qs Request to offer qs under an unmodified MIT licence

My company is very interested in using this library asap but we have some licence constraints and cannot use this library unless it is licensed under an unmodified MIT licence: https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT

I was wondering if it is possible to include this as a licence (in addition to the existing BSD one) and release a new version we can start using it. Thanks.

Mar 28 '19 02:03 ogenodisho

I vastly prefer MIT, but I'd need to get the permission of all previous contributors to the library before adding it.

Why is BSD-3 a license constraint? It's not a viral license, nor unenforceable, which are typically the things that make a license untenable for most companies.

Mar 28 '19 03:03 ljharb

Would that take a long time? I'm sure they wouldn't be adverse to it.

I don't think I can reveal too much about the nature of the license constraint due to privacy reasons.

Mar 28 '19 03:03 ogenodisho

It would be very helpful in general; I've never heard of BSD-3 being a problem for anyone before.

It would take a long time because there's 46 of them; hopefully none would be averse, but i'm sure there's a reason they didn't select MIT in the first place.

[x] @nlf
[x] @papandreou
[ ] @dead-horse
[x] @hueniverse
[x] @tdzienniak
[ ] @elidoran
[x] @geek
[x] @Om4ar (just to start with), are all of you comfortable with adding MIT to this project? Please post an explicit comment indicating assent, just to be clear :-)

Mar 28 '19 04:03 ljharb

I approve of relicensing the library and my contributions under MIT. :+1:

Mar 28 '19 07:03 papandreou

Switching a project from BSD-3 to MIT is an absurd request and a complete waste of time. The legal differences would not stand in court if someone used BSD-3 as if it was MIT. The only real exception is the 3rd clause:

Neither the name of the copyright holder nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.

That said, I don't think there is any material contribution of mine still present in this module. I would support the position that any contributions I might have made to this module are no longer present, and therefore you do not need my permission to republish under a different license.

Mar 29 '19 23:03 hueniverse

Thanks for both the license info and the waiver :-)

Mar 30 '19 01:03 ljharb

@ogenodisho given that, i really can’t conceive of any possible constraint that could prevent you from explaining why you can’t use BSD-3, unless your company is planning to use our product name or contributor names to endorse your own product without permission. Can you elaborate?

Mar 30 '19 01:03 ljharb

We can use it under BSD-3 license but due to time constraints we would be able to utilise the library faster if it was licenced under MIT.

It's not the case that we CANT use this library if it's licenced under BSD-3. That's why in the original question I was asking to add the license in addition to the existing licence - im not asking for a replacement of the current licence.

However, considering that it looks like this issue won't be resolved in time I think it can just be closed.

Mar 30 '19 01:03 ogenodisho

@ljharb Sure, I don't mind changing the license.