The Open Ownership Software Licence
Draft 0.2. A plain-English summary. The full text is what counts.
What you may do
Almost everything open source lets you do:
- Run the software, for any purpose.
- Study all of its source. There's no hidden part.
- Change it, and share your changes.
- Fork it and take it in your own direction.
The one condition
Each person who uses the software:
- is a member of a member organisation registered with the licensor — any one, anywhere, their choice;
- completes a short annual declaration (about five minutes, mostly pre-filled); and
- pays the membership fee, or declares hardship.
That's the whole of it. If no member organisation is reasonably available to you, you decide that yourself, and the condition doesn't apply.
Hardship
If you can't afford the fee, say so in your declaration. Nobody approves it, nobody investigates it, and nobody can refuse it. You're a full member with a full vote. Your name is never published.
Trying it first
Use it freely for three months before the condition applies, with everything switched on. Starting the trial over and over to avoid membership is a breach.
Share alike, with the public
If you change the software or build on it — including types, components, functions and templates — and you use what you built, you publish it under this licence for everyone, not just for the people you gave it to. There's no open core and no "we only run it on our server" exception. The data in your fields stays private.
Where the licensor runs a public registry for types, components and functions, you publish there.
Only what can actually be done
Every obligation only applies while there's a working way to meet it. No member organisations? No fee and no membership. No registry? Nothing to publish to. If someone builds them again, the obligations come back. If the licensor itself is wound up, the conditions end for good and the software becomes permissive.
Leave the reminder in
The software may remind you about membership. The reminder never blocks you, and nothing in the licence asks for keys, activation or tracking. But removing the reminder from the code is a breach.
Running it for other people
- Non-commercial operators show a small badge on their site saying it's run by members of a co-operative.
- Commercial operators can buy a commercial licence instead, which removes the badge and the share-alike requirement. It costs much more than membership on purpose, and costs more again if you stop your own users becoming members.
The price
There's one membership fee, the same everywhere. The licensor records it; the members set it, by a line in their annual declaration. Member organisations can't change it.
If you get it wrong
You report yourself, like a tax return. If something's wrong, you get time to put it right. Suspending your licence is a last resort.
Things you should know
- It isn't open source. It's source available. It isn't OSI-approved and isn't trying to be.
- Shells don't help. Structuring through companies to avoid the condition is looked through to the real party behind it. A person's own hardship declaration is never questioned.
- No warranty. As with open source, the software comes as it is.
- It's a draft. No lawyer has reviewed it. Don't rely on it yet.