Understanding licenses, bit by bit
An idea that is suggested every now and then is to look at software licensing and give it a kind of “Creative Commons” feel; that is, present the terms of the license in a pleasant and orderly way by means of icons. Now, we’ve already come to the realization that calling something “Creative Commons licensed” is vague to the point of being useless (just “some rights reserved“). Calling something “Free Software” is also vague, but there is a rock-solid guarantee at the bottom: the term guarantees you, the recipient of the software, at least the Four Freedoms. Any Open Source software you receive usually means at least the Four Freedoms as well. So you need to say which CC, which Free Software license, which Open Source license.
CC has six licenses; they are split neatly and orthogonally along the commercial / non-commercial and yes / share-alike / no axes.
The thing is, CC is a much simpler system because it applies to work where there are no patent concerns, where embedded systems don’t have a place, where share-alike has a simpler meaning. I have trouble bringing this same simplicity to software licensing, but I thought I would give it a try.
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