Update: More licenses at QuickTopic, raph’s weblog.

I think that people really use software licenses to express intentions, and don’t really read the details of the licenses. So I think that licenses should be made as simple as possible, so that they don’t disagree with intentions… thus, haiku licensing:

PD: do what you feel like / since the work is abandoned / the law doesn’t care
MIT: take my code with you / and do whatever you want / but please don’t blame me
LGPL: you can copy this / but make modified versions / free in source code form
MPL: like LGPL / except netscape is allowed / to change the license
GPL: if you use this code / you and your children’s children / must make your source free

RIAA: if you touch this file / my lawyers will come kill you / so kindly refrain

posted June 20, 2002 11:08 PM (Politics) #

Nearby

do the Archive!
Do you trust Microsoft’s Trusted Computing Platform?
David Sifry is Online
[more|less] annoying than an NPR Pledge Drives
cloudmark
License Haiku
My Cocoa App
EFF Rudeness
Emergent Hypertext
Microsoft Attempts to Cement Monopoly Under Guise of Continuing Copyright Terrorism
An Anti-DRM Video Game

Aaron Swartz (me@aaronsw.com)