[olug] Political statements and other oddities in software licenses

[Sam Tetherow]

I don't really think it is a good way to push your agenda for most 
cases.  In this specific case I could understand the military 
restriction if the author is a pacifist as I could see there being a 
chance that the military would use a joystick driver.

The other two I'd see as 'crusader' type clauses.

I remember seeing several licensing restrictions against the military as 
well as a couple that excluded the NSA/FBI/CIA.  Most of those were from 
the mid to late 90s and usually stemmed from the controversy over the 
RSA patent.

I've always held the position that if you wrote the code you ought to be 
able to attach whatever license you want to it.  If you want to restrict 
it such that noone named Bob can use your code I guess that is your right. 

Using weird licensing will most likely result in either, responsible 
people not using your code because they don't want to worry about 
license restrictions, or people disregarding you license altogether.  
Either case is generally not what you probably intended when you 
licensed the code.


	Sam Tetherow
	Sandhills Wireless



Adam Haeder wrote:
> GlovePIE is an application specifically designed to emulate Joystick and 
> Keyboard input from a variety of devices. It's primary purpose is to allow 
> for the use of a Wiimote on a PC.
>
> Take a look at this software license: 
> http://www.wiili.org/index.php/GlovePIE#Copyright_Notice
>
> For those that don't want to follow the link, here are some highlights:
> - You may not use this software directly or indirectly for any military purpose.
> - You may not export this software to Israel, or use it in Israel
> - Missionaries may not use this software
>
> What do you all think of pushing your political (or whatever else) agenda 
> in your software licenses? Is this the right thing to do? Is this an 
> effective way to raise awareness about the issues you care about the most?
>
> I can think of a one other example along these lines: the check in the nmap configure script that would prevent it from 
> compiling on SCO, in response to their legal wrangling.
>
> What do you think?
>
> --
> Adam Haeder
> Vice President of Information Technology
> AIM Institute
> adamh at aiminstitute.org
> (402) 345-5025 x115
> PGP Public key: http://careerlink.com/adamhaederpgp.html
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