[Discuss] licensing with some exclusivity in hardware

[Javier Serrano]

Hi Wouter!

On 06/29/2016 01:07 PM, Wouter Tebbens wrote:

> 1) How effective is the Creative Commons "NC" clause in designs on the
> restriction of commercial activity with the hardware build with those
> designs? Take the case of the Ultimaker 3D printer: they claim to be
> "open source", [1], but their designs are under the CC BY-NC-SA license,
> [2]. Now I'm not bringing this up for discussing whether using the "open
> source" term is appropriate, but to check whether the Non-Commercial
> clause over the design has any relevant effect on commercial activity
> over machines built based on that design.

As has been said already, I think NC is ineffective at what it usually
tries to do. I also agree something with NC attached to it cannot be
called "open source", at least if we are going to go with the official
definition.

> 2) Every now and then I have discussions with designers, inventors and
> other makers about their willingness to share their documentation under
> a free license, but they are afraid of big corporations profiting from
> their work. Indeed that is what Google and Facebook do with the
> GNU/Linux operating system on their server park. It happens everywhere
> and maybe some of us worry about it, while others don't care: this is
> part of the freedoms, that we don't distinguish about the *purpose of
> use*. If we do go this way, things get non-free and complicated.

And a trademark would not have solved the problem for the cases you
describe. It does solve other problems though, so I still think
trademarks and certification are good tools to use where they can be useful.

Since an EC project was what triggered this thread, I think working on
procurement policies with big public actors such as the EU could be a
great boost for OSHW. As usual, this has already been proven to work
reasonably well with software. Another good target would be the
conditions attached to big research and innovation programs like Horizon
2020. A single decision in Brussels can bring more money and activity
into OSHW than the combined efforts of many small actors for many years.

Cheers,

Javier