SSPL vs AGPL / Free Software / OSD / DFSG on what must be included

Posted Sep 8, 2025 10:00 UTC (Mon) by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
In reply to: SSPL vs AGPL / Free Software / OSD / DFSG on what must be included by immibis
Parent article: Rug pulls, forks, and open-source feudalism

> > The license must not place restrictions on other software that is distributed along with the licensed software. For example, the license must not insist that all other programs distributed on the same medium must be open source software."

> That - linking without linking - is exactly what the SSPL is meant to prevent.

Which means that the SSPL is not a *COPYRIGHT* licence. The GPLv2 set out to be a *copyright* licence, which meant that it did not talk about anything other than copying, distribution and *LINKING*, because copyright only extends as far as derivation. And derivation is a legal concept, not anything the FSF/GPL have jurisdiction over.

The GPL v3 (and other licences) added patent law into the mix, which I personally think was a mistake.

The SSPL is now trying to add other stuff - over which it has absolutely no legal jurisdiction - into the mix. This effectively results in a licence where compliance is impossible, because it is demanding actions over which it has no lawful authority, and which (as other people have pointed out) are quite likely to be illegal.

Cheers,
Wol

SSPL vs AGPL / Free Software / OSD / DFSG on what must be included

Posted Sep 10, 2025 10:30 UTC (Wed) by arsen (subscriber, #161285) [Link] (1 responses)

> The GPL v3 (and other licences) added patent law into the mix, which I personally think was a mistake.

Why? The goal is to undermine all sorts of restrictions that are placed by the owning class on users. Patents are, in this regard, no different to copyright.

SSPL vs AGPL / Free Software / OSD / DFSG on what must be included

Posted Sep 10, 2025 14:39 UTC (Wed) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

Then have a separate patent licence.

I agree with you that the "owning classes" as you call them are covetous and rent-seeking, but I think mixing copyright and patents is a stupid thing to do.

They're also fundamentally different in that program copyrights (outside of the US) have *always* been treated as a "written work", and it makes sense that way. They are, basically, a mathematical treatise. And written works are not patentable. Nor are mathematical proofs. And programs are also just a (not necessarily correct :-) mathematical proof. So software patents are completely different in that they are figments of miserly lawyers' imagination, not something that actually exists.

So my patent licence would simply be "By distributing this work you accept that it is not patentable material, and you therefore agree not to sue anyone using it for breach of patent. This does not bind your defence in any way shape or form if you are sued on patent grounds for using this work". But that would be *separate* from the copyright licence.

Just as trademark law is a completely separate, third branch of IP, and the GPL explicitly says nothing about it other than explicitly saying you are allowed to exercise it over GPL'd works (and you should be - trying to ban it would be a very stupid thing to do...)

Cheers,
Wol