FOSS: Keeping it Legal

by Mike Gunderloy - Mar. 27, 2008Comments (2)

 There are two streams of creativity that come together to create a free or open-source software application. The first, and most obvious to the majority of developers, is the set of bits that make up the source code for the application. But equally important to the political aspirations behind open source is the second stream: the legal craft that goes into making up the license for the software. If, like most developers, you're a bit shaky on this second part, help is as close as the publications of the Software Freedom Law Center.

If the legal issues behind open source are a big muddle to you, then you're not quite prepared to lead an open source project. An excellent way to avoid the most common pitfalls is to read the SFLC's A Legal Issues Primer for Open Source and Free Software Projects, recently revised to version 1.5.1. This booklet covers four main areas:

  1. Copyrights and Licensing
  2. Organizational Structure
  3. Patents
  4. Trademarks

Copyrights, of course, are fundamental to FOSS: they are the basis for every license from the GPL to BSD and everything in between. The first section explains how you get a copyright on your code, and then reviews some of the major licenses (notably GPL and BSD) that let you share your rights with others. It also covers the thorny area of copyright unification, and what to do when you suspect someone is violating your license.

Next up is organizational structure. This section is an introduction to running a larger project that needs some more formal structure than "one guy in a garage." The authors review corporate forms, how to incorporate, and what you need to do to stay legal after you incorporate. There's also a section on getting (and maintaining) non-profit status.

Patents are a mysterious threat to many developers; the third section works to demystify this area. The SFLC folks explain how to read a patent as well as how to defend yourself against possible infringement claims. This hasn't been a huge area of concern for most projects, but with continued threats from proprietary software vendors - and increasing success of FOSS vendors - it could become one.

Finally, there's a quick review of Trademark law, including how to protect your marks and what to do with them when a project forks.

All in all, this document should be required reading for anyone who wants to get a serious open source project underway. If all you do is cut and paste a license from some other project, you're doing yourself the same disservice as you would be by cutting and pasting code you don't understand. In either case, you run the risk of using something that's not quite right for you, and paying the consequences later.


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2 Comments
 

As a small software organization that is doing consulting work, figuring out the ins and outs of the legal issues is as difficult as it is important.


Thanks for this article and the series of articles on this topic.


Keep up the good work.


0 Votes

Reuven's and Mike's great posts on licenses are also very relevant here:


http://ostatic.com/158397-blog/first-know-thy-licenses


http://ostatic.com/158639-blog/choosing-the-perfect-license


0 Votes
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