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49 lines
2.7 KiB
49 lines
2.7 KiB
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# Licenses
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I agree with free-culture licenses; I am a hippie at heart.
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I license all the content on my site under the [CC-BY-SA](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).
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## Other Licenses
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### GPL
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The GPL is the only license which guarantees code openness.
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It allows people to redistribute and modify your code with no restrictions except that they must also share all changes back to the original author.
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### MIT/BSD/Apache/Mozilla/etc.
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The MIT and BSD licenses are more considered more "permissive" in that they allow closed source derivatives of the code to exist.
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Part of me wants to like this more: more freedom right?
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Sure, I suppose, but not freedom for users: the vast majority of the time this is freedom only for corporations.
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I'm sure this occasionally helps a small business, but I see the MIT and BSD licenses as mostly a way to get big corporations free software that they can then sell for a profit.
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To be clear, a corporation is allowed to sell GPL software; however, as a GPL-licensed work, the corporation must share the code with the original developer of the program and anyone who purchases the software from the company.
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### CC-based licenses
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Creative Commons (CC) based licenses are more for artistic works (like blog articles and music) and apply very rarely to programs.
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CC licenses may have a combination of a few different restrictions, or no restrictions (also known as the CC0 or Public Domain license).
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The restrictions are as follows:
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* BY--the original author must be credited.
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* SA (Share-alike)--all derivative works must share the same license.
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* NC (Non-commercial)--the material may not be used for profit.
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* ND (No derivatives)--the material may only be used as is; you may not edit the materials and redistribute them.
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I decided to license my site as CC-BY-SA.
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This means that as long as I am attributed and the source material is licensed the same as my own site, then redistribution and alteration of the material is permitted.
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### Copyright
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Full copyright means no derivatives or redistributions may be made in any way, shape or form.
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This is an outdated model, I think anyway.
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The truth is: free-culture licenses are necessary in a world full of death plus 70 years (or similar) copyright terms.
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But I want freedom to be perpetuated, not stolen for corporate greed, hence the GPL above the BSD/MIT and CC-SA above CC.
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I have never considered licensing with NC (non-commercial) for one reason: I run a small business;
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I know what it's like to have all sorts of licensing restrictions stopping you from making a few bucks.
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I license my site content under CC-BY-SA as an act of good faith, with the hope that there is something better than the copyright regeime we are currently under.
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