6 ms·

Zed's new Lamson licence: yank the rug at any time.

21 points by anthonyb 14y ago

anthonyb 14y ago
And now he's blocked me because he doesn't understand copyright law. Is there a fan club? Do I get some sort of t-shirt?
- jfoutz 14y ago
  Are you sure he didn't block you because the avengers came out on May 4th?
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    "The Vengeful Public Licence" does have a ring to it, although "The Ghetto Public Licence" might be more apt.
- jbapple 14y ago
  I don't understand copyright law, either. In your opinion, would it be legal for you to fork Lamson at a version before the revocation clause was put in the license, then distribute the source with that license?
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    Sure, depending on what the license was previously. I'm pretty sure that's happened before (LibreOffice, maybe?).
  - taligent 14y ago
    It has been GPLv3 before. https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/commit/d259a669728a92a386f3e3090fe5792793d4463f https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/commit/d259a669728a92a386f...
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
chbrown 14y ago
The wording in question: 5. The copyright holder reserves the right to revoke this license on anyone who uses this copyrighted work at any time for any reason. And his explanation from the README: Lamson is licensed under the license in the https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/blob/master/LICENSE https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/blob/master/LICENSE file. It's a variant of the BSD license that is revokeable and makes contributor's rights clear up front. It's a phenomenal idea. I'm gonna start buying stuff in revokeable cash.
dangrossman 14y ago
IANAL: My understanding is that even if he were to revoke the license, any copies you already made under it would remain your legal property, as they were made lawfully. It's the right to copy (naturally the author's exclusive right) the license is giving you. Revoking that right prevents you from making future copies, but would have no power to make you destroy the ones you already have. Right?
- anthonyb 14y ago
  Nope. If he revokes, you lose the licence, and can't use lamson any more. It's how the GPL works, too. See this tweet: http://twitter.com/zedshaw/status/223966065091284992 http://twitter.com/zedshaw/status/223966065091284992
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
    - anthonyb 14y ago
      A lot of online licences work that way. If you buy something you have more recourse under law, I think, but IANAL, etc.
  - caseydurfee 14y ago
    Just curious, has that aspect of the GPL ever successfully been held up in court?
    - anthonyb 14y ago
      Yep, since it's essentially just copyright law with no fancy licence involved: I made X, you're using it without permission.
      - dangrossman 14y ago
        That's not copyright law. Copyright law governs the right to make copies and distribute copies. Use of a copy you legally acquired can only possibly be restricted by a license agreement; contract law.
my_throwaway 14y ago
The copyright holder reserves the right to revoke this license on anyone who uses this copyrighted work at any time for any reason. Legalese for "a non-open source project that no-one should put any trust in."
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
lsaferite 14y ago
So, does that mean anything up to commit e78520b857384462b9eecdedfc0f8c2e57cdd00a is under the standard BSD license then?
- georgemcbay 14y ago
  Whether or not it means anything depends upon which judge/jury might be deciding it, but if you forked at that commit and didn't use any of his code post that change you'd have a pretty good case that the modified terms don't apply to you since he publicly 'released' that version under the traditional BSD license (or optionally GPLv3).
  - tzs 14y ago
    Careful, though. If the original license is seen by the court as a bare copyright license, rather than as a contract, then the copyright holder may be able to revoke that license. If that were the case, people with copies distributed before the revocation would no longer be able to make and distribute copies or derivative works. This is a thorny and confusing area, and we are not going to know for sure until we have a few actual cases litigated.
taligent 14y ago
Actually this "license" is completely nonsensical and in stark contradiction to the Github terms of service. "Contributors agree that any contributions are owned by the copyright holder and that contributors have absolutely no rights to their contributions." US Copyright law states that contributors ALWAYS have the copyright to their own work unless they explicitly transfer to another party.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    Except when you commit something that you don't own (such as the company you work for claim ownership), at which point all sorts of legal shenanigans commence. This is why most large open source projects have a contributor agreement of some sort, which basically says "I own all of the copyright and patents for this thing, and you can have a free irrevocable licence to use it."
    - taligent 14y ago
      That is only the case because you have explicitly transferred those rights to your employer when you first start working for them and sign the paperwork. That is completely legal. This isn't.
      - anthonyb 14y ago
        Not necessarily - it depends on whether it's work for hire. The point being that in some cases you may not have authority to grant that part of the license, and having a blanket "All your codes are belong to Zed" is potentially a good way for Zed to get sued.
caseydurfee 14y ago
A software engineer drafting up his own crazy license is on as solid footing as a lawyer drafting up his own crazy email server software. This is yet another example of engineers' disease. Having experience in a narrow technical domain does not confer you expertise in other domains. Being a mechanical engineer does not make you qualified as an expert on climate science. Being a software engineer does not make you qualified as an expert on contracts.
- gue5t 14y ago
  Don't the all-caps make it binding on a fundamental, quarks-and-protons level like the GPL and copyright?
  - caseydurfee 14y ago
    Indeed, how do you say "cruise control for cool" in Latin?
caseydurfee 14y ago
Original version of the license: "Lamson is licensed BSD or GPLv3, whichever you want. This basically means you shitheads who like using software without giving credit can go on being leeches on the world and tell everyone that you're fucking brilliant and invented all the gear running your shitty little company when really you just borrowed shit from real creators like me." New version of the license: "Neither the name of Zed A. Shaw may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission." We could very well call this whole incident "Learn You Have Borderline Personality Disorder The Hard Way, By Being Laughed Out Of Court." BSD, meet BPD.
medecau 14y ago
Change the license to officially BSD. https://github.com/medecau/lamson/commit/e78520b857384462b9eecdedfc0f8c2e57cdd00a https://github.com/medecau/lamson/commit/e78520b857384462b9e... This is the last change before the introduction of the new clauses.

21 points by anthonyb 14y ago

And now he's blocked me because he doesn't understand copyright law. Is there a fan club? Do I get some sort of t-shirt?

jfoutz 14y ago
Are you sure he didn't block you because the avengers came out on May 4th?
- anthonyb 14y ago
  "The Vengeful Public Licence" does have a ring to it, although "The Ghetto Public Licence" might be more apt.
jbapple 14y ago
I don't understand copyright law, either. In your opinion, would it be legal for you to fork Lamson at a version before the revocation clause was put in the license, then distribute the source with that license?
- anthonyb 14y ago
  Sure, depending on what the license was previously. I'm pretty sure that's happened before (LibreOffice, maybe?).
- taligent 14y ago
  It has been GPLv3 before. https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/commit/d259a669728a92a386f3e3090fe5792793d4463f https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/commit/d259a669728a92a386f...
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]

chbrown 14y ago

The wording in question: 5. The copyright holder reserves the right to revoke this license on anyone who uses this copyrighted work at any time for any reason. And his explanation from the README: Lamson is licensed under the license in the https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/blob/master/LICENSE https://github.com/zedshaw/lamson/blob/master/LICENSE file. It's a variant of the BSD license that is revokeable and makes contributor's rights clear up front. It's a phenomenal idea. I'm gonna start buying stuff in revokeable cash.

dangrossman 14y ago

IANAL: My understanding is that even if he were to revoke the license, any copies you already made under it would remain your legal property, as they were made lawfully. It's the right to copy (naturally the author's exclusive right) the license is giving you. Revoking that right prevents you from making future copies, but would have no power to make you destroy the ones you already have. Right?

anthonyb 14y ago
Nope. If he revokes, you lose the licence, and can't use lamson any more. It's how the GPL works, too. See this tweet: http://twitter.com/zedshaw/status/223966065091284992 http://twitter.com/zedshaw/status/223966065091284992
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    A lot of online licences work that way. If you buy something you have more recourse under law, I think, but IANAL, etc.
- caseydurfee 14y ago
  Just curious, has that aspect of the GPL ever successfully been held up in court?
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    Yep, since it's essentially just copyright law with no fancy licence involved: I made X, you're using it without permission.
    - dangrossman 14y ago
      That's not copyright law. Copyright law governs the right to make copies and distribute copies. Use of a copy you legally acquired can only possibly be restricted by a license agreement; contract law.

my_throwaway 14y ago

The copyright holder reserves the right to revoke this license on anyone who uses this copyrighted work at any time for any reason. Legalese for "a non-open source project that no-one should put any trust in."

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

lsaferite 14y ago

So, does that mean anything up to commit e78520b857384462b9eecdedfc0f8c2e57cdd00a is under the standard BSD license then?

georgemcbay 14y ago
Whether or not it means anything depends upon which judge/jury might be deciding it, but if you forked at that commit and didn't use any of his code post that change you'd have a pretty good case that the modified terms don't apply to you since he publicly 'released' that version under the traditional BSD license (or optionally GPLv3).
- tzs 14y ago
  Careful, though. If the original license is seen by the court as a bare copyright license, rather than as a contract, then the copyright holder may be able to revoke that license. If that were the case, people with copies distributed before the revocation would no longer be able to make and distribute copies or derivative works. This is a thorny and confusing area, and we are not going to know for sure until we have a few actual cases litigated.

taligent 14y ago

Actually this "license" is completely nonsensical and in stark contradiction to the Github terms of service. "Contributors agree that any contributions are owned by the copyright holder and that contributors have absolutely no rights to their contributions." US Copyright law states that contributors ALWAYS have the copyright to their own work unless they explicitly transfer to another party.

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- anthonyb 14y ago
  Except when you commit something that you don't own (such as the company you work for claim ownership), at which point all sorts of legal shenanigans commence. This is why most large open source projects have a contributor agreement of some sort, which basically says "I own all of the copyright and patents for this thing, and you can have a free irrevocable licence to use it."
  - taligent 14y ago
    That is only the case because you have explicitly transferred those rights to your employer when you first start working for them and sign the paperwork. That is completely legal. This isn't.
    - anthonyb 14y ago
      Not necessarily - it depends on whether it's work for hire. The point being that in some cases you may not have authority to grant that part of the license, and having a blanket "All your codes are belong to Zed" is potentially a good way for Zed to get sued.

caseydurfee 14y ago

A software engineer drafting up his own crazy license is on as solid footing as a lawyer drafting up his own crazy email server software. This is yet another example of engineers' disease. Having experience in a narrow technical domain does not confer you expertise in other domains. Being a mechanical engineer does not make you qualified as an expert on climate science. Being a software engineer does not make you qualified as an expert on contracts.

gue5t 14y ago
Don't the all-caps make it binding on a fundamental, quarks-and-protons level like the GPL and copyright?
- caseydurfee 14y ago
  Indeed, how do you say "cruise control for cool" in Latin?

caseydurfee 14y ago

Original version of the license: "Lamson is licensed BSD or GPLv3, whichever you want. This basically means you shitheads who like using software without giving credit can go on being leeches on the world and tell everyone that you're fucking brilliant and invented all the gear running your shitty little company when really you just borrowed shit from real creators like me." New version of the license: "Neither the name of Zed A. Shaw may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission." We could very well call this whole incident "Learn You Have Borderline Personality Disorder The Hard Way, By Being Laughed Out Of Court." BSD, meet BPD.

medecau 14y ago

Change the license to officially BSD. https://github.com/medecau/lamson/commit/e78520b857384462b9eecdedfc0f8c2e57cdd00a https://github.com/medecau/lamson/commit/e78520b857384462b9e... This is the last change before the introduction of the new clauses.