I hope that opensource.org applies some sensible legal criteria when reviewing submissions - especially this one. All other discussions are just hot air.
see below for some of my own hot air ...
On 2004.02.12 12:21 Lawrence E. Rosen wrote:
[snip]
> i. NASA legal counsel requires that all NASA > releases of software > include indemnification of the U.S. Government from any third party > liability arising from use or distribution of the software. See 4.B.
All open source licenses include very broad disclaimers of liability. Does the government also require indemnification? Why? I'm sorry, but I can't conceive of any open source distributor or contributor to NASA
This is a liability issue. Why should the government be responsible for the misuse of the software they write? Why should anyone expose themselves to third party lawsuits when all they want to do is provide some benefit to the public? Anyone who doesn't understand this part of the license has no business using the associated software in the first place.
software who would dare to indemnify the US government or any of its agencies. You're the one with the deep pockets and with a Congress that can legislate any protections you need against tort, contract or intellectual property liability. Why should we assume those risks for you? :-) Please stick with a disclaimer of liability; every open source license has one.
You have it backwards. Why should NASA accept the risk of you using their product? That would put my (however small) tax contribution to NASA at risk! Not O.K.
NASA obviously spent a lot of time putting that license together, and those who have even an ounce of a clue about licensing recognize the importance of this wording.
Better question: Why should the NASA license stoop to the lower level of other open source licenses that are just pseudo legal terms written up by a bunch of non-legal people?
The onus to provide a "suitable-for-US-courts" license is on the people who wrote the original licenses. Specifically, the folks who wrote the existing licenses endorced by opensource.org have the responsibility to show their writing is up to par with what NASA puts out - not the other way around. Is NASA perfect? no, but at least they're open to discussing the license in public on this list. And they'll address *legitimate* licensing issues as they come up.
"Big brother" ranting just doesn't belong in a discussion about licenses. I'm glad NASA's got big pockets, and I'm glad they're protecting it with their licenses so they can worry about space exploration.
> ii. Federal Statute mandates that the U.S. > Government can only be > held subject to United States federal law. See 5.C.
The Open Software License (OSL, www.opensource.org/licenses/osl-2.0.php)
establishes jurisdiction, venue and governing law for a US-based
licensor
(such as a US government agency) in the United States. See OSL � 11.
[Foreign readers of this email should take comfort that the OSL is not
US-centric; jurisdiction under the OSL lies wherever the licensor
"resides"
or "conducts its primary business."]
In any license, specifying a venue is up to the writer. Take it or don't use the license. Or how about asking the folks at NASA, "Would you also consider <<venue>> as a suitable venue in your license?" That would at least be POLITE. Chances are the presently stated venue has the best chance of making sure NASA can fend off frivilous and silly lawsuits. Just a guess. . .
> iii. NASA policy requires an effort to accurately > track usage of > released software for documentation and benefits > realized?purposes. See 3.F.
Such provisions are not allowed in an open source license. Reporting requirements are viewed as unreasonable limitations on the rights of licensees to do anything they want internally with open source
Biggest problem of all here - who in all of creation has the authority on blessing open source licenses? I don't even think that half of the existing opensource.org endorsed licenses are capable of achieving their self-stated goals. Asking NASA to adopt license language that might not serve its intended purpose is just flat out wierd.
I maintain that an open source license has certain characteristics and achieves some well defined goals - the primary one being quick, open distribution or source code and documentation to the end user without charging a license fee. It is entirely unappropriate to specify what belongs and doesn't belong in an open source license. Either the license achieves it's own goals or it doesn't.
The NASA license strives to deal with legal issues, not moral "Open Source will save your grandmother and the free world" issues. The beauty is, the NASA license may do that someday :-)
software (e.g., make copies, derivative works, etc.). On the other hand, because of "reciprocity" (see my further comment below) you'll be able to see improvements to NASA software that are distributed by others, and benefit from them. That will be measurable.
I don't want some hack trying to "improve" NASA software. There's no benefit in having untrained engineers who don't understand NASA trying to improve NASA products. It's like having the boy scouts try to improve the Mars rover. NASA owens the bragging rights on their software, and I think it's important to keep it that way.
> iv. Federeal Statutes and NASA regulations requires > a prohibition > in NASA contracts against representations by others that may > be deemed to > be an endorsement by NASA. See 3.E.
Various licenses do that. See, for example, OSL sections 4 [Exclusions from License Grant] and 6 [Attribution Rights].
Obviously, NASA's well paid lawyers disagree with what's there. My money's on the NASA lawyers.
> v. Because it is important that each of the aforementioned
> clauses be a part of each open source agreement relating to > NASA released > software, the proposed agreement must mandate that distribution and > redistribution of the software be done under the aegis of > NOSA (mandatory > domination similar to GPL). See 3.A.
I call this feature "reciprocity." Lots of licenses do that, including the
you and anyone else with a similar opinion are most likely not trained to call that anything. *I'm* not even trained to call it anything and I've spent a lot of time studying law. I won't even try. Spend a few years doing nothing but government licensing and arguing cases then try labeling it.
GPL, MPL and CPL; similarly, the OSL contains a reciprocity condition that requires any licensee who distributes derivative works of OSL-licensed software to do so under the OSL. You don't need to write a new license to obtain that license feature.
I'm sorry if I've misunderstood your license by relying on your summary of it rather than the license itself. I intend to read through the license itself soon, but I wanted to get these general questions on the table first.
I think you not only misunderstood the license, but you may only have succeeded in bringing out the armchair lawyers in force to debate these misguided points. It just doesn't do anyone any good.
Richard Schilling -- license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3
