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A Software License That's Libre But Not Gratis?
duncan bayne writes "My company is developing some software using Ruby. It's proprietary software — decidedly not free-as-in-beer — but I don't want to tie my customers down with the usual prohibitions on reverse engineering, modification, etc. After all, they're licensing the product from us, so I think they should be able to use it as they see fit. Does anyone know of an existing license that could be used in this case? Something that gives the customer the freedom to modify the product as they want, but prohibits them from creating derivative works, or redistributing it in any fashion?"
If it is an interesting question, more than just the poster can benefit from the answer.
um, like, hire a real lawyer. really, dude.
which was the name of Microsoft's family of "not quite open source" licenses a few years back. Several products allowed you to examine the source code but do little else. I don't think they even allowed you to modify and recompile it in those days, but they've since replaced it (IIRC) with the "Microsoft Permissive License" which might be less restrictive.
One product I remember was Rotor, a sample implementation of the .Net Common Language Runtime (similar to Mono but not as comprehensive). Another was the WTL Win32 GUI framework, which was an alternative to MFC based on ATL (Active Template Library).
Slashdot was even more heavily anti-MS a few years ago and there used to be withering sarcasm at any mention of "Shared Source"... not so sure about today.
gives the customer the freedom to modify the product as they want, but prohibits them from creating derivative works
Modifying the product is creating a derivative work.
My company is developing some software using Ruby. It's proprietary software â" decidedly not free-as-in-beer â" but I don't want to tie my customers down with the usual prohibitions on reverse engineering, modification, etc. After all, they're licensing the product from us, so I think they should be able to use it as they see fit.
Look into selling them a copy of your software, instead of a license to use a copy of your software. US copyright law does permit people who actually own a copy of software to make certain kinds of modifications (don't recall what exactly), make the needed copies to actually use it (disk -> ram, etc), and such.
A basic search will turn up a lot of licenses, how can you be so lazy that you can't type something into Google but are able to submit a Slashdot story?
It's not laziness. We just love seeing you get your knickers in a twist.
Why is it that you couldn't just say "as it is currently understood"? Obviously because it's not understood that way anymore. Copyright today bears very little resemblance to old copyright law. IANAL, but I read a book once.
IANAL, but if you are not imposing a EULA, you shouldn't need any kind of license. End-user licenses restrict what can be done with the copy of the software that is owned. Licenses like the GPL restrict what can be done when redistributing the software, but impose nothing on the end-users. If you are not wanting to permit your end-users to redistribute, simple copyright is enough to protect your rights without the need for an additional licenseIf the software is not being redistributed and you aren't requiring a EULA, then the end-users are free to modify the software as they see fit (or do anything with it, except redistribute) under existing copyright law. So it seems copyright law as-is protects you from redistribution and permits your users the ability to modify the software, without the need of any license.
This is 100% incorrect. Copyright law does not allow some to create a derivative work without the consent of the copyright owner. And when I say derivative, I mean modification. The author of the summary is confused because he or she does not understand that a modification is a derivative work (assuming modification uses the original aspects of the work that the original author created himself.) You are assuming that copyright protects only from redistribution. That is wrong. Here is what the statute says:
15 USC 106. Exclusive rights in copyrighted works
Subject to sections 107 through 122, the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following:
(1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;
(2) to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work;
(3) to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending;
(4) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works, to perform the copyrighted work publicly;
(5) in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, to display the copyrighted work publicly; and
(6) in the case of sound recordings, to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission.
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#106
As you can see, derivative and distribution are two separate rights granted to the copyright holder.
A basic search will turn up a lot of licenses, how can you be so lazy that you can't type something into Google but are able to submit a Slashdot story?
Why read Slashdot at all? Just Google the news, like I do. Just type "What is <current-date> like?" into Google and let'er rip.
Google provides search results, not dialog.
Slashdot used to provide editing, too, but for a while now that's been more of a nuisance than a feature.
*ducks*
Because it's not about helping, it's about feeling better about himself by proving his intellectual superiority in a public forum.
Just like I did right there ;-)
This isn't really accurate. Although it is true that copyright law appears to prohibit the mere creation of a derivative work whether or not it is distributed, in fact some kinds of derivative work are not considered infringing so long as they are not published. If your interpretation were correct, annotating your own copy of a copyrighted book would constitute copyright infringement, which is not the case. You are perfectly free to annotate your books - you are not free to publish your own annotated edition of someone else's book. Similarly, it is infringing to publish a translation of a copyrighted work, but you may make your own translation and keep it for your own use.
> important to keep the source code super secret
The reason will most likely be listed below:
1. End users making their own changes but still complaining about error that may or may not be a result of their unauthorized modifications
2. Afraid that other competitors will 'leverage' your investment in development using legal or illegal means.
3. They don't want anyone to know that they 'leveraged' your investment in development to further their own product using legal or illegal means.
4. They didn't bother to patent anything and they're relying on being hidden to keep their trade secrets safe.
5. They license another developer's code which has the exact same limitation, and instead of negotiating with the upstream dev for source distribution rights or reimplementing the needed functionality themselves, they just choose to do nothing.
Anyways, many development environments/frameworks allow for source distribution because customers want to know why an obscure function 3 stack steps into your API routine is throwing ugly errors at you. With clear-and-open source, a developer could use a debugger and realize that they screwed something up before having to contact support with an obvious (to the original dev) problem.
Outside development libraries/frameworks and free products, a full source dump of any given product is pretty rare, at least from my experience.
Bye!
Not only is specialized software with restricted access to the source, but the person selling the software needs to have an actual contract in place, not rely on copyright law. My company does this: we develop highly specialized software, and our customers have the option of either using it in binary form, or having access to the source so they can customize it on their own (this costs more). Either way we have contracts in place written by our corporate lawyers that basically say "whatever you do, you are not allowed to sell it, redistribute it, etc." and the contract is specific to that business relationship. It names the two companies and the specific terms of the sale that is occurring, and the terms of the contract.
Relying on copyright law would likely not work very well in this case, as it is ambiguous enough that to this day people are arguing about it in court.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!