Bifalgorithm post · Infotech governance policy ethics and law · Appendix D: Software licensing
Licenses
Licenses (Infotech governance policy ethics and law · Appendix D: Software licensing) — "The BSD license is very simple and therefore short. Its only condition…
Ideas in this flowchart
- Permissive software licensing and public-domain software
- BSD license
- The BSD license is simple and short.
- Users must mention the author’s name when incorporating the software into their own programs.
- All other uses and redistribution are permitted, including commercial use.
- It appeals to authors seeking the widest possible use of their work and accepting commercial exploitation by others.
- FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and Apache are notable examples.
- The comparable MIT license requires users to indemnify the author against liability arising from use.
- Artistic License
- The software may be used and redistributed without further restrictions.
- Modification is permitted, but modified versions may be redistributed only when the modifications are freely available to everyone.
- Selling software covered by the Artistic License is not permitted.
- The Perl interpreter is a notable example.
- Public domain
- Public domain is not technically a license because the software has no copyright.
- Anyone may use, distribute, and modify the software without restriction.
- Commercial exploitation is allowed, and identifying the original author is not required.
- The author relinquishes all rights, imposes no restrictions on third parties, and is not liable for damages.
