Editing Licenses

==About Licensing policy==

The licensing policy for executables must be thought out to get registered in [[Sourceforge]]. There is a proposed [[Consumerium Software License]], which is basically the Apache 1.1 license with "apache" changed to "consumerium".

* Research and development is under [[GFDL]] - some sections, e.g. [[glossary]] may have to be [[GFDL Invariant Section]]s to avoid tampering and sabotage by those who want to create a counter-Consumerium to hide truth about products.

* License for the actual [[Server]] and [[Client]] software isn't decided yet but it'll probably be something on the order of [[Consumerium Software License]] to stop installation of [[bad copy problem|unconformant software '''pretending to be genuine''']] [[Consumerium]] software. This is very important, because:
:#The [[Retail]]ers will totally freak out if there is even an minor possibility that the [[Price]] information can leak outside the physical shop.  So the clients can't be under [[GPL]].
:#The [[Consumerium Software License]] also protects the [[consumer]]s, because the [[retailer]]s can't modify the servers to track the consumers more then they have allowed in their preferences.

* [[XML]] [[DTD]]s are under [[GPL]] (more licensing schemes, such as [[LGPL]], are considered)

* Further on, the XSL-stylesheets that provide data-interchangeabililty between ConsuML and popular e-commerce grammars such as [[ebXML]] should be released under [[GPL]] and [[LGPL]], so that no-one has to rewrite them to connect these different systems together 
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* [[Sourceforge]] allows the possibility to submit your own "open source compliant" license, so if we take the Apache license, replace "Apache Software Foundation" with whatever Consumerium-entity we can come up with that holds the copyright. Unfortunatelly I still haven't gotten around to registering an association so it's a bit of a problem. Having our own license cover both [[XML]] and [[executables]] would help so that we don't have to have two (or more) separate projects, which would be a hassle. The R&D material is under [[GFDL]] so we still would able to have that positive association with all things GNU. And about the [[content]] licenses: I've been thinking that it would be quite practical to [[GFDL]] everything where it's reasonable. Having a single [[Consumerium Software License]] would give us the control we need over the development process and the fact that all our brainwork is [[GFDL]]'d would inhibit people from declaring that we are "control freaks", since they are free to fork away. And the license could be expalained to people by showing them the diff with the Apache license.

* Actual content of the system (if it gets built someday) will be using whatever license the information producer wishes though there will be guidelines on where [[Open content]] and where [[Proprietary]] licenses are preferred.  Ideally the license could be [[factionally defined]], so that all [[Greens]] or [[Pinks]] or [[Reds]] could for instance agree on how data sharing in their faction works.  This would be most efficient, especially if existing institutions like poltical parties and NGOs agreed to cooperate in factions matching their own politics and assumptions.  They could have their own definitions of [[contested terms]] that would be allowed for in the software, so that as little political assumption as possible was built in to it (a good reason to leave [[contested terms]] open in the design phase and not to rely on any one definition, e.g. of "[[done]]").

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===External links:===
* [http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html Gnu.org's list of Free Software Licenses]