Which license for website content, games and assets ?

Développement

Aurélien Rodot

il y a 6 ans

Hey,

Just to have your opinion about which licenses we should use for user content on the website :

Sorunome

NEW il y a 6 ans

Why not let the game author specify which licence to use on their games? Like, some prefer MIT, some prefer BSD, some prefer some form of CC or some form of GPL.

Even propriatary licences can make sense if you'd try to make some moneyy off of your game.

So yeah, i am very strongly in favour of allowing the creators to pick their licence of their content....they created it after all!

Drakker

NEW il y a 6 ans

I also think that users should be at liberty to choose their own licenses. With that said, there is nothing wrong by recommending a specific license, by clearly putting forward its advantages and why the Gamebuino community recommends it.

Sorunome

il y a 6 ans

With that said, there is nothing wrong by recommending a specific license, by clearly putting forward its advantages and why the Gamebuino community recommends it.

I agree with that! In case we are discussing that, I'd recommend for games GPLv3 or later (not LGPL because a game is a fully-done project, not just some library for which the LGPL was designed for).

As for images, a recommendation of CC-BY-SA sounds good to me, or maybe also CC-BY-SA-NC

Sorunome

NEW il y a 6 ans

Drakker Drakker

With that said, there is nothing wrong by recommending a specific license, by clearly putting forward its advantages and why the Gamebuino community recommends it.

I agree with that! In case we are discussing that, I'd recommend for games GPLv3 or later (not LGPL because a game is a fully-done project, not just some library for which the LGPL was designed for).

As for images, a recommendation of CC-BY-SA sounds good to me, or maybe also CC-BY-SA-NC

Aurélien Rodot

NEW il y a 6 ans

But as the games use the LGPL Gamebuino library (which is LGPL because it's based on LGPL code), so they should be LGPL too ?

And GPL is for code only, for the assets what do you think about CC BY-SA ?

Also the problem is that if people don't wan't to give the right to their games, Gamebuino won't be able to distribute them on the gallery.

Sorunome

il y a 6 ans

But as the games use the LGPL Gamebuino library (which is LGPL because it's based on LGPL code), so they should be LGPL too ?

No, licences such as GPLv3 are LGPL compatible
EDIT: in fact, LGPL stuff  can also be used in propriatery programs, you just have to provide the source of the library, not the entire program

Also the problem is that if people don't wan't to give the right to their games, Gamebuino won't be able to distribute them on the gallery.

Not at all, have a checkbox that users have to check to allow distribution via gamebuino library. The creators can give people special permissions outside of the licence, whatever they have. In this case, the creator would give gamebuino the right to distribute it by checking that checkbox.
Checkbox aside, open source licences would probably allow that anyways, checkbox would also cover us up for all kind of licences

baba

il y a 6 ans

I think it is a good idea to only accept free software games on this website !

Sorunome

NEW il y a 6 ans

Aurélien Rodot Aurélien Rodot

But as the games use the LGPL Gamebuino library (which is LGPL because it's based on LGPL code), so they should be LGPL too ?

No, licences such as GPLv3 are LGPL compatible
EDIT: in fact, LGPL stuff  can also be used in propriatery programs, you just have to provide the source of the library, not the entire program

Also the problem is that if people don't wan't to give the right to their games, Gamebuino won't be able to distribute them on the gallery.

Not at all, have a checkbox that users have to check to allow distribution via gamebuino library. The creators can give people special permissions outside of the licence, whatever they have. In this case, the creator would give gamebuino the right to distribute it by checking that checkbox.
Checkbox aside, open source licences would probably allow that anyways, checkbox would also cover us up for all kind of licences

Drakker

NEW il y a 6 ans

As Sorunome said, the license of the library used has no relation to the license of an app or game... otherwise pretty much everything would be GPL nowadays, including Windows.

baba

il y a 6 ans

I doubt this is true for the GPL

baba

NEW il y a 6 ans

Drakker Drakker

I doubt this is true for the GPL

baba

NEW il y a 6 ans

The games should all be licensed under the GPLv3 so everyone can freely review, study and modify the code :p on the previous Gamebuino games, it was sad to sometimes see games without the source or without free software licensing, many games could not be modified, fixed or updated :(

For the artworks I tend to like CC-BY-SA :p

baba

NEW il y a 6 ans

Aurélien Rodot Aurélien Rodot

I think it is a good idea to only accept free software games on this website !

Aurélien Rodot

NEW il y a 6 ans

So what we suggest is that when you upload your creation, you can select from a set of licenses, but it has to be somehow open source?

Maybe leave to option not to copyleft/opensource, but mention that it's totally uncool?

erico

NEW il y a 6 ans

I´m with @drakker and @sorunome. Let the creator choose and Let Gamebuino recommend the best license according to its vision.

wuuff

NEW il y a 6 ans

I believe in open source software, but I also agree that forcing a certain license on an end user is wrong. I understand the appeal of requiring everyone to share their source so that nobody can share only a binary blob, but that really should be left up to the choice of the individual.


If you really wanted to force people to make their code open source, you could just make the library GPL instead of LGPL, but that kind of thing will discourage participation from some people, and what's the benefit?


People will probably still release early prototypes of something without source because they want to wait until it's in a more presentable state before sharing the source. Several very exciting unfinished Gamebuino projects deep in the old forums don't have any source, and sadly that means they can probably never be finished by anyone. However, I don't think that forcing people to make everything they post open-source will fix that. I think that people will just post screenshots instead of code, or simply wait until they're finished to post anything. And if they never finish, well...they may never post anything at all...

alxm

NEW il y a 6 ans

Yes, please let authors decide what licenses to publish their work under. I usually use GPL for code and a non-commercial CC for media, but this is my own free choice (for something that I'm releasing for $0 to begin with).