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If I contribute a code under the new CLA, is Grafana Labs allowed to relicense that contribution under a non-copyleft license, like Apache Public License 2.0, w

If I contribute a code under the new CLA, is Grafana Labs allowed to relicense that contribution under a non-copyleft license, like Apache Public License 2.0, without my further permission? If yes, than it's a really bad bad thing and I hope they change it. CLAs that permit relicensing for a project that already uses permissive license is fine and fair. But doing that on a project with a copyleft license is a bad taste. It would enable Grafana Labs to give Grafana to a party X which can then give it to party Y, where X isn't required to give all the necessary freedoms to Y. https://opensource.com/article/19/2/cla-problems https://opensource.com/article/19/2/cla-problems https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2014/jun/09/do-not-need-cla/ https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2014/jun/09/do-not-need-cla/

justincormack 5y ago
The new CLA doesn't seem to allow relicense. The old one [1] allowed relicense under OSI approved licenses. [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20200311075025/https://grafana.com/docs/grafana/latest/developers/cla/ https://web.archive.org/web/20200311075025/https://grafana.c...
ec109685 5y ago
Don’t they have a license to your work and they can do however they please with it? E.g. sell it to X and Y for whatever they want and X and Y have no obligations to ever release anything back?
- lmm 5y ago
  Not necessarily. They have whatever rights the terms of the CLA say they have.
rocqua 5y ago
Usually part of the CLA is meant to allow dual licensing. The idea is that the company also makes the software available under a commercial non-viral license. Hence if you contribute to a GPL project with a CLA, some companies could still publish your code closed source through a commercial license deal.
jillesvangurp 5y ago
It's a very good point. IMHO copy right transfers are something to be wary off. Any company that practices that can do a bait and switch on the license. I see it has a hard requirement for long term success of an OSS community to have a large and active community of copyright holders. IMHO who holds the copyright is more important than the actual license. Anything OSI endorsed should be fine. However, AGPL to me screams "talk to us about buying a special license if you want to use this commercially". That requires copy right transfers. AGPL without copyright transfers does not make sense for companies for this reason.

justincormack 5y ago

The new CLA doesn't seem to allow relicense. The old one [1] allowed relicense under OSI approved licenses. [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20200311075025/https://grafana.com/docs/grafana/latest/developers/cla/ https://web.archive.org/web/20200311075025/https://grafana.c...

ec109685 5y ago

Don’t they have a license to your work and they can do however they please with it? E.g. sell it to X and Y for whatever they want and X and Y have no obligations to ever release anything back?

lmm 5y ago
Not necessarily. They have whatever rights the terms of the CLA say they have.

rocqua 5y ago

Usually part of the CLA is meant to allow dual licensing. The idea is that the company also makes the software available under a commercial non-viral license. Hence if you contribute to a GPL project with a CLA, some companies could still publish your code closed source through a commercial license deal.

jillesvangurp 5y ago

It's a very good point. IMHO copy right transfers are something to be wary off. Any company that practices that can do a bait and switch on the license. I see it has a hard requirement for long term success of an OSS community to have a large and active community of copyright holders. IMHO who holds the copyright is more important than the actual license. Anything OSI endorsed should be fine. However, AGPL to me screams "talk to us about buying a special license if you want to use this commercially". That requires copy right transfers. AGPL without copyright transfers does not make sense for companies for this reason.