I will get more info here soon, but to keep it quick and simple for now,
here goes:

I plan to do a little research, then start a sourceforge project for my
Virtual World project.

I intend to use the BSD license, at least for parts of it. The reasons
for using this license, much like the reasons for using any FOSS license,
are mostly philisophical.

Anyone is free to discuss on the talk page, just click the Discussion link above.
Anyone making changes to this page directly will have to register first.
:-)


Many people will ask right away, why use the BSD License. Why not use the GPL or just go proprietary.

I know that at the moment, the GNU GPL license has a lot of popularity, but I do not feel it is what is best for this project.

First on my list of reasons, is the matter of freedom. I want the code that I contribute to a project to be completely free. While many GNU advocates would argue that this is the purpose of the GPL, I would have to say that I do not completely agree with their version of freedom. It says that you are free to use this code as you wish, as long as you are willing to give up most of the rights normally associated with ownership of code. This is not to say that the original author gives up anything. After all, the copyright owner is still free to do as he wishes with his code, and it was his choice to choose a specific license. However, by choosing the GPL, he forfeits many of those rights for others that might wish to use that code.

The terms of the GPL make it very hard to use the licensed code in any large scale proprietary project. The reason for this is simple, it is not permitted to close or conceal any part of a project containing even a few lines of GPL code. There are of course exceptions. Code released under the LGPL may be dynamically linked to a project without effecting its licensing. For this reason, I prefer the LGPL over the GPL.

Under the terms of the BSD license, the only requirement to use the code is to include a copyright notice, and disclaimer. Where the copyright notice must be included depends on how the project is distributed. If it is distributed as source code, then the copyright notice should be included in a comment block in the files that are affected. This means that if the file is made up of, or includes, code that was released under the BSD license, then it should include the notice. If the project is released in a binary only form, then the copyright notice must be found in the documentation.

Beyond that requirement, the contributor is free to choose whether or not he wishes to make the code available or not.

This last part is where things derail in a major way when it comes to dealings with the GNU community. In order to release GPL'ed code, no matter how much you have changed it or added to it, you MUST make the source code available. While this is a noble thought, there are many cases where the organization that you are dealing with will not want this. I am also of the opinion that this should be an option, not a requirement.

If you produce a block of code, and release it under the BSD license, then the code that you release is free. It will stay free and available under that license as long as you choose to allow it to be free. If another person decides to make changes to that code for his own purposes, then chooses not to release the modified code, then his version of the code may not be free, but yours still is. What you contributed is still there and available to the world to use. Nothing is lost. Ideally, whenever possible, authors and contributors should choose to allow their own code to remain free as well, as we all gain from this. However, saying that they MUST make that decision is not freedom. Under the GPL, the contributor is not free to make these choices. Under the BSD license he is.

As my brother put it, paraphrased for politeness, "But doesn't that mean someone can just jack your stuff." My response was, "Yeah, I know that, but that is kind of what I want."

In the world of MMORPG's and other networking projects, there is an understanding of the value of open standards, and open software. There is also however a strong degree of competition, and a desire for secrecy. While the GPL encourages the sharing of knowledge, it does not encourage any form of secrecy. While I myself am comfortable with total openness at most levels, I understand that in order to seriously compete, there will come a time where privacy may be needed in some aspects of the project. That needs to be an option. I may be wrong, but if I am, then at the very least this license will not cause any harm. :-)


ensed code in any large scale proprietary project. The reason for this is simple, it is not permitted to close or conciel any part of a project containing even a few lines of GPL code. There are of course exceptions. Code released under the LGPL may be dynamically linked to a project without effecting it's licensing. For this reason, I prefer the LGPL over the GPL.

1. The New BSD License
2. The GNU Foundation (Free Software Foundation)