[OLPC library] Licensing for One Laptop Per Child

[Samuel Klein]

On Feb 5, 2008 5:29 PM, Chris Ball <cjb at laptop.org> wrote:
> Hi Edward/library list,
>
>    >> We spoke last week when you were on Forum with Michael Krasny. I
>    >> asked about licensing The Art of Learning for use on the One
>    >> Laptop Per Child XO computer in developing countries. We would
>    >> want to work out a license for free distribution to poor
>    >> students in developing countries, without disturbing your
>    >> copyright and sales in richer countries. We would also want
>    >> permission for people in developing countries to create their
>    >> own translations, in the same way the XO laptop software is
>    >> localized, and other content translated.
>
> Thanks for working on this!  I'm surprised to see a Developing Nations
> License analog being proposed here, however; this conflicts with the
> general move away from licenses that don't provide at least worldwide
> non-commercial sharing, and also conflicts with OLPC's thoughts on
> software freedom, though they don't have to apply here:
>
>    http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_on_free/open_source_software
>
>    * Must allow these rights to be passed on along with the software.
>      This means that we must not provide a license specific to the $100
>      Laptop project or organization or its customers. [..]
>
> Do we accept content for the XO under licenses that don't provide for at
> least non-commercial sharing?

We won't ship any content that cannot be shared on the laptops.

Creators are welcome to publish collections and books under any
license they wish, for others to download, but we strongly recommend
simple attribution and share-alike licenses.

For more on licensing, see   http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Licensing

SJ