[oslc] License grant option in addition to covenant

[Scott Bosworth]

Just prompting for any final feedback by Friday of this week. So far (and
not surprisingly) it's been pretty quiet. I have received some off-line
feedback that the license grant option seems like a good add. Olivier also
suggested a "layman's faq to the OSLC legal terms" which I've added to my
to-do list.

Thanks and happy new year...Scott


bosworth at us.ibm.com wrote on 12/09/2010 12:42:41 PM:

> From: Scott Bosworth/Raleigh/IBM at IBMUS
> To: community at open-services.net
> Date: 12/09/2010 12:43 PM
> Subject: [oslc] License grant option in addition to covenant
> Sent by: community-bounces at open-services.net
>
> When it comes to IP matters, OSLC workgroup participants (typically
> their employers) agree to two things today:
>
> (1) that contributions to the community are made under a Creative
> Commons copyright license, and
> (2) to make an IP Covenant (a promise) not to file patent claims
> against implementations of an OSLC specification
>
> These things in combination allow for a free flowing specification
> authoring process and a tangible form of encouragement of OSLC spec
> implementations.
>
> One of our community members shared with me that his company is not
> accustomed to the IP Covenant legal approach and prefer instead to
> make a specific license grant to implementers of OSLC
> specifications. To address the concern, I worked with folks from
> that company and with my IBM colleague and IP attorney Dan
> McLoughlin to draft language that would allow workgroup participants
> to either (a) make the IP Covenant as has been our standard practice
> to date, or (b) provide a no-charge, royalty-free license grant
> covering any IP necessary to implement an OSLC specification. Dan's
> proposed license grant language is linked to below [1]. You'll note
> that the language and substance are largely the same as that of the
Covenant.
>
> Now that we have a draft, I'd like to open it up to the community
> for comment. I'll take any feedback on the license grant language
> between now and the end of the year. Feel free to send me that
> feedback directly via e-mail. Barring any major issues, I'm
> proposing to summarize the feedback and add the final language as an
> option, alongside the Covenant, to the OSLC terms of use in the
> first week of January. The new option won't come into play for any
> current specs/covenant documents, however workgroup participants who
> are involved in future specs can decide to continue to make use of
> the IP Covenant or instead make use of the License Grant.
>
> One last thought - I'm not sure that either option is "better" or
> "preferred" -- that's really up to individual workgroup participants
> to decide in consultation with their legal experts and in context of
> their organization's practices. That said, both of these legal
> approaches/tools offer the kind of assurances intended to encourage
> OSLC spec implementations. I'm happy that we can introduce this
> option. Thanks...Scott
>
> [1] http://open-services.net/bin/view/Main/OslcLicenseGrantDRAFT
>


Scott Bosworth | IBM Rational CTO Team | bosworth at us.ibm.com | 919.486.2197
(w) | 919.244.3387(m) | 919.254.5271(f)
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