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The experts' legal guide on free software
Feb. 14, 2008

On Valentine's Day, the SFLC (Software Freedom Law Center) published a legal guide, "A Legal Issues Primer for Open Source and Free Software Projects," for open-source developers and organizers.

The Legal Issues Primer 1.5 covers four main areas. The first looks at copyright questions and how the most important open-source licenses handle copyright. Next, the authors take on what issues to consider in deciding how to legally organize an open-source developers group.

Moving on, the Primer then delves into the complicated do's and don't of American patent law and how it's currently applied to software. Rather than try to examine the whole complicated set of issues, the document focuses in "on defensive measures that developers can take if they have been threatened by a patent holder with allegations of patent infringement."

Finally, the Primer's authors, which includes some of the best known names in open-source intellectual property law such as Bradley M. Kuhn, Eben Moglen, and Daniel B. Ravicher, examine U.S. trademark law. This section contains several practical examples of how to use trademarks effectively.

"By publishing this guide, we hope to share our knowledge, just as free software developers do when they share their creations with the world," said James Vasile, an SFLC Counsel, in a statement. "I take great pride in this work put together by my colleagues, and I expect that it will be especially useful to developers of free software."

I would go further. I think any open-source developer or open-source group administrator must read this paper. It's no replacement for a lawyer in the event that someone does get into legal hot water. But it does an admirable job of spelling out in simple-to-understand English what's what in fundamental open-source legal issues.

The Legal Issues Primer for Open Source and Free Software Projects is available in HTML, PDF and Postscript versions.

It's copyright statement declares that it is copyrighted by the SFLC but that, "Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire document is permitted in any medium; however, this notice must be preserved on all copies."


Steven J. Vaughan Nichols



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