Re: ODbL / DbCL licenses: not DFSG compliant?
Dear Charles,
On Sep 22, 2013, at 5:49 AM, Charles Plessy wrote:
> Le Sat, Sep 21, 2013 at 06:46:55PM -0400, Nick Oosterhof a écrit :
>>
>> are the Open Database License (ODbL) [1] and Database Contents License (DbCL) DSFG [2] compliant? [...] I found an earlier thread [3] where it was argued that section 4.6 of the ODbL [1] makes it non-compliant (I presume with DSFG 1) [section 4.6 requires that using the database and distributing the results requires making the database or 'patch' files available for non-profit costs ]
>>
>> which would restrict people from selling a Derivative Database or Produced Work for significant (higher than reasonable production) cost.
>>
>> Is that a reasonable interpretation?
>
> in case of use for profit, the section 4.6 requires that the customer can
> access to what the DFSG call "source code" or "patch files", with no
> unreasonable additional cost. It therefore does not restrict people from
> selling a Derivative Database or Produced Work for significant cost.
Thanks for the clarification. I think I understand this better now: a customer who pays for the database has to have access to the database can decide for theirselves whether to sell the database to others.
>
> This is similar to the requirements for conveying non-source forms in the GPL
> and the AGPL, which are accepted as Free by Debian.
Ok, that makes sense.
> I have not studied the other clauses of the ODbL, but section 4.6 therefore
> does not seem to make it non-free.
Great, thanks for your help in clarifying this.
best,
Nick
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