Open Source License Question

[Donnal Walter]

Michael Sparks wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Oct 2004, Robert Kern wrote:
> 
>>Donnal Walter wrote:
>>
>>>Thanks for this reference and the one to Creative Commons. Is there a
>>>good mailing list or on-line forum appropriate for discussing
>>>licensing issues?
> 
> ...
> 
>>http://www.opensource.org/licenses/#email
>>
>>I do recommend reading some of the archives first. Some of your
>>questions have been tread over many times on that list.
> 
> Reading Lawrence Rosen's book on open source licensing is highly
> recommended as well for people interested in this sort of thing. It's
> oddly readable for a law (IPR law at that) book.

Ok, I browsed most of the opensource.org mailing list for the past six 
months, and while enlightening, it didn't answer my specific questions 
(and I have not asked them there, as most questions there are about 
specific licenses). Rosen's book is not available to me at the moment, 
but I have been reading St. Laurent's book, which has been helpful. 
Nevertheless, may I pose the following scenario here?

Given:
1. PA, the "primary author" in this scenario.

2. FW, a "framework" authored by PA for developing small custom 
applications in Python, especially by non-programmers who are 
professionals in another field.

3. OApps, a suite of "original applications" written by PA using FW.

4. CApps, "contributed apps" to be written by other professionals in the 
field using FW.

5. BigApp, an integrated version of OApps/CApps into a single "big 
application" managed by PA using FW.

Now, PA wishes to make FW, CApps, and BigApp available as free software 
such that:
     a. pros in the field will be encouraged to use OApps and BigApp
     b. pros will be encouraged to help improve OApps and BigApp
     c. pros will be encouraged to contribute CApps to Bigapp
     d. other programmers will be encouraged to help improve FW.

PA would like derivatives of OApps and BigApp to remain free (seeing no 
reason why they should ever be proprietary), and is therefore leaning 
toward copyleft (CL) licensing for these.

For similar reasons, PA wants to *encourage* CApps to be released under 
CL or CL-compatible license so that they can be included in BigApp.

PA sees little advantage in allowing derivatives of FW to be proprietary 
(and therefore is leaning toward CL for this, too). However, see next 
paragraph.

PA does not currently plan on combining FW with other software, but is 
aware of:
     a. another framework (FW2) that is non-copyleft (NCL), and
     b. another framework (FW3) that is CL,
with which FW might be merged one way or another in the distant future.

Here are my questions.

1. Is there a compelling reason for PA *not* to use a CL license (say 
Gnu GPL) for OApps and BigApp? These are "end-user" applications, not 
system components.

2. Am I right in thinking that the license for FW will have little or no 
legal bearing on the licenses contributors choose for CApps?

3. Am I right in thinking that a CL license for BigApp would encourage
(but not require?) using CL for CApps (if they want them included)?

4. Will either a CL or NCL license for FW affect the likelihood of 
receiving improvements from programmers outside the field of interest?

5. If PA chooses a CL license for FW, can it later be changed to NCL in 
order to be combined with FW2?

6. If PA choses a NCL license for FW, can it later be changed to CL in 
order to be combined with FW3?

Thanks,
Donnal Walter
Arkansas Children's Hospital