
Is license-free a good idea? - weinzierl
The liblfds project [1] (disussed in [2]) has the following license:<p><pre><code>    license

    There is no license. You are free to use this library
    in any way. Go forth and create wealth!

    If however for legal reasons a licence is required, the 
    license of your choice will be granted, and license is 
    hereby granted up front for a range of popular licenses:
    the MIT license, the BSD license, the Apache license, 
    the GPL and LPGL (all versions thereof) and the Creative 
    Commons licenses (all of them). Additionally, everything 
    is also placed in the public domain.
</code></pre>
Not to pollute the other discussion I decided to ask the question here:<p>Is this a good idea?<p>Food for thought:<p>* Some of these licenses are not compatible. Probably no problem because only one license applies at a time?<p>* As far as I can tell all mentioned licenses (even CC0) have a disclaimer. Does the disclaimer apply? Does the public domain part leave me in danger of a lawsuit in a jurisdiction where the disclaimer is necessary?<p>* Public domain doesn&#x27;t exist everywhere (though this is controversial [3]). This no problem if you place your work int the public domain and offer other licenses in places where no public domain exists, like SQLite does. But what if you offer free choice?<p>[1] http:&#x2F;&#x2F;liblfds.org&#x2F;<p>[2] https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11805728<p>[3] http:&#x2F;&#x2F;cr.yp.to&#x2F;publicdomain.html
======
hp
This "license-free" text is a lot of needless confusion that will only serve
to complicate anyone's life who needs to show this to a lawyer.

The project could avoid the term "license free" and follow the guidelines for
applying CC0 here for example:
[https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/CC0_FAQ#How_do_I_apply...](https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/CC0_FAQ#How_do_I_apply_CC0_to_my_work.3F)

The CC0 dedication itself is available in summary form
[https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
and full legal form
[https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/legalcode)

CC0's full legal form includes a "fallback license" in jurisdictions where
public domain isn't permitted.

A piece of software can be public domain (which does mean you don't need a
license to use/modify/redistribute it), or it can have a permissive license,
or a choice of multiple licenses.

If "license free" means public domain, use the proper term, and use the
suggested text from CC0 (written with a lawyer's help).

If "license free" means there's a choice of licenses, then offer a choice of
licenses.

If something is not public domain, then "there is no license" normally means
the default license, which is "all rights reserved" \- everything is
prohibited. For that reason, the term "license free" kind of implies the
opposite of what this project intends.

Don't reinvent the legal wheel... especially when the CC0 dedication is
already the exact thing you want to say.

------
dozzie
For any practical purpose, it's not "license free", it's your choice from the
six licenses mentioned. BSD or MIT alone (or Apache? I don't remember the
contents) would be plenty enough here.

