Project lacks any sort of license information
asb opened this issue · comments
First of all, this looks absolutely fantastic. One way it could be more useful to people is if it included a license declaration, so people who extend the work would know what they're able to do with it. How about MIT or BSD?
Understood, and I should do that. My feeling is it is public domain, take it, use it. What I wont do is take responsibility for whatever harm you do with it. ...hang on...googling...reading... sounds like public domain may not be the proper term, sounds like I need to take some action to show that it is available for use, use at your own risk, if you take it, call it your own, then try to take legal action against me or others, well that is your karma you have to deal with.
I dont like the existing popular licenses in that they are centered around you must keep this copyright statement and this license on subsequent copies. If you are going to take my code and change it, its yours, not mine I dont want my name tied to your code.
I will think more on this, thank you for the comments.
Maybe Creative Commons CC0 is what you're after? It is essentially a public domain dedication designed to work around the fact public domain isn't recognised in the same way worldwide.
http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/CC0_FAQ
Additionally, there is the license declaration sqlite uses. It has the problem that if you're not in the US you may be able to truly disclaim all copyright (by my understanding).
** The author disclaims copyright to this source code. In place of
** a legal notice, here is a blessing:
**
** May you do good and not evil.
** May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
** May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
Thanks, I have research and thinking to do about this...I like the
sqlite one, didnt know about it.
With respect to your coment, if I am in the US then what does that
mean? Is this related to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain_software
The Berne Convention ... a program is automatically subject to a copyright
Were you meaning that in the US an sqlite like statement I really may
not be giving it up (copyright) and outside the us I may really be?
David
On Thu, Jun 28, 2012 at 3:47 PM, Alex Bradbury
reply@reply.github.com
wrote:
Maybe Creative Commons CC0 is what you're after? It is essentially a public domain dedication designed to work around the fact public domain isn't recognised in the same way worldwide.
http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/CC0_FAQAdditionally, there is the license declaration sqlite uses. It has the problem that if you're not in the US you may be able to truly disclaim all copyright (by my understanding).
** The author disclaims copyright to this source code. In place of
** a legal notice, here is a blessing:
**
** May you do good and not evil.
** May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
** May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub:
#3 (comment)
My apologies, I said "if you're not in the US you may be able to truly disclaim all copyright" but meant "if you're not in the US you may not be able to truly disclaim all copyright". Sqlite even sells licenses for people who are worried about this: http://www.sqlite.org/copyright.html listing one of the reasons to buy a license as "You are using SQLite in a jurisdiction that does not recognize the right of an author to dedicate their work to the public domain.". There's a discussion of the issue of European authors disclaiming copyright here: http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.db.sqlite.general/12441
I think something like the Sqlite license would be just fine. This simple all permissive license text as suggested by GNU may also suit:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#GNUAllPermissive
Copying and distribution of this file, with or without modification, are permitted in any medium without royalty provided the copyright notice and this notice are preserved. This file is offered as-is, without any warranty.
Thank you for your comments and concern. I have done some research. I like the Fair License but read somewhere that the warranty disclaimer needs more meat in the USA. Public Domain as you and everyone else mentions is just a sticky mess, better to just say I wrote it, you can use it, carry this around so that everyone knows I said that. The MIT License.