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I think this is misleading. In the event that you bring a patent infringement case against Facebook, you still have a license to use react, but you lose the pat

I think this is misleading. In the event that you bring a patent infringement case against Facebook, you still have a license to use react, but you lose the patent rights that would cover you if you came up with something that infringed on a Facebook patent. Meaning that you now have to fight your case in court without any protection. You're safer with this license and the patent grant, than you are without it. The BSD license on it's own, and the MIT license don't give you any sort of patent grant at all.

geofft 9y ago
That depends on whether you believe that the BSD license gives you an implied patent grant - it does, after all, just say "Redistribution and use...are permitted," without saying anything specific to copyright. See also http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Implicit_patent_licence http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Implicit_patent_licence If the concept of an implicit patent license is coherent and legally meaningful (it sounds like it is), then an explicit patent license, like Facebook's, would supersede it - and so losing your rights under the explicit license would leave you worse off than relying on the implicit one. In any case, this is why people like the Apache license and the GPLv3, so you don't have to think about whether a patent license is implied. Both of those have explicit patent licenses with significantly less draconian termination clauses than Facebook's. (Obviously I am not a lawyer, otherwise I'd know better than to comment on HN about unclear areas of IP law.)
carussell 9y ago
The MIT license almost definitely protects you from anyone who published under that license and would try to bring a patent suit against you. It enumerates protection against anything a suit might deal with. It just does it without actually using the word "patent" anywhere.
cygx 9y ago
Not necessarily. Case in point: Its language regarding patents is what made the OSI reject CC0 (or discuss it to death until its application was withdrawn): Without an explicit mention of patents, it's up to the courts to decide whether the grant of usage rights includes an implicit grant of patent right. With an explicit mention, you're hosed.

geofft 9y ago

That depends on whether you believe that the BSD license gives you an implied patent grant - it does, after all, just say "Redistribution and use...are permitted," without saying anything specific to copyright. See also http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Implicit_patent_licence http://en.swpat.org/wiki/Implicit_patent_licence If the concept of an implicit patent license is coherent and legally meaningful (it sounds like it is), then an explicit patent license, like Facebook's, would supersede it - and so losing your rights under the explicit license would leave you worse off than relying on the implicit one. In any case, this is why people like the Apache license and the GPLv3, so you don't have to think about whether a patent license is implied. Both of those have explicit patent licenses with significantly less draconian termination clauses than Facebook's. (Obviously I am not a lawyer, otherwise I'd know better than to comment on HN about unclear areas of IP law.)

carussell 9y ago

The MIT license almost definitely protects you from anyone who published under that license and would try to bring a patent suit against you. It enumerates protection against anything a suit might deal with. It just does it without actually using the word "patent" anywhere.

cygx 9y ago

Not necessarily. Case in point: Its language regarding patents is what made the OSI reject CC0 (or discuss it to death until its application was withdrawn): Without an explicit mention of patents, it's up to the courts to decide whether the grant of usage rights includes an implicit grant of patent right. With an explicit mention, you're hosed.