1. Spdx-Legal
  2. Topics

[spdx] - Do we need a SPDX-License-Identifier for full copyright?

J Lovejoy
 

Hi Roland,

I’m forwarding this to the SPDX-legal mailing list as that is the best place for this question. You also need to join that to post.  I don’t have the link to that handy but if you go to the SPDX website and the “participate” page, you will find it. 

Thanks,
Jilayne 
SPDX-legal co-lead

Sent from my phone, please excuse brevity and typographical errors. 

On Apr 5, 2022, at 9:57 AM, spdx@... Notification <noreply@...> wrote:



A message was sent to the group https://lists.spdx.org/g/spdx from stamp@... that needs to be approved because the user is new member moderated.

View this message online

Subject: Do we need a SPDX-License-Identifier for full copyright?

Dear SPDX community,

this is Roland at fairkom, where we host RegisteredCommons.org, a
service established in 2006 and which we intend to relaunch this year.

Registered Commons gives creators and software developers a tool to time
stamp their work together with a chosen license and download a
certificate. Whilst we promote CC and other open source licenses in the
license chooser, several users opt for "full copyright". In the metadata
set we would like to include an SPDX field, however we don't know yet
what users could fill in if they choose not to share their work (yet). 
We have not seen such an identifier on
https://spdx.github.io/spdx-spec/SPDX-license-list/ .

Or is an empty SPDX-License-Identifier always saying that no license has
been chosen and full copyright applies? We think an empty identifier is
ambiguous and also could mean that no license decision has been made yet
or the license is not listed with SPDX. Or should we discuss to
introduce an "SPDX-License-Identfier: Full Copyright" - whatever this
means at the creator's jurisdiction.


We welcome any proposals here on this list or at our licensing issue
https://git.fairkom.net/hosting/faircommons/-/issues/8

Best, Roland

A complete copy of this message has been attached for your convenience.

To approve this using email, reply to this message. You do not need to attach the original message, just reply and send.

Reject this message and notify the sender.

Delete this message and do not notify the sender.

NOTE: The pending message will expire after 14 days. If you do not take action within that time, the pending message will be automatically rejected.

Change your notification settings

mime-attachment

mime-attachment

Matija Šuklje
 

Die 6. 04. 22 et hora 01:07 J Lovejoy scripsit:
Or is an empty SPDX-License-Identifier always saying that no license has
been chosen and full copyright applies? We think an empty identifier is
ambiguous and also could mean that no license decision has been made yet
or the license is not listed with SPDX. Or should we discuss to
introduce an "SPDX-License-Identfier: Full Copyright" - whatever this
means at the creator's jurisdiction.
To my understanding of the spec the following should indicate full copyright:

`SPDX-License-Identfier: NONE`

<https://spdx.github.io/spdx-spec/file-information/#85-concluded-license-field>

… but I can agree in practice some ambiguity can creep in, esp. when some
people scan and audit (I’m guilty of this sometimes as well) they might not
bother to apply the license ID to all files that the license applies to, but
failed to mention the license in the file itself.


cheers,
Matija
--
gsm: tel:+386.41.849.552
www: https://matija.suklje.name
xmpp: matija.suklje@...
matrix: @silverhook:matrix.org
Till Jaeger
 

Am 06.04.22 um 10:02 schrieb Matija Šuklje:
Die 6. 04. 22 et hora 01:07 J Lovejoy scripsit:
Or is an empty SPDX-License-Identifier always saying that no license has
been chosen and full copyright applies? We think an empty identifier is
ambiguous and also could mean that no license decision has been made yet
or the license is not listed with SPDX. Or should we discuss to
introduce an "SPDX-License-Identfier: Full Copyright" - whatever this
means at the creator's jurisdiction.
To my understanding of the spec the following should indicate full copyright:

`SPDX-License-Identfier: NONE`

<https://spdx.github.io/spdx-spec/file-information/#85-concluded-license-field>

… but I can agree in practice some ambiguity can creep in, esp. when some
people scan and audit (I’m guilty of this sometimes as well) they might not
bother to apply the license ID to all files that the license applies to, but
failed to mention the license in the file itself.
What about "LicenseRef"?
https://spdx.dev/spdx-specification-21-web-version/#h.1v1yuxt
https://reuse.software/faq/#custom-license

Accordingly, this would be:

# SPDX-License-Identifier: LicenseRef-NoLicense

Could someone clarify what to use?

Best,
Till

1 - 3 of 3