[Tinyos-alliance] License proposal

Tue Mar 7 08:38:16 PST 2006

Rob,
  Thanks for sending this around.  It should serve as a useful platform for
discussion today.  I think it is fair to say that this represents Moteiv's
position.  The email goes back and forth between a proposed Alliance
document and a Moteiv document, so let's focus on the approach rather than
the specifics.  For more on the Moteiv side, people can look at the Moteiv
web site, which contains their apache-like copyright.

Just to pull out a couple of the higher level issues.

1. I believe that our position is to have a small collection of acceptable
licenses.  Today we have a collection of BSD-like wording.  This is a
proposal to add Apache-like options.

2. The Apache-like option would be quite different than Apache, in that it
does not place the copyright in the Apache name and require crediting of
Apache, it keeps it in the contributor's name and requires credit to the
contributor.
   - this may raise the question of whether their needs to be a pure-BSD
subset?

3. This version has some teeth about not using with TinyOS or @copyright.
This is a bit tricky in light of 2.  It is simpler with Apache.  Also,
permission is more complex, since it would mean permission of all the
copyright holders. 

4. We need to think about what reproduction means in the embedded world.
Source code is easy, but what does it mean for the binary to reproduce it?

5. The issue of whether we can guide the venue is potentially quite a large
one.  Nice idea.  Non-trivial.

6. We need to get a sense of what constitutes a large enough change to
warrant introduction of a new author or new copyright.  I'd like to take the
position that it needs to be quite substantial.  Bug fixes should show up in
the modification history.

7. As with BSD, this remains mute to any underlying IP.  Quite different
from GPL in that regard.

-----Original Message-----
From: tinyos-alliance-bounces at millennium.berkeley.edu
[mailto:tinyos-alliance-bounces at millennium.berkeley.edu] On Behalf Of
rob at moteiv.com
Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2006 3:51 AM
To: tinyos-alliance at mail.millennium.berkeley.edu
Subject: [Tinyos-alliance] License proposal

Sorry for the late email, but perhaps you will at least have a chance to
glance
at the proposal below before the meeting.   David or Lama, could you send
out
the bridge info again -- my email archives are not accessible at the moment.
Thanks,

Rob

The goal of the TinyOS licensing is to encourage participation of
individuals
and institutions in development and usage of TinyOS.  To that end, the
TinyOS
should provide:
- means of encouraging individual and institutional contributions
- adequate legal protection for the contributors
- minimal overhead associated with adopting the license.

As we are committed to the open source philosophy, the main avenue for
encouraging the contributions is recognition.  Recognition as noted in the
code is important -- that recognition spreads among the peers of the
contributor, and is highly valueable.  However, as the code comprising
TinyOS
will be used in, often proprietary, systems deeply embedded into the
environment, it is important that the acknowldgements be given by a wider
community of users and developers.  I argue that the most appropriate place
to
achieve that is to acknowledge the contributors in the end user
documentation.  That strikes a balance between advertisements and marketing
materials (where the individual contributions would perhaps dilute the brand
of the organization marketing the end application), and just the source code
(where no one but the developers would be aware of this).

The adequate legal protection refers broadly to warranties and liabilities
arising from using the code, use of patents that may be underlying
the code, and branding issues.   Moteiv's license, includes two
provisions in addition to the standard (open) software disclaimer.  The
first
clause dictates that in the event that a suit was brought against a
contributor, it should be filed in the preferred venue of the contributor; I
believe this is particularly important for small companies in this
community,
as they operate with very limited travel and legal budgets.  The second
clause
in Moteiv's license explicitly spells out the condition for the termination
of
the license.  As a patent policy I would recommend following Lama's
suggestions on the subject:  RAND terms, no mandatory disclosure, etc.  When
it comes to branding, there is an opportunity for both individual
contributors
and for the TinyOS community to build upthe brands involved.   I would
propose
that the alliance retains the right to grant the use of TinyOS name and logo
for promototional purposes, the contributors shall retain the right to
choose
whether their name may be used in promoting the product.

Minimal overhead with adopting the license has two facets: organizational
and
operational.  For contributors and users the license of TinyOS may need to
be
approved by a legal department; organizational facet refers to the ease of
accepting the license by the organization.  By operational facet we mean the
ease of use and compliance with the licenses.  Over the past few years
(basically ever since Netscape decided to open source their browser, in
1998)
open source licenses have received considerable scrutiny from various
corporate legal departments. I would advocate adopting the clauses standard
to
the widely adopted open source licenses. Two candidates are at the
forefront:
Apache license and the New BSD license.  I would advocate in the interest of
simplicity that both of these licenses be allowed for both the core and
working group charters.  Other benefits of these licenses are: they are
compatible with each other, they do not pose a threat of IP dillution as
result of mandatory royalty free patent license, and they are compatible
with
GPL.

TinyOS has a wide range of contributors.  Often a simple TinyOS application
will include components written by authors all over the world; the system
must
provide adequate aid to the programmer building and deploying applications
to
comply with the license terms.  TinyOS build tools already scan the source
files to generate the documentation; data relevant to the licensing of the
code, such as copyright date, copyright holder, and license type can be
extracted by the same mechanism as the documentation generation.  In
addition
to the already present @author tag, I would advocate the addition of
@copyright and @license to identify the copyright holder and the license
type.
The copyright holder may be an individual, or an institution; the copyright
stays with the individual contributor.  For the components in the core, the
license MUST be one of the licenses approved by the TinyOS Alliance.  As a

As a matter of policy, we advocate that the simple bug fixes to the existing
code may merit an addition to the @author tag.  The @copyright and @license
on
a file may be changed only in the event of transfer of maintenance or in the
presence of significant contribution to the file (e.g. conforming to new,
non-trivial interfaces; changing StdControl to SplitControl does not count).

To comply with all of these terms, the two acceptable licenses are presented
below.

@copyright -- copyright holder
@licence -- TinyOS public

TinyOS  Public Software License
=======================
Version 1.1

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
met:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer.

2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

3. The end-user documentation included with the redistribution, if
any, must include the following acknowledgment:

   "This product includes software developed by @copyright"

This acknowledgment must appear in the software itself, if and
wherever such third-party acknowledgments normally appear.

4. The names "TinyOS" and "@copyright" must not be used to
endorse or promote products derived from this software without prior
written permission. For written permission, please contact
info at moteiv.com.

5. Products derived from this software may not be called "TinyOS", nor
may "TinyOS" appear in their name, without prior written permission of
the @copyright.

6. THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED
WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
NON-INFRINGEMENT, MERCHANTABILITY, AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL MOTEIV CORPORATION OR ITS
CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL,
EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO,
PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR
PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING
NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS
SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

7.  Any action or suit relating to this software may be brought only
in the courts of a jurisdiction wherein the Moteiv resides or in which
Moteiv conducts its primary business, and under the laws of that
jurisdiction excluding its conflict-of-law provisions. The application
of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International
Sale of Goods is expressly excluded. Any use of this software outside
the scope of this license or after its termination shall be subject to
the requirements and penalties of the U.S. Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C.
§101 et seq., the equivalent laws of other countries, and
international treaty. This section shall survive the termination of
this license.

8.  All rights under this license shall terminate upon breach of any
of the material terms or conditions of this license and a subsequent
failure to cure such breach in a reasonable period of time after
becoming aware of such noncompliance. If all rights under this license
terminate, use and distribution of this software shall cease as soon
as reasonably practicable. However, any obligations under this license
to the software shall continue and survive.

====================================================================

NewBSD style license (that's the current Intel license):

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification,
are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

    * Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice,
this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
    * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
notice,
this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation
and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
    * Neither the name of the <ORGANIZATION> nor the names of its
contributors
may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
without
specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS"
AND
ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
IMPLIED
WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE
DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
FOR
ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
DAMAGES
(INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES;
LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND
ON
ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT
(INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF
THIS
SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

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