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The MIT License, Line by Line

writing.kemitchell.com

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Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#61

Post by IshKebab »

torstenvl wrote: post #44
thed wrote: post #42

This article touches a point I have been wondering about regarding the Notice condition: "But web developers, as a whole, haven’t got the memo.". The JavaScript and npm ecosystem are extremely dependency-heavy. Even if you only take a few yourself, the number of sub-dependencies of even a simple application are often in the hundreds. Why does "everyone" ignore the attribution of their dependencies and sub-dependencie…

I'm not following your train of thought here really. Are you saying that people are stripping out the notice from the source code as a matter of course and then redistributing it?

He's saying that if you depend on A and A depends on B and they're both MIT licensed then technically you should include the licenses for A and B on your site, but most people only include A.

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#62

Post by alkonaut »

CameronNemo wrote: post #43
alkonaut wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this “inclusion” typically done for a project that is deployed in compiled format and contains hundreds of libraries with dozens of different licenses? It must be especially difficult on devices where it’s difficult to accept user input or display licenses. In commercial desktop software I have shipped, it has been a section in help>about with a long list of third party libs each showing a text document.

I downloaded trivy (a go CLI tool) recently and they have some tooling to pack up dependency licenses and include them in the release tarball. It is possible and quite easy, if you plan ahead. Notably, Debian binary packages include extensive copyright information.

But are licenses only included in e.g a zip with binaries but not available from “within” the software counting as included/available?

For anything distributed as source it’s easy enough.

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#63

Post by davidcuddeback »

pmoriarty wrote: post #37
systemvoltage wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. I was wondering which license actually satisfies "Don't care" philosophy and gets me out of any legal responsibility/liability.

There's also this: DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE Version 2, December 2004 Copyright (C) 2004 Your Name Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim or modified copies of this license document, and changing it is allowed as long as the name is changed. DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION 0. You just DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT…

That license doesn't seem to satisfy the parent's requirements:

> gets me out of any legal responsibility/liability

The license you posted doesn't disclaim any warranties or liabilities. I suggest reading what TFA's "Warranty Disclaimer" section says about UCC defaults. The way I read it (IANAL), you would have more liability with the license you posted than you would under the MIT license.

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#64

Post by davidcuddeback »

torstenvl wrote: post #29
systemvoltage wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. I was wondering which license actually satisfies "Don't care" philosophy and gets me out of any legal responsibility/liability.

Just commit the work to the public domain then.

Wouldn't you still need language to disclaim warranties and liabilities?

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#65

Post by [deleted] »

tacitusarc wrote: post #51
betenoire wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> at least one has to be below (average) this is the pedantic part. Normal usage of average means "pretty much what I expected", which is what they are trying to convey, imo.

I think normally usage, that is non mathematical usage, doesn't mean what I expected, it means the middle of available options, or perhaps the most common option. When applied to quality one would expect that means there is low quality, average quality, and high quality. So I seriously don't know what this means in a legal context.

[deleted]

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#66

Post by njharman »

CameronNemo wrote: post #46
torstenvl wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In general it means "this applies to derivative works." At best, it might provide an argument that APIs aren't covered (now that that's a thing). But copyright law doesn't really recognize "substantial portion" as a term of art (though it's arguably related to one of the prongs of a Fair Use inquiry). IANYL but my personal practice is and would be to ignore the word "substantial."

So if I copy a 3 line example off stackoverflow I may need to add a license disclaimer... Wow.

Read the SO TOS. Probably can't legally include that unless SO gives you license.

Thanks to the 197? Law that provided automatic copyright the instant anyone says or does anything copyrightable.

I'm sure SO TOS states by using this site you assign or grant copyrights to SO. Same as HN and any site otherwise they'd be liable for reproducing what I wrote in this comment which in USA is automatically copyrighted to me the moment I hit "reply".

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#67

Post by kemitchell »

thed wrote: post #42

This article touches a point I have been wondering about regarding the Notice condition: "But web developers, as a whole, haven’t got the memo.". The JavaScript and npm ecosystem are extremely dependency-heavy. Even if you only take a few yourself, the number of sub-dependencies of even a simple application are often in the hundreds. Why does "everyone" ignore the attribution of their dependencies and sub-dependencie…

I doubt there's any single answer that isn't tautological. In other kinds of development, like embedded programming, notice files are a part of the cycle. Web developers simply haven't developed the habit.

Which is a real head scratcher, because as a rule, JavaScript developers use JavaScript package managers, and JavaScript package managers, especially npm, provide good license metadata and auditability. You can have an automated tool, usually a plugin for your front-end bundler, compile a pretty good notice file for you, no many how many direct and transitive dependencies you have.

I think there's also a chicken-and-egg problem, in that it's not exactly clear how to make the notices file for front-end code available. Link from website footer? At the top of the client bundle? Comment at the top of the client bundle, with a URL for the notices files?

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#68

Post by kemitchell »

throwaway8581 wrote: post #60
tacitusarc wrote: post #14

> The implied warranty of “merchantability” under UCC section 2-314 is a promise that “the goods”—the Software—are of at least average quality, properly packaged and labeled, and fit for the ordinary purposes they are intended to serve. So, all goods have an implied warranty requiring they must be of at least average quality? How does that work? Does average have a different meeting in a legal context?

The article doesn't really get it right. This is what the UCC actually says: (2) Goods to be merchantable must be at least such as: (a) Pass without objection in the trade under the contract description; and (b) In the case of fungible goods, are of fair average quality within the description; and (c) Are fit for the ordinary purposes for which such goods are used; and (d) Run, within the variations permitted by the…

I paraphrased, because I don't think the nuances matter that much in context. The subject is a broad disclaimer of implied warranties, after all. Quoting the UCC and commentaries would only distract the reader and make the post longer.

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#69

Post by kemitchell »

systemvoltage wrote: post #7

> The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. What’s the reasoning behind asking users to carry around a notice? Why not just let users go without it? Is it for legal reasons or for crediting the authors? I’ve released MIT licensed software before and frankly when someone is using my code, I really don’t care about credit or leaving be…

https://writing.kemitchell.com/2020/12/27/War-on-License-Not...

Re: The MIT License, Line by Line

#70

Post by paxys »

> 171 words every programmer should understand

Except there really isn't any agreement on some of the finer details of the license, no matter how much you want to study and understand it. Does the license text have to be included in only the source code or the compiled software? What if the source code of the derived software isn't made public? What is "substantial portions" of the software? Can a MIT project be relicensed? What is the point of any of these clauses then?

While it is a great license, I wish something closer to just public domain would have become the OSS default, since that is what 99% of developers want anyways.

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