 Unlicense logo | |
| Author | Arto Bendiken |
|---|---|
| Published | 2010 |
| SPDX identifier | Unlicense |
| FSFapproved | Yes[1] |
| OSIapproved | Yes[2] |
| GPL compatible | Yes[1] |
| Copyleft | No[1] |
| Linking from code with a different license | Yes |
| Website | unlicense |
TheUnlicense is apublic domain equivalent license for software which provides apublic domainwaiver with a fall-back public-domain-like license, similar to theCC Zero for cultural works.[3] It includes language used in earlier software projects and has a focus on ananti-copyright message.[4][5]
The text of the Unlicense is as follows:[5]
This is free and unencumbered software released into the public domain.Anyone is free to copy, modify, publish, use, compile, sell, ordistribute this software, either in source code form or as a compiledbinary, for any purpose, commercial or non-commercial, and by anymeans.In jurisdictions that recognize copyright laws, the author or authorsof this software dedicate any and all copyright interest in thesoftware to the public domain. We make this dedication for the benefitof the public at large and to the detriment of our heirs andsuccessors. We intend this dedication to be an overt act ofrelinquishment in perpetuity of all present and future rights to thissoftware under copyright law.THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OFMERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OROTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE,ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OROTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.For more information, please refer to <https://unlicense.org>
TheFree Software Foundation states that "Both public domain works and the lax license provided by the Unlicense are compatible with the GNU GPL."[1]
Google does not allow its employees to contribute to projects under public domain equivalent licenses like the Unlicense (and CC0), while allowing contributions to0BSD licensed andUS government PD projects.[6]
Notable projects that use the Unlicense includeyoutube-dl,[7]Second Reality,[8] and thesource code of the 1995 video gameGloom.[9]
In a post published on January 1 (Public Domain Day), 2010, Arto Bendiken, the author of the Unlicense, outlined his reasons for preferring public domain software, namely: the nuisance of dealing with licensing terms (for instancelicense incompatibility), thethreat inherent in copyright law, and theimpracticability ofcopyright law.[10]
On January 23, 2010, Bendiken followed-up on his initial post. In this post, he explained that the Unlicense is based on the copyrightwaiver ofSQLite with the no-warranty statement from theMIT License. He then walked through the license, commenting on each part.[11]
In a post published in December 2010, Bendiken further clarified what it means to "license" and "unlicense" software.[12]
In December 2010,Mike Linksvayer, the vice president ofCreative Commons at the time, wrote in anidenti.ca conversation "I like the movement" in speaking of the Unlicense effort, considering it compatible with the goals of theCC Zero (CC0) license, released in 2009.[13][14]On January 1, 2011, Bendiken reviewed the progress and adoption of the Unlicense, saying it was "difficult to give estimates of current Unlicense adoption" but there were "many hundreds of projects using the Unlicense".[15]
In January 2012, when discussed onOSI's license-review mailing list, the Unlicense was brushed off as acrayon license. In particular, it was criticized for being possibly inconsistent and non-standard, and for making it difficult for some projects to accept Unlicensed code as third-party contributions; leaving too much room for interpretation; and possibly being incoherent in some legal systems.[16][17][18] A request for legacy approval was filed in March 2020,[19] which led to a formal approval in June 2020, with an acknowledgement of a "general agreement that the document is poorly drafted".[2]
In 2015,GitHub reported that approximately 102,000 of their 5.1 million licensed projects (2% of licensed projects on GitHub.com) used the Unlicense.[20]
Until 2022, theFedora Project recommended CC0 over the Unlicense because the former is "a more comprehensive legal text".[3] However, in July 2022, the CC0 license became unsupported and software to be released in the Fedora distribution must not be under CC0, due to CC0 not waivingpatent rights.[21]
There is general agreement that the document is poorly drafted. It is an attempt to dedicate a work to the public domain (which, taken alone, would not be approved as an open source license) but it also has wording commonly used for license grants. There was some discussion about the legal effectiveness of the document, in particular how it would operate in a jurisdiction where one cannot dedicate a work to the public domain. The lawyers who opined on the issue, both US and non-US, agreed that the document would most likely be interpreted as a license and that the license met the OSD. It is therefore recommended for approval.
Fedora recommends use of CC-0 over this license, because it is a more comprehensive legal text around this tricky issue. It is also noteworthy that some MIT variant licenses which contain the right to "sublicense" are closer to a true Public Domain declaration than the one in the "Unlicense" text.
anybody affixing a licensing statement to open-source software is guilty of either magical thinking or of having an intention to follow up on the implied threat
@bendiken surely there's a better name than copyfree, but I like the movement and look fwd to your roundup.
In case it's of interest, I'm engaged in an ongoing Identi.ca conversation with Mike Linksvayer, the vice president of Creative Commons [...] In short, the folks at Creative Commons are aware of the Unlicense initiative, and apparently supportive of it.
1 MIT 44.69%, 2 Other 15.68%, 3 GPLv2 12.96%, 4 Apache 11.19%, 5 GPLv3 8.88%, 6 BSD 3-clause 4.53%, 7 Unlicense 1.87%, 8 BSD 2-clause 1.70%, 9 LGPLv3 1.30%, 10 AGPLv3 1.05% (30 million × 2% × 17% = 102k)
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