the license to end all licenses
has (in 5 years) failed. At best it provides a useful theoretical
basis for understanding license (in)compatibility.

>> No, because there are other valid goals too, like simplicity and
>> comprehensibility (and maybe practical goals like 'ease of
>> enforceability' which I wouldn't necessarily classify as public policy
>> or philosophy), and these affect drafting.
> 
> I agree that's important work that shouldn't be ignored, but rather
> pointless to begin until the philosophy and policies are decided, right?

The goal of simplicity/conciseness is sufficiently important to me
that it is necessary to draft the license while figuring out
philosophy and policy as I go along. I also wanted to start out with
the GPLv3 text rather than starting over from scratch (even now there
is a kind of "GPLv3 ghost" that influences the draft though so little
of the original GPLv3 wording remains).

But also, right now at least, I don't really have lots of *new* ideas
about what a strong copyleft license should be. (If other people do
and want to propose them, great!) In that sense I'm not like RMS and
Eben in 2005 thinking ambitiously about how GPLv3 could address DRM
and DMCA and  patents, or you thinking about network services. I think
I have more ideas about what it *shouldn't* be, and also (more
positively) ideas about what it should *look* like.

- Richard



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