MaNGOS License

[wolverine]

I think that I might be on to something. I should be able to post a EULA that references GPL V3 as well as the points that were discussed here:

Now another way to limit liability is to update the GPL to state something like it's not allowed to run a this software for Commercial, or with any Monetary Gain without express Written Consent of the MaNGOS Foundation. Remember that the License you Grant for the use of the Source and all Compiled versions is controlled by you the MaNGOS Foundation and there's no and, if's or buts about it. If you word it correctly it stands in all Countries, Principalities and such covered the world over under the Digital Millennium Act. Also if there's a breach in it your Safe due to the fact that you Documented it but the Offending Parties can be held Liable even by you which also covers the recent BS with the Repo's.

Thanks for the ideas, DaemonCantor. Perhaps we can get this issue licked so that Activision will be compelled to leave us out of any issues they may have with other people and their "public" servers.

I just realized how to make it legally impossible for people to use our software to generate an income for themselves.

[wolverine]

I'm also thinking of a way to write in a "self defense" mechanism for the project so that if we catch someone doing what we are trying to prevent, we can realiate.

Please note the word "can". That does not bind us to any obligation to turn people in. It just means that we are capable of retaliation for the abuse of our creations.

Lemme know what you think so far and as I am able to produce the pieces of the puzzle and fit them together.

[antz]

As for a self defense system.... due to the nature of the way git tracks changes, unless we hid it really really well, those that wanted to run the server could just revert the commits for that function and our work would be not nothing.

Sounding good, but I have a question..... Can you 'upgrade' a license. Mangos is currently released under gpl v2, legally can that be changed to gpl v3 ?

[wolverine]

As far as a I know, it can be done. I've done once before on an old project of mine and no one ever said anything.

I believe that it would be similar to a company like Microsoft suddenly saying that Microsoft Word version 2003 and older were suddenly under the Abandonware license. Not that they really would, but still, as an example.

Or if Apple suddenly wanted to opensource all of their operating system code from version 9 backwards.

It does happen. Sometimes it happens naturally and sometimes it happens intentionally. The only way that I could think of to safeguard it might be to "re-release" it under version 3. Kinda like a grand re-opening or a store or putting a store under new management.

[wolverine]

GOT IT!

How do I upgrade from (L)GPLv2 to (L)GPLv3? (#v3HowToUpgrade) First, include the new version of the license in your package. If you're using LGPLv3 in your project, be sure to include copies of both GPLv3 and LGPLv3, since LGPLv3 is now written as a set of additional permissions on top of GPLv3.

Second, replace all your existing v2 license notices (usually at the top of each file) with the new recommended text available on the GNU licenses howto. It's more future-proof because it no longer includes the FSF's postal mailing address.

Of course, any descriptive text (such as in a README) which talks about the package's license should also be updated appropriately.

Straight from the horse's mouth.

If we want to see this in action, I could always work on upgrading the license for M2...

[antz]

Excellent, unless anyone has any serious objections I think that is a go to GPLv3

- nice work guys