[ANN]PyCrash 0.2 released

[Paul Rubin]

Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> writes:
> > I have chosen the GPL without any special reason: I know it and so I
> > simply used it. I’m not a license expert: I write code, no contracts.
> > However, my major intent is to contribute to python community with this
> > tool: so, if the type of licence can be a problem for the end-user I’m
> > ready to change it in the future.
> 
> The page at http://www.opensource.org/licenses/ can rapidly propel you
> towards a better understanding of license issues.  

You might also look at:

   http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html

the section "What is Copyleft?" explains a bit of the GPL rationale.

> In any case, I recommend the MIT license (on that page) as the simplest
> way to "contribute to the python community" if you have no particular 
> desire to constrain the use of your code in any way (including, for example,
> requiring things like "proper credit be given in the documentation" etc).

Well, public domain is simpler, but "simplest" doesn't necessarily
mean "best".  The GPL aims to make sure that everyone receives all the
benefits of any improvements that anyone makes, and also to guarantee
that end users have the freedom to study and modify the code that they
run.  The MIT license (etc.) is of somewhat more benefit to product
vendors, since it lets them freely use your code in proprietary
products without having to pass that freedom on to their users.  I.e.
you get to be an unpaid developer for someone else's proprietary product.

My own approach has been that I GPL stuff that I write with my own
resources, but I'm flexible about licenses if I'm getting paid for the
work.  That's the spirit of the MIT license too, since it was
negotiated with corporate sponsors of the MIT projects it was
originally applied to, i.e. the programmers who worked on those
projects were writing code that ended up in those companies' products,
but they were also getting paid by those companies, so it was fair.
(I worked at the MIT Athena project for a while so I got some of that
money myself).  There's been a few times when someone has asked me to
use an MIT-like license on a self-financed project and I've replied
I'd consider if it the requester was willing to provide development
funding.  Nobody has taken me up on that so far.  It kind of makes you
wonder.