Questions about copyleft-next

Tue Jul 1 16:44:31 UTC 2025

On Tue, Jul 1, 2025 at 12:23 PM secureblueadmin
<secureblueadmin at proton.me> wrote:
>
> I have a slightly tangential question along the lines of
>
> > “I won't engage in proprietary relicensing” and really mean it.
>
> Is the intent of the current section 6 to preclude issues such as the addition of a CLA? https://isitreallyfoss.com/concerns/copyleft-cla/

That's this section:

"If You Distribute a work to Me specifically for inclusion in or
modification of a Covered Work (a "Patch"), and no explicit licensing
terms apply to the Patch, You license the Patch under this License, to
the extent of Your copyright in the Patch. This condition does not
negate the other conditions of this License, if applicable to the Patch."

This does not preclude the addition of a CLA, but I suppose (aside:
it's weird to discuss something you know you wrote but don't remember
:) it provides some support for the view that a CLA is not needed.
This is clearly modeled on Apache License 2.0 section 5.

> Also, is there a plan to include an "affero clause" (network distribution) in this license? or in a different license? If so, how could this be done while still preserving the outward compatibility with (non-affero) GPL?

Excellent question. copyleft-next 0.3.1 does not (as far as I can tell
:) have an "Affero clause". However, the latest "draft" version of
copyleft-next, i.e.
https://git.copyleft.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/src/commit/5fdb9dca6bd9c7ab204976e46ce4663b8d4482c7/Drafts/copyleft-next
does have one, which the original licensor can opt out of:

https://git.copyleft.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/src/commit/5fdb9dca6bd9c7ab204976e46ce4663b8d4482c7/Drafts/copyleft-next#L90-L98
(which uses these definitions:
https://git.copyleft.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/src/commit/5fdb9dca6bd9c7ab204976e46ce4663b8d4482c7/Drafts/copyleft-next#L226-L237
)

It does not conflict with what you call the outward compatibility of
GPL, because of this (counterpart in the latest "draft" to what I
called the GPL escape hatch in copyleft-next 0.3.1):
https://git.copyleft.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/src/commit/5fdb9dca6bd9c7ab204976e46ce4663b8d4482c7/Drafts/copyleft-next#L72-L80

As another aside, this structure of having "Releases" and "Drafts" was
probably a bad idea.

I won't speak for bkuhn (a well known enthusiast of the Affero GPL
both in theory and practice) but I think as a minimum feature
copyleft-next should have an "Affero clause" of some sort. That was
not an assumption I would have made in at least the earlier earlier
history of copyleft-next, obviously.

Richard

> On Monday, June 30th, 2025 at 11:18 PM, Bradley M. Kuhn <bkuhn at ebb.org> wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > > On Mon, Jun 30, 2025 at 6:18 PM secureblueadmin asked about:
> >
> > > > [this] is an interesting way of preventing (A)GPL/commercial dual
> > > > licensing:
> > > > 7. Nullification of Copyleft/Proprietary Dual Licensing
> > > >
> > > > If I offer to license, for a fee, a Covered Work under terms other
> > > > than a license that is OSI-Approved or FSF-Free as of the release
> > > > date of this License or a numbered version of copyleft-next released
> > > > by the Copyleft-Next Project, then the license I grant You under
> > > > section 1 is no longer subject to the conditions in sections 3
> > > > through 5.
> >
> >
> > Richard Fontana replied:
> >
> > > In copyleft-next 0.3.1 the proprietary relicensing poison pill (isn't that
> > > what we sometimes used to call it?)
> >
> >
> > Shortly after you (Richard) invented §7, I dubbed it the “copyleft equality
> > clause”: https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2020/jan/06/copyleft-equality/
> >
> > I remember because it marked the third time in my career [0] my only
> > contribution to something important was naming it. Now that I'm active in
> > copyleft-next again, though, I hope to actually contribute more than names
> > for things again. 😆
> >
> > I really dislike the term “poison pill” not only for its violence but also
> > because it's typically a tactic used by contracting parties who don't trust
> > each other. IMO, the copyleft equality clause is a way that a licensor can
> > state “I won't engage in proprietary relicensing” and really mean it. It
> > builds trust while poison pills typically erode trust.
> >
> > secureblueadmin asked:
> >
> > > > However, this license also says:
> > > > If the Derived Work includes material licensed under the GPL, You may
> > > > instead license the Derived Work under the GPL.
> > > >
> > > > As far as I can tell, it would seem that if there's some code under
> > > > copyleft-next that you want to include in your GPL/commercial dual
> > > > licensed software, you can just create a Derived work that combines
> > > > `copyleft-next` code with `GPL` code, and then use that derived work (now
> > > > under the GPL) in your GPL/commercial dual licensed software. Is this not
> > > > a loophole?
> >
> >
> > secureblueadmin noted:
> >
> > > > Anyhow, thanks for taking the time to read this and bear with my lack of
> > > > legal knowledge :)
> >
> >
> > Richard replied:
> >
> > > No need to apologize for what you say is a lack of legal knowledge. I would
> > > think your question would be equally likely to be raised by a lawyer.
> >
> >
> > I agree. IANAL either but I've been involved in copyleft policy for 30
> > years, and I still had to stare at the copyleft-next text and your question
> > for about 7 minutes to make sure I definitely agreed with Denver's and
> > Richard's analysis.
> >
> > I think I do, for a third, slightly different reason: the copyleft equality
> > clause actually removes the §§3-5 requirements for everyone in the world all
> > at once and its binding once the Covered Work is distributed just once.
> >
> > Remember the entity seeking to proprietary relicense has to have exclusive
> > rights to the code anyway, so they could always license the Covered Work a
> > new way (including under GPLv2, if they wanted) and didn't need copyleft-next
> > §3 to do it anyway. Heck, §7 even lets them do it, too, without §§3-5.
> >
> > The big flaw still remaining in the equality clause is that it may not fully
> > prevent entities in cahoots doing something nasty.
> >
> > Meanwhile, on my “list” of conversations to reopen is a complete overhaul of
> > the approach in §3¶2 anyway. But more on that much later; not first thing on
> > my list.
> >
> > -- bkuhn
> >
> > [0] I named the Classpath and the Replicant projects but have contributed
> > virtually nothing else to them other than the names and moral support to
> > the developers.
> _______________________________________________
> next mailing list
> next at lists.copyleft.org
> https://lists.copyleft.org/mailman/listinfo/next