Rename license to describe its impact and omit confusing "Commons," like "No Reselling Clause"

[troy]

https://twitter.com/kevinverse/status/1032392644649832449 requests improvements here. Many, perhaps even half, of this week's complaints were about the name "Commons Clause." This name is unclear in 3 ways:

1. The word "Commons" is heavily used by the Apache Software Foundation (see https://commons.apache.org/ and @apache). That confusion is exacerbated by the fact that one popular license is the Apache License. An average person who reads "Apache License modified with Commons Clause" is very likely to believe that both licenses were created and supported by ASF. Also, the existing Creative Commons project adds to the confusion. "Commons" may be the single most confusing English word to use in a license name.
2. It doesn't describe anything about what the license does, like "No Reselling Clause," "No Aftermarket Clause," or "No Hosting Clause" would. While one can probably do better than those 3 ideas, all are much clearer than "Commons Clause."
3. The word "Commons" tends to make people think that the license is removing restrictions rather than adding to them. Whatever one's view of the license terms, the name should make clear to a casual reader/downloader that this Clause is adding usage restrictions (as the "No" prefix does), not removing them.

Example license statement with new name:

This project is licensed Apache 2.0 modified with No Reselling Clause.

or

Apache 2.0 + No Reselling Clause

[xizhao]

Thank you for the detailed and helpful suggestions @troy.

I really like this idea and totally accept the feedback on the naming confusion "Commons" can create -- I've heard a lot this feedback on Twitter as well, this one being my favorite:

https://twitter.com/flamefew/status/1032655828342329345

I'm not sure if No-Resale is technically accurate, but I was discussing with some others the need for a new word. "Commons" isn't exactly as well-defined as "Open Source", so it seemed like safe territory at first. But having a new vocab word for this would definitely help. @kemitchell any ideas?

Also see #5, one middle-ground is just adding guidance to clarify how this should be applied.

[troy]

With your tense change (Reselling -> Resale), I think No-Resale Clause (or No Resale Clause) is a great name. It's simple, direct, memorable enough, and summarizes both the actual clause and the intent as well as anything short that I can think of.

[rectang]

Please see http://www.apache.org/foundation/license-faq.html#mod-license for guidance from the ASF on how to create your own license using the Apache License 2.0 as a point of departure. The proposed naming conventions from this issue, Apache 2.0 modified with No Reselling Clause and Apache 2.0 + No Reselling Clause would not conform to that guidance.

Please see dgraph-io/dgraph#2416 for an objection to the current Commons Clause naming convention raised by a member of the ASF Board of Directors.

Interested parties should consider joining the discussion on the Commons Clause at https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL-402 to work with the ASF on a naming convention.

[janhoy]

+1 to avoid the use of Apache name in your modified license at all, except for telling that it is based on ASL2

[ddevault]

How about calling it something like the "Limited commercial use license", or LCUL for short?

[pedro-nonfree]

The word "Commons" is heavily used by (...)

... economists to talk about common property (that has different features than private and public property). Tragedy of the commons, Governing the commons and the great work of Elinor Ostrom [2] (nobel prize in economics because its work) are completely unrelated to the commons clause license. Don't try to change the roots of the word with your own interest.

"Commons" isn't exactly as well-defined as "Open Source", so it seemed like safe territory at first

@xizhao Commons is not safe territory for a Source available license with limited commercial use.

This license should put all the things in the table clearly. Because problems grow (and that's why I am here) [3]. And this is bad image for you and the projects that use it.

I'm very sad to read this:

We didn’t have to, we could have just written a new, proprietary license. But people understand the popular open source licenses, and we wanted to be clear that we were allowing everything those licenses allow, except for one kind of use.

Yes, we all know that open source is great, its success is because its clarity.

You can distribute propietary software putting the source available. You can make an exception of the all rights reserved to non-profit purposes, etc. It is easier to say, don't try to fool us in our miserable little time we have to do some contribution.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commons [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elinor_Ostrom [3] https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/issues/40

[ddevault]

You're talking to /dev/null. They don't give a shit, they know that they're apropriating the language of open source and are deliberately diluting the open source ecosystem.