Open Source License But Maintain Prominent Attribution

Question

I'd like to release a program under an open source minimal restriction license but there are 2.73 bajillion options (give or take an order of magnitude).

Basically our only requirements are:

• Don't hold our company liable for end user use or 3rd party modifications
• Keep our company's logo and contribution attribution / website in the about / credits dialog

The goal is to allow our user-base to use and customize but deter competitors from redistributing it as their own original work by making them keep our logo if they want to copy.

Reason I say logo and/or reference in the help->about is that no one cares about licenses or readme files to look for attribution; they care if the app meets their needs.

Answer 1

The BSD license(s) and the MIT X11 license are some of the simplest and most permissive Open Source / Free Software licenses. With the exception of the original (and officially obsolete) 4-clause BSD license, they are also GPL-compatible (if that is something you care about).

Both the MIT X11 license and the 3-clause BSD licenses require attribution. The BSD licenses list attribution for source distribution and binary distribution separately (the latter explicitly prescribing that the attribution must be in the documentation and/or other materials included with the distribution, which arguably includes packaging etc.), the MIT X11 license simply says to include both the copyright notice and the license in "all copies or substantial portions of the Software" without explicitly prescribing how.

Neither of the licenses explicitly mention anything about an "About → Credits" dialog, which is not terribly surprising, considering that one was written before graphical user interfaces even existed (in the Unix world) and the other was written for one of the first ever graphical user interfaces. However, AFAIK, the MIT X11 license itself is not copyrighted, so you might be able to create a derived version which does what you want.

However, providing attribution in such a dialog is pretty much the standard way for GUI applications to abide by the terms of the MIT X11 and BSD licenses, even though it is not actually prescribed by the license.

Answer 2

Almost all open source licenses have a warranty disclaimer.

The attribution here is a problem, and - despite you say you want this - I'm not sure you would actually want this. Why not?

It creates a legal hazard. Your company logo and name is a trademark. When someone adapts the work, they and they must retain the logo and company name, they open themselves up for trademark infringement suits. They may not pass themselves off as you, yet you want to enforce this possible confusion. That's not a good idea.

You probably want to prevent that a very bad product is distributed with your name on it. This is part of the reason trademark law exists. If nothing is stopping them from making a really bad derivative work, and you force them to put your name on it, that's probably not a situation you want to find yourself in.

The GPL suite of licenses does include the following phrasing:

An interactive user interface displays “Appropriate Legal Notices” to the extent that it includes a convenient and prominently visible feature that (1) displays an appropriate copyright notice, and (2) tells the user that there is no warranty for the work (except to the extent that warranties are provided), that licensees may convey the work under this License, and how to view a copy of this License. If the interface presents a list of user commands or options, such as a menu, a prominent item in the list meets this criterion.

and in 7.b of the GPLv3 allows

Requiring preservation of specified reasonable legal notices or author attributions in that material or in the Appropriate Legal Notices displayed by works containing it;

So this allows you to require attribution to be maintained (along with off course the new copyright holder) in some prominently visible place.

Such provisions exists for all of the GPL suite, GPL, LGPL, AGPL, versions 2 and 3.

Answer 3

IANAL, but the first is accomplished by ensuring there is a statement that keeps your company not liable for anything regarding the released software and that's it. You claim you're not even liable for the software you release in the first place. (you know, bugs happen, are you gonna pay for those? NO) This then applies to successive modifications by third parties, too.

e.g. GPL has this:

15. Disclaimer of Warranty.

THERE IS NO WARRANTY FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES PROVIDE THE PROGRAM “AS IS” WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR OR CORRECTION.

The company logo and stuff should be guaranteed by Perl's style "Artistic License" their boilerplate contains a liability waiver, too. (like pretty much every software license or EULA everywhere, but those made for aerospatial and militar applications)