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Who Owns Dmoz?

Posted by Cliff on from the stuff-to-think-about dept.

C. Adam Kuether asks: "I like the concept of the open directory project and am considering joining the effort and contributing my bit to organizing the Web. I am concerned about the ownership rights to this compilation. The useage agreements seem reasonable enough now, but what assurance is there that this work will not become just another asset of the Time/Warner/AOL (read Netscape) media empire? Could this project convert to a legally enforceable open and free use license? Are the existing open content licenses practical? "

2 of 68 comments (clear)

  1. Wait a minute... by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5
    I don't know AOL's management except by reputation. But I know the Mozilla folks pretty well, and they are not about to stand for their company running rough-shod over other people's rights. AOL would have to both dismiss all of those folks and continue the project. Not likely.

    Also, given the directory license, you could (and in fact someone should) archive the project as insurance - if the terms change, you can continue the project under the old terms.

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.
  2. Openness at DMoz by Chalst · · Score: 5
    All of the output from DMoz is available in regularly updated RDF logs.

    If AOL were to start to misuse DMoz, then it would be possible (not
    easy, the code for the ODP is closed source) to start a new volunteer
    project based on these logs.

    It may worth signing up just to be privvy to the arguments going on in
    the editors fora around the whole openness/AOL controversy... Take
    care on your application, though: about 90% of applications are
    rejected.

    Charles (http://achilles.bu.edu/cas)