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CeCILL: La Licence Francaise Du Logiciel Libre
News for nerds writes "Researchers at three French government-funded research organizations revealed the new Open-Source license, known as CeCILL (English .pdf here), which they say is compatible with the FSF's GPL. CeCILL is intended to make free software more compatible with French law in two areas where it differs significantly from U.S. law: copyright and product liability. I, for one, welcome our nouvelle overlord of freedom."
GPL translations have always been awkward, they don't translate well into the local legal frameword. This new license is good because it's based on French laws rather than a french interpretation of US laws, and as an added bonus, if such a license is ever challenged in court, judges will take it more seriously if it's home-grown than if it's an "import" license.
Now, not being a lawyer and all, my question is: can a french developer use the CeCILL license as a drop-in replacement for the GPL? can he ship both licenses in a software product's tarball and consider both licenses equivalent in terms of rights they grant, in each country?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
It's nice to see that someone is making Open Source -- or should that be Logiciel Lisible Libre? -- "official". If this licence stands up to the scrutiny of the courts, and with official backing there really is no reason to suppose otherwise, then it's an important step in the right direction. The licence overcomes the Great Omission of BSD -- that is, it explicitly states that if you distribute modified binaries you must also make the source available -- and even provides explicit permission to use the GPL as an alternative licence.
How long before there is a full-on, EU-wide Open Source push? What with rampant piracy in the former Eastern Bloc countries, official approval for the fair alternative can only benefit ordinary people.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
In fact, logically, if the GNU GPL was somehow incompatible or did not work fully with French law then the French government could not claim that their license was compatible with the GNU GPL under French law. That is, if the new license is really compatible with the GNU GPL then, by definition, the GNU GPL would work just as well as it in French law therefore there is no need for the new license.
I don't like the US goverment either (as a Ukonian) but the USan free software community and the FSF are the antithesis of the current US government, as they stand up for liberty and human rights--in a way they are the true USans (who follow the ideals of the constitution) as opposed to the USans who now give the US such a bad name.
Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley
[This post is in the public domain (copyright-free) unless otherwise stated]
Let me couch this in terms more enticing to understand, let's look at the post in terms of beer...mmmmmm beer. Where I live there's a brewer that makes good beer. Sleemans is a brewery that's been around for more than a hundred years because it makes a good brew. The owner of the brewery, a Mr. John Sleeman speaks out in advertisements that promote his brand name while talking about drinking and driving. He says he knows he can't stop people from drinking and driving but that he feels a responsibilty to speak out against it as he is a brewer. I think Mr. Sleemans' efforts are laudatory. While he can't really do anything to stop people from drinking his brew then driving he can speak to the ethics of the situation and ask that people don't drink and drive.
My post simply spoke to the likelihood that FSF/OS organizations may have to speak to the ethics of the product being used is suppresive states. If and when this scenario comes into play the community will have to address the ethics of the situation. simple n'est pas?
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
The French do not follow the same rules as the English for word capitalization. This is evident in the French article, if you RTFA: /.-capitalized title:
CeCILL : première licence francaise de logiciel libre élaborée par le CEA, le CNRS et l'INRIA
Now compare it with the
CeCILL: La Licence Francaise Du Logiciel Libre
Notice how not every single word (including the articles) is capitalized? (Also, why don't Slashdot support accents and foreign characters?)
Article 13 of the English translation says: "The Agreement is governed by French law. ... In the absence of an out-of-court settlement within two (2) months as from their occurrence, and unless emergency proceedings are necessary, the disagreements or disputes shall be referred to the Paris Courts having jurisdiction, by the first Party to take action."
This is very clearly a restriction the GPL does not make (it doesn't define any court having jurisdiction), and the GPL says that no additional restrictions may be added to a GPL'ed program. Defining which law governs the interpretation of the license is exactly why the license of Python 1.6b1 and later versions through 2.1 is not considered GPL-compatible by the FSF.
I haven't read the rest of the license in detail, but given that they didn't even get this one right, which has been a problem with one quite well-known project's license before, I don't have too high hopes...
In theory, you might also be able to haul them to New Oreleans and sue under Louisiana law (they still use Nepolianic Code in that state). Interestingly, lawyers from Louisana are the only American attornies who can practice law in France.
/. geeks understand what you are talking about with the GPL, I can't same the same for most lawyers or especially judges. It doesn't even specify which GPL license, the Free Software Foundation, or which version (the new version 4 of the GPL that gives all copyright to RMS and forces you to pay him (Mr. Stallman) $1 for each time the software product is running?) It doesn't even deal with GPL varients like LGPL or FDPL, not to mention if other free software source code gets mixed in with this license, like BSD-link licenses.
This is a huge hole, and I'm not even sure it would hold up in U.S. courts... as in if an American modified software using this this license, would the license even be recognized at all by U.S. Courts? As in would this license even be held to be recognized in a U.S. Court, or would this provision throw the whole license out and invalidate the entire license?
Yes, I also read section 11.4, but in this case that may not be sufficient language to justify "invalidating" the juristiction question. I don't see U.S. courts enforcing civil action against U.S. citizens that was done in a French court, particularly when the alleged infringement took place on American soil. In other words, knock your socks off and sue for millions of dollars against an American, but you couldn't collect a dime even if you won in court. It would just have the effect of placing a legal ban on that person from ever coming to France (which most Americans wouldn't care about anyway).
How I could see U.S. common law interpreting this, assuming that it declares this license to be invalid, is to consider more along the lines of intent rather than actual prohibition. An "enlightened" judge might presume the terms of the GPL as an alternate, but more likely consider that the software was place into "Public Domain", and follow existing U.S. common law regarding its copyright status at that point. At least the GPL has a provision that if the license is unenforceable, then the license is revoked at it reverts to standard copyright terms, which would otherwise mean it simply can't be redistributed. I don't see this provision at all.
I'm not too comfortable with Section 5.3.4 either. It mentions almost in passing that this license can be superceeded by the GPL under some circumstances. The Gnu Public License is not otherwise defined (Is that the General-microsoft Propritary License instead?) and while most
From a developer perspective, I would avoid software that is released under the CeCILL like it was some diseased, virus infected piece of software. I wouldn't even want to open the software to examine its internal workings, for fear of "contamination". That is the real point of going through this exercise, is that this group wants to have their license widely distributed, or at least have their software adoped widely with this license.
Ultimately, this is another case of "Don't try this at home". RMS took quite a bit of time trying to come up with the GPL, and even he got it wrong the first time. Writing an open source license that grants freedom to copy but preserves copyright is not a trivial thing. In addition, the writing process of an open license can't be done in a traditional committee, but the process must also be open and subject to change if the community finds holes in the license. I just don't see the CeCILL having gone through that process, particuarly with the holes mentioned here.
Even if the license might in theory legally binding on you, it would be highly improbably that any court would find that a claim by you to have licensed the code under certain terms would not consistute estoppel if you claimed as truth that people could distribute the software under the terms of the GPL.
In fact, it goes further than that. If you assert that your software is licensed under the GPL, and that by placing the software under the GPL you're allowing people to do Foo with it, then you will be prevented from later suing people for violating the GPL even if Foo is a violation of the license.
This principle is meant to provide safety that you can rely on statements from someone without needing to have every little detail agreed in writing.
(The term "estoppel" came to English from French, btw.)
ObDisclaimer: IANAL
Quote: IANAL.
/.? If not, why don't we just post in every YRO story that "No one here is a lawyer." Think of how many "IANAL's" we'd save ourselves.
Quote: IANAL either.
Are there any lawyers on
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