On Aug 19, 2011, at 9:14 PM, Vitaliy wrote:

> Say you wanted to publish schematics & gerbers, and did not want to =20
> restrict
> their use in any form. Which license would you choose? GPL doesn't =20
> fit the
> bill because it forces whoever uses the files, to publish derivative =20
> works.

Least restrictive is to release them to the public domain.

GPL and related are primarily software licenses, ill suited to =20
hardware (or even to deeply embedded software.)  Check out the =20
creative commons licenses ( http://creativecommons.org/ ), and see =20
what the Open Source Hardware folks are doing and saying ( http://freedomde=
fined.org/OSHW=20
   http://www.openhardwaresummit.org/ )

Arduino has been using the CC "Attribution Share-Alike" license, which =20
is somewhat like Gnu licenses in that derivative works are supposed to =20
be published as well.  It seems to have been working OK.  Not everyone =20
has published their derivative works (which is a pretty tough thing to =20
define, since Arduino is a pretty trivial design, but some things are =20
clearly derivative.)  OTOH there are some pretty significant =20
derivative works that HAVE followed in the philosophical footsteps =20
even for significantly changed designs.  I don't think there have been =20
any legal test cases associated with it yet.

"Publish" in the open source hardware world is also somewhat subject =20
to interpretation.  A printed schematic may meet the legal definition, =20
but not the spirit people had in mind.

BillW

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