Licenses in a nutshell, please

Community Forums/General Help/Licenses in a nutshell, please

Tricky(Posted 2011) [#1]
I've recently started on a big project. It's not yet certain how it will be released, if that would be shareware form or open-source form. That will really depend on the opinion of the other people involved.

When it comes to open-source I know that there are several ways to license the stuff under. GPL is of course the most known one, but I wonder if that's the best one. When I look the licenses up I always get a full out-written version of the licenses. Well, I have to be honest here, it's not that I am too dumb to understand, I just have a low tolerance for a lot of information especially in written form.


Perhaps I can describe best in a few do and don't's I wish to see in the license if the project would become open-source.

The project's engine is written in BlitzMax, much of the game is however done in lua scripting. All lua scripts, pictures, sounds, music and so on are in a big file that I'd rather not see modified, but the game allows patching on a way that is pretty similar to the patching system DOOM, HERETIC and HEXEN use, and that system has been specifically intended to make all kinds of modifications people would like to see. Of course, if people come up with good modifications in the patch files, they may be made "official" and thus be put in the giant file.
And yeah, if people seem able to even create a complete new game with this engine just by creating a new big file, I would only encourage it.

When it comes to engine modifications, I'm not sure how much modifications to expect as only members of the Blitz community will be able to compile those (and compiling requires a minor modification to the MaxLua module), but anyway the same kind of story will apply. Of course the patching as described above won't work here, but modifying for own use is fine, but when it comes to distribution I do like to have a view on it.

It's not said this policy will last forever, but at least in the first setup of the release. More freedom can be granted if the game has been released longer. It may even be that I let loose on that from the start.

Most important of all is that nobody can (at least license-wise) "steal" the credit from me and any other boy or girl who ever gets him/herself involved into a project of mine.

More games of mine may be released this way (I even got a few finished projects that I'm considering to release in the open-source). As I said, I have a low tolerance for lots of information, so if you can put some licenses that are commonly used for open-source in a nutshell I would certainly be grateful.

Last edited 2011


xlsior(Posted 2011) [#2]
Commonly used licenses:

GPL, BSD, MIT, Apache, Creative Commons

More info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPL_license
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_license
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_commons

BSD and MIT are the most permissive -- they generally want the license info to be included, but it's OK to incorporate a program licenced as such into a closed-source commercial program.

Creative Commons is a collection of six different license, with different rights and restrictions. See the wikipedia link for more info.

GPL is difference in that it only allows the program/code to be included into other GPL licenced products, which would require the user to open source his/her program as well, and release the full source. Because of this GPL is sometimes considered 'viral'.

The real question here: Are you looking for "free as in free of charge" or "free as in freedom"?


Tricky(Posted 2011) [#3]
Well, that's what I wonder myself what is best.

Of course free of charge is the basic idea and I'm looking how much more freedom I can give. Of course, I don't want people to use the program itself as a source for commercial products, but for example, a game I'm considering to release in open-source is BallPlay Genius, a puzzle game with level-editor. If you want to create your own levels in my game, I won't stop you if you want to release them in an other license than the game itself (in other words, the levels you create are copyrighted by you and not me, only the game is, does GPL allow that?)


The freedom comes most of all in modifications to the project itself. Ah, I have to admit I am a control freak and I have a little trouble giving the control out of hand, but in the same time I realize that by allowing people to modify things the product should become better than I can make it on my own. Maybe I may need to release the idea of being in control of all modifications that come from that. Should a program or game become popular (ya never know) things may become too much for me to handle.

So the deal is most of all that the program itself is free and remains that way either in original or modified form. If the program is suitable to make things in it (like the levels for my puzzle game) then those things are copyrighted by the ones who make that. And most of all, I often use third-party stuff from people who make it freely available for such purposes, that stuff of course, remains copyrighted by their respective creators and of course their respective licenses.

Last edited 2011


Htbaa(Posted 2011) [#4]
Creative Commons is really only aimed at content, not software. They even advise against using it to license software.

Also, note that no matter how you license your software, you hold the copyright. So if you release your engine under GPL that would force others to release their games build with it to be released under GPL as well, at least when they intend to release it to the public. You however, as the copyright holder (or author of) don't have to do this. Due mind though that if you use a 3rd party library that is licensed under GPL your software should be GPL licensed as well thus forcing you to release your source code when you decide to release it to the public.

I'm not sure, but I believe you're allowed to sell GPL licensed software without distributing the source beforehand. However, when someone buys your software you have to give them the source code (it's GPL licensed remember). Which in turn gives the buyer full right over the source code within GPL's license.

Unfortunately, to be really sure you should consult a lawyer specialized in software licenses :-).


Tricky(Posted 2011) [#5]
I see... I just released a project with Creative Commons, but that's not really a big issue as it was not one of the projects I've put most importance in.

Better luck next time I guess...

What would basically help me most is just a page containing a simple "Do's" and "Don'ts" per license type. I mean, I tried to read the GPL license, but since it's written in "official" vocabulary I can hardly understand anything of it. As a matter of fact the Creative Commons was the only license type I could find with understandable language. I did find a list of all sorts of licenses on the GNU website, but the problem is that the site hardly provides any info that's usable for me aside from linking into the (hard to read) licenses themselves.

Consulting a lawyer seems also to me as the best of ideas, but the problem is, a lawyer consult costs more than I can afford :(


Htbaa(Posted 2011) [#6]
You can always relicense :-)

I like those simplified webpages Creative Commons has made available. Reading all those open source licenses is very confusing. Wikipedia doesn't make it much clearer either. Maybe there are Simplified English versions of the biggest licenses on Wikipedia?