User:Laforge49

I realized today that Open Source Software (OSS) needs a creative commons license to counter a common perversion.

First, there are a number of licenses which, in various forms, simply give away the work. A common one is LGPL, which is the one I've been using. [[1]]

Then there is LGPL, which says that the work can be used for free so long as the composite work is also LGPL. This is called the left-handed virus and precludes the development of proprietary work for monetary gain.

But there is what I consider to be a major perversion here, with many companies offering a dual license. One license is LGPL and allows you to use the work in non-proprietary software. The other license is a proprietary one, which you pay for and which allows you to use the work in your own proprietary software. There is a lot of fabulous software released with this kind of dual license.

I consider this kind of dual licensing a perversion because it prevents other companies from building on your work and offering the same kind of dual license unless a royalty payment of some kind is made. And the royalty payment will set the minimum of what you can charge for your work. Work which builds on several other works with this kind of licensing must charge an unreasonably high price with the bulk of the payment going to other companies.

I realized today that we need a new kind of license which falls between LGPL and GPL but without the anti-commercial bias of the free software foundation. [[2]]

This new license would

• Allow free use of a work in another work so long as that other work uses the same license.
• Like GPL, mandate that the source code of a work under this license be open as a form of left-handed copyright.
• And allow for the creation of proprietary work.

There are some obvious problems with this idea. For it to work, you need a participatory community. A Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) perhaps?