| | | Annual Report 1994 | |
The issue is this: in UNU/IIST's Advanced Software Development
and Research Projects software is often being developed joint
with groups in a developing country. Who owns the rights
to this software?
UNU/IIST's current, unrehearsed34
position is this:
All software that is developed with partial (thus including full)
funding from UNU/IIST (or any other UN body) is public
domain, i.e. free software.
This is the usual policy of any reasonable computer science
department or institute, and is the policy of all such with whom
UNU/IIST wishes to exchange anything: software, reports, staff!
It is, however, in a significant way,
different from for example the GNU General Public License of
the Free Software Foundation -- which is transitive:
i.e. propagates to all derivatives, that is all value-added
instantiations of freely distributed software. (See next `rule'.)
Therefore, what does UNU/IIST mean by `free, public domain software':
The co-developers -- and for that matter anybody else, including
potentially UNU/IIST itself -- are free, at own expense, to enrich
(value-add) and commercialise such software, with a view toward profit.
Should UNU/IIST be offered the possibility of co-R&D
application domain specific software such that all of UNU/IIST's
expenses, including reasonable overhead expenses and some similarly
reasonable profit, are covered, then UNU/IIST views the client as possessing
all rights.
UNU/IIST will only undertake "225%"35 (fully funded and contracted) developments provided
the activity (i) can serve to train Fellows from developing countries
free of charge and expense (out of the profit), (ii) offers an interesting
test-bed for research ideas, and (iii) can otherwise lead onto follow-on
R&D that will directly benefit developing countries.
Public Domain, Free Software:
Free Commercialisation Rights:
UNU/IIST is strongly encouraging its collaborators to do so,
while informing them, up front, of this policy.
On Fully Funded Software Development:
info@iist.unu.edu, March 1995
Annual Report 1994