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diff --git a/www/license.html b/www/license.html index 5fcb94f4..15104ed6 100755 --- a/www/license.html +++ b/www/license.html @@ -1,7 +1,7 @@ <html><head><title>Toybox License</title> <!--#include file="header.html" --> -<h2>Toybox is released under the following "zero clause" BSD license:</h2>, +<h2>Toybox is released under the following "zero clause" BSD license:</h2> <blockquote> <p>Copyright (C) 2006 by Rob Landley <rob@landley.net> @@ -18,7 +18,33 @@ ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.</p> </blockquote> -<p>You can treat it as a license if you like, but this variant is functionally -equivalent to placing the code in the public domain.</p> +<p>The text of the above license is included in the file LICENSE in the source.</p> +<h2>Why 0BSD?</h2> + +<p>As with <a href=https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/>CC0</a>, +<a href=http://unlicense.org>unlicense</a>, and <a href=http://wtfpl.net/>wtfpl</a>, +the intent is to place the licensed material into the public domain, +which after decades of FUD (such as the time OSI's ex-lawyer compared +<a href=http://www.cod5.org/archive/>placing code into the public domain</a> to +<a href=http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6225>abandoning trash by the +side of a highway</a>) is considered somehow unsafe. But if some random third +party +<a href=https://github.com/mkj/dropbear/blob/master/libtomcrypt/LICENSE>takes +public domain code</a> and slaps <a href=http://www.opensource.apple.com/source/gnuzip/gnuzip-25/gzip/gzip.c>some other license on it</a>, then it's fine.</p> + +<p>To work around this perception, the above license is a standard 2-clause BSD +license <a href=https://github.com/landley/toybox/commit/ee86b1d8e25cb0ca9d418b33eb0dc5e7716ddc1e>minus the half sentence</a> +requiring text copied verbatim into derived works. If 2BSD is +ok, the 0BSD should be ok, despite being equivalent to placing code in the +public domain.</p> + +<p>Modifying the license in this way avoids the hole android toolbox fell into where +<a href=https://github.com/android/platform_system_core/blob/fd4c6b0a3a25921a9fe24691a695d715aecb6afe/toolbox/NOTICE>33 copies of BSD license text</a> +were concatenated together when copyright dates changed, or the strange +solution the busybox developers used to resolve tension between GPLv2's "no +additional restrictions" and BSD's "you must include this large hunk of text" +by sticking the two licenses at +<a href=http://git.busybox.net/busybox/tree/networking/ping.c?id=887a1ad57fe978cd320be358effbe66df8a068bf>opposite ends of the file</a> and hoping nobody +noticed.</a> <!--#include file="footer.html" --> |