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Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2013 15:52:20 +0000 (UTC)
From: "Lawrence Rosen (JIRA)" <jira@apache.org>
To: legal-discuss@apache.org
Message-ID: <JIRA.12533496.1322768871947.99211.1370965940285@arcas>
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Subject: [jira] [Commented] (LEGAL-114) License Header - Short Form?
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    [ https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL-114?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=13680451#comment-13680451 ] 

Lawrence Rosen commented on LEGAL-114:
--------------------------------------

Dennis Hamilton wrote:
1. I don't think the ASF wants to ever sue anyone for copyright infringement, let alone collect statutory damages.
2. I think the ASF wants to be able to defend against claims that any of its releases are infringing works.

I agree. The copyright notice doesn't help Apache much because we *don't* want to sue but only to protect ourselves against suit. But it protects our contributors who *may* want to sue and collect statutory damages for copyright infringement of *their* works and who may not get them because *we* didn't put on our collective work copyright notice and *we* removed their original notice.


It tells you just enough to refer to 17 USC 401 et seq., and presumably to the records of the Library of Congress, to understand your rights and responsibilities. It is like a warning sign on the freeway. Like a notice of patent or a trademark should send you to the public records if you are concerned.

By the way, since this is off-list, there is a whole other aspect of this problem that you yourself introduce. I'm afraid to broach it now, but there are LOTS of good reasons -- including ones relating to public policy -- why ASF should also *register* its collective work copyrights at the Library of Congress and not just put on a copyright notice. That would require us, however, to identify contributors to our collective works and set up an automatic mechanism to fill out copyright registrations forms, and I'm not confident that our records are accurate enough for that. Reputable publishers do this all the time, but I gather we're not a reputable publisher yet.

/Larry


-----Original Message-----
From: Dennis E. Hamilton (JIRA) [mailto:jira@apache.org] 
Sent: Monday, June 10, 2013 9:51 PM
To: lrosen@rosenlaw.com
Subject: [jira] [Commented] (LEGAL-114) License Header - Short Form?


    [ https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL-114?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=13680205#comment-13680205 ] 

Dennis E. Hamilton commented on LEGAL-114:
------------------------------------------

Oh my.

I'm sorry that Larry feels insulted.  

Not that long ago, some pointed out to me that when you want legal advice, it is important to tell the attorney what it is you want to accomplish.  

 1. I don't think the ASF wants to ever sue anyone for copyright infringement, let alone collect statutory damages.

 2. I think the ASF wants to be able to defend against claims that any of its releases are infringing works.

Then there's how the ASF navigates those two tensions in its conduct under a public-interest charter.  In particular, how can it encourage folks to be aware that the works are licensed and how can recipients of the works assure themselves that they are satisfying the conditions of those licenses.  (The Category A-B-X business falls into this bucket, of course, along with NOTICE files and other materials.)

 ----
Personal observations: 

When I see a Copyright yyyy by So-and-So and its contributors/licensors that does not tell me much.  Does that mean there's a joint Copyright?  Certainly not.  "Licensors" have me wonder how to parse that.  Contributors I can understand because it is used in other terms and conditions and descriptions of how Apache projects work.

If I see a license statement that says the work is licensed in a particular manner, and I have access to that license, that is pretty much all that I need.  I have to assume that whoever placed that license there had the right to do so and it is an honest, factual statement.  But that's what it comes down to anyhow.  It's certainly all that I have to comply with.

One miniscule nit.  It amuses me that the iCLA that I entered into does not say anything about an Apache License, ALv2 or any other kind.  It does make a transitive grant of a license directly to the ASF and also directly to any recipient of a contribution of mine that survives in a release by the ASF.  As a practical matter, I don't expect anyone to reverse-analyze an Apache release to determine what part remains of a contribution of mine that they are then free to use under my generous grant, one that doesn't compel anything about ALv2.  So the ALv2 is it and I assume that, as contributors and committers, we're all satisfied with that.

Basically, I think reminding us that we're forgoing an opportunity that there is no desire to exercise is not such a concern in light of the other considerations at play here.


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> License Header - Short Form?
> ----------------------------
>
>                 Key: LEGAL-114
>                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL-114
>             Project: Legal Discuss
>          Issue Type: Question
>            Reporter: Roger Meier
>
> Hi all
> Today the license headers within files does need ~ 15 lines within a file.
> This needs lot of space at the top of a file, probably too much if you have a small README file. 
> e.g. http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/thrift/trunk/tutorial/README?view=markup
> Is it possible to use a smaller header reflecting the license terms within a source or README file?
> Can we use something like that one or a shorter one?
> {noformat}
> /*
>  * Copyright (c) The Apache Software Foundation
>  * Licensed to the ASF under one or more contributor license agreements
>  * (see NOTICE file distributed with this work). ASF licenses this file to you
>  * under the following license http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
>  * Software distributed is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES
>  * OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
>  */
> {noformat}
> Should we mention also the License identifier (Apache-2.0) used within spdx standard?
> see http://spdx.org/licenses/
> Thanks,
> Roger

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