It's under the "I don't give a shit as long as some dude in china doesn't slap another name on it and sell it licence". I am not sure what the official name for that is tho :-)
This is a good intention, but unfortunately the way copyright law works, having the license be ill-defined means that nobody can really use it and be assured that they're above-board, particularly in something like an Apache or GNU open source project, or in a company environment.
Unfortunately, there's not really a good, widely used license that does what you want, mostly because you run into problems pretty quickly based on derivative works with what you want. Let's say somebody merges your email client with a browser - can they call that by a different name? Can they sell that?
Anyhow, I'd suggest looking at looking at the Apache or BSD licenses (if you want the broadest use) or the GPL (if you want to ensure that modifications to the code must be distributed with any binaries made from the code). Licenses are a bit of a pain, but you can just pick one of the common ones and it'll really help adoption.
* Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
Ok I think I read you, but lets say his new commercial product was proprietary; the product costs $100. If the license for his original Inbox2 product was GPL, he would be required to distribute the source code on his new product right? So my point is, if its a BSD license he can integrate that code into the $100 product and not have to share the source code. I'm no software license expert so if I'm mistaken please correct me here.
IANAL either, but I still think he'd be free to use his original code in a commercial product. By releasing under GPL, you give others a limited license to redistribute and modify the software subject to some conditions, but you keep all your rights, and you are free to distribute proprietary versions of the code.
I think MIT and BSD licenses fall into that category in that the copyright must be left unaltered. But that still won't stop someone from doing what you say ;)
When you write code, you automatically have copyright on it (in most countries). Failing to include a copyright notice or including a license text does not make your work fall into the public domain.
As far as I can tell this code is not currently open source. The only permissions given are:
"now fork it, fix it and send pull requests". Which omits some important permissions, without which this cannot be called open source.
The author publicly announced it was open source via HN.
"Open-source software is software whose source code is published and made available to the public, enabling anyone to copy, modify and redistribute the source code without paying royalties or fees.[19]"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source
"Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired,[1] if the intellectual property rights are forfeited,[2] or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_domain
He put it on GitHub, and he announced it was Open Source on HN.
"There's no license in this case and you cannot claim any intellectual property of the code. It would be the same if you uploaded the content on your own site without providing any license. According to the terms:
We claim no intellectual property rights over the material you provide to the Service. Your profile and materials uploaded remain yours. However, by setting your pages to be viewed publicly, you agree to allow others to view your Content. By setting your repositories to be viewed publicly, you agree to allow others to view and fork your repositories."
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4007674/whats-the-default...
No, that's not how it works. At least in the US, an author has an implicit copyright over his or her work even if he or she does not post a copyright notice. The author would have to explicitly forfeit his or her rights to the work in order for it to be in the public domain.
This was actually the case in most of the world when the USA was still using a register. It's relatively recently that the USA has signed up to what the rest of the world has been doing for a while ... just for a change.
Of course there are some places that haven't signed the Berne Convention and don't have a copyright treaty through TRIPS or something similar.
Also not a lawyer, but pretty sure that no license is the same as "All rights reserved" (meaning, the most restrictive possible). Claiming "All rights reserved" doesn't give you more rights, but does establish that you communicated it and that anyone violating it had a better chance of knowing that.
(I think -- not a lawyer)
His statement to fork, fix, and ask for pulls perhaps gives some rights, but not usage or deployment ones.
In other word, if the author intends something else, they should say so.
EDIT: just noticed ThirdParty folder -- that changes the default to whatever is compatible with the licenses asserted in these libraries. I didn't check them.
Hmm- I think that is a grey area. Note what is said here about default license/rights on GitHub as of 10-7-2011:
"Copyright and Content Ownership
We claim no intellectual property rights over the material you provide to the Service. Your profile and materials uploaded remain yours. However, by setting your pages to be viewed publicly, you agree to allow others to view your Content. By setting your repositories to be viewed publicly, you agree to allow others to view and fork your repositories.
GitHub does not pre-screen Content, but GitHub and its designee have the right (but not the obligation) in their sole discretion to refuse or remove any Content that is available via the Service.
You shall defend GitHub against any claim, demand, suit or proceeding made or brought against GitHub by a third party alleging that Your Content, or Your use of the Service in violation of this Agreement, infringes or misappropriates the intellectual property rights of a third party or violates applicable law, and shall indemnify GitHub for any damages finally awarded against, and for reasonable attorney’s fees incurred by, GitHub in connection with any such claim, demand, suit or proceeding; provided, that GitHub (a) promptly gives You written notice of the claim, demand, suit or proceeding; (b) gives You sole control of the defense and settlement of the claim, demand, suit or proceeding (provided that You may not settle any claim, demand, suit or proceeding unless the settlement unconditionally releases GitHub of all liability); and (c) provides to You all reasonable assistance, at Your expense.
No license/no copyright declaration means no rights in all countries that have signed the Berne Convention (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berne_convention). This includes the USA since 1989.
"Copyright under the Berne Convention must be automatic" and "Under the Convention, copyrights for creative works are automatically in force upon their creation without being asserted or declared."
I'm pretty sure the grandparent meant "no copyright notice = no rights granted" rather than "no notice = no rights reserved". Maybe I'm just reading it too charitably.
Yes I did. My reply was to someone who assumed "no license" would grant him "all rights" (public domain) when in fact it does not give him any rights. For the copyright owner, the reverse is obviously true.
You and the other downv^Wredditors read it without considering the context.
