Subject: Re: A few questions regarding licensing
From: Tommi Leino (namhas@majik.netti.fi)
Date: Fri Jun 25 1999 - 10:51:30 EEST
Mietitääs tätä vähän. Vähänkö sumu juttu hei! Eli joku joka osaa enkkuu vois muotoilla hienosti enkuks vetää, mä nyt vaan hieman vastailen että voitte tehdä niin. > In your FAQ you say that the Majik server source code is not being > released because of fears of bad Majik clones being produced. Has this > been a problem in previous projects? Serverin koodia ei anneta koska me ei haluta että ihmiset _tuhlaavat_ resurssejansa moneen eri majikkiin kun kaikki voisivat keskittya vain yhteen ja tehda siita paras. Ei ole ollut ongelma aikasemmissa projekteissa koska ovat olleet kokonaan ei-vapaita, mutta koko open source communitylla nayttaa olevan tama ongelma. Esimerkiksi on olemassa varmaan 20 erilaista ilmaista cd-playeria unix:lle jotka eroavat toisistansa lahinna ui:n (user interface) puolesta. Mita jos he olisivat keskittyneet vain yhteen? > Why else do you consider code forking to be a concern? Well, with the client. It might be possible for someone to fork it to display something that he/she shouldn't see in the game. But we have come to accept the fact as an occasional minor inconvenience and considered that there is more good on having open source than not having. > Do you consider this development model to be a threat or possible boon to > free (as in speech) software? > > Who actually owns the copyright on the server? Majik Development Team, that means all who have been registered as the developers of Majik's client or server. Anyone who we approve can join to the Development Team and thus can see and modify the source, but not to distribute it. > > If one of your members wanted to share the server source code outside of > the development team would there be any legal means to prevent this? Well, the server license prevents our members to distribute the source. > Could the Majik server be sold to any company, and if so then who would > benefit due to development efforts? Majik couldn't be sold. Only if the offer is too tempting we have agreed to share the money received among the registered developers and designers of the project and start a new project with the help of the money received. > How well documented is the protocol used between the server and client? It is well enough documented for the developers, but not that good for outsiders. We allow but don't actually need outsiders doing new derivates of the client. > Are there any RFCs that will be released at some point on the > client/server protocol? No. > Is the client/server protocol a "moving target?" That is, does it change > often and are many clients not backwards compatible with old server code? That is what we try to prevent. > How would you react if another team made a server that the Majik client > could use? By our license it is possible to do that, legally, but that wouldn't be such a wise choice for them in many cases. > How would you react if a commercial company made a server that the Majik > client could use? We would be proud that a commercial company would use our client for their project. We don't really think that any company would do such a thing. > Do you consider this form of licensing to be a model for commercial > efforts? No. > How would software developers benefit from the use of this licensing > model? > How would consumers benefit from the use of this licensing model? They would have more professional piece of software. A free software developed like the commercial software is. I would say this is a "Open cathedral" development model, if you have read Raymond's "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" article (http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-paper.html). > What are the disadvantages of this licensing model? Majik will not never become a generic game driver for all to play with, instead a well-designed and consistent fantasy role-playing world. > That's all the questions I have. Sorry that the list of them is so long. > I may have a few more, based on the responses I receive. However, they > won't be so plentiful. Thank you very much for taking the time to go > through all those...Thank you even more if you answered them. Good luck > with your development efforts. Thank you. We are very proud that you would do an article of our development model. Hmm, tätä pitää kyl miettii oikee kunnolla - kiukulla! Vittu jos tää pääsee johonki kovis lehtee. Pitää yrittää puhuu hyvin että jengi näkis tän modelin hyvänä ja kätevänä. Keksikää ja kirjottakaa jotain jo tänään. -- Tommi Leino / Majik 3D project namhas@majik.netti.fi http://majik.netti.fi
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b25 : Tue Feb 12 2002 - 00:03:52 EET