[computer-go] Collaboration project. Once again

[Joss Wright]

On Mon, 2006-08-07 at 09:23 -0400, Don Dailey wrote:
> On Mon, 2006-08-07 at 11:48 +0100, Joss Wright wrote:
> > 
> > I've been following this for a while, and it has occurred to me in
> > other
> > projects: does it really have to be released under a license? If you
> > really don't have anything specific that needs to be in the license
> > (which is what most people's use of things like the BSD or even GPL
> > license is for) then just don't use one. There is quite an obsession
> > with licenses, and I do question what hideous consequences there would
> > be to just putting software up without attaching a license. 
> 
> I'm not a legal expert, but it seems reasonable from a legal standpoint
> that in the case of litigation concerning the software,  it would be FAR
> better to have a clear statement of your expectations regarding it than
> to have nothing at all.  
> 
> If there is not a clear statement of ownership (or that it's been
> donated to the world),  doesn't that make it more vulnerable to other
> claims of ownership, perhaps with some minor changes to the code?
> 
> How would you refute this when you never made any claims to the contrary
> except after the fact?
> 
> Again, I'm no expert but someone could claim this by stamping their own
> license on it.    In a court of law,  which claim would stand up?   A
> piece of software with a clear statement of ownership or one with no
> statement at all?    
> 

I think that the fear of litigation is possibly caused by a cultural
barrier. Living in the UK, I find it very hard to believe that I could
be the subject of any litigation regarding the behaviour of a piece of
open-source software that I had written. I could understand if it was a
hacking tool, or other "dangerous" piece of software, but in that case I
don't think that the GPL would cover me either. If my Go
server/client/engine doesn't work well I don't think that I would have
anything to fear in court.

Ownership would be covered by standard copyright, which I believe
doesn't even have to be claimed in order for it to be in force. If
someone made minor changes to the code and asserted ownership of the
changed version, I wouldn't be worried. Such an action wouldn't prevent
me from working on my own version of the code, and licenses such as BSD
allow for others to take the code and add non-open extensions to it
anyway.

Even with a license, someone could theoretically take the code, change
the license and claim ownership. I see no difference between that and
putting up some software that has no license attached to it. Both cases
would be equally difficult to prove in court, and equally unlikely as
far as I can tell.

The response that I think carries the most weight was regarding others'
view of the code. If there is no license then I could understand other
people being reluctant to work on it as they have no idea whether I
would then leap up and sue them for stealing the source. If I had made
the source publicly available then I would be surprised if this stood up
in court, but I could understand others being wary of it.

The solution would be to put somewhere on the page/in the code "do what
you will with this software", but I suppose that that classes as a
license anyway.

I think that I'm just depressed by a world where absolutely everything
one does has to be covered in metaphorical stickers just in case you get
sued. I'm not used to it in the UK, although there is a trend in that
direction. I suppose that if I were to release anything significant I'd
be tempted by the BSD license, but I think I would probably just release
it "unbranded" as I see that as having the same effect.

Joss