Use the Unlicense instead of CC0 to represent the public domain

[bhuga]

I'm not sure how keen you are to have this conversation, but I didn't even realize there were more than 3 licenses before! Ack!

When I helped create the Unlicense a few years back, it was based on the dedication of the most successful public domain software project, SQLite. I can imagine that with public domain still a minority, we don't want to clutter the field with varying implementations of it. But I would humbly suggest that the Unlicense is a better example of a public domain license:

• Its dedication is based on SQLite's, one of the top 10 software projects of all time by any metric.
• It's actually a public domain dedication instead of a license emulating one.
• It's shorter and clearer.
• It seems to have greater adoption than CC0 (probably because CC was dis-recommending the use of CC0 use as late as 2011):

356 cc0 results
1080 unlicense results

You may disagree, in which case, go ahead and close the pull. I just wanted to have the conversation :)

This pull would be the one to address #36 if we wanted to.

[artob]

The Unlicense probably does have greater adoption for code than CC0 does, in part due to Creative Commons formerly discouraging the use of CC0 for code as @bhuga mentions.

GitHub search results for the Unlicense:

• UNLICENSE
• LICENSE
• COPYING
• README

GitHub search results for CC0:

• LICENSE
• COPYING
• README

[artob]

I think my own preference would be to have both CC0 and the Unlicense represented (as per #36), these being the two most widely used public domain dedications today. Which one should be offered up as the default could be determined e.g. by empirical metrics over time; at this point, it's almost a tie. As I've written previously about the ongoing dialogue I have had with the vice president of Creative Commons on this topic:

The future of the Unlicense, and the public domain more generally, looks promising. I recently had the opportunity to engage in a brief dialogue with Mike Linksvayer, the vice president of Creative Commons. It turns out that the folks at Creative Commons are already aware of the Unlicense initiative, and supportive of it. This is truly gratifying and welcome news indeed.

Mr. Linksvayer relates that though Creative Commons have previously discouraged using any of their licensing instruments for software, there has been discussion concerning the application of CC0, specifically, to cover software as well. This raises the question of how that might affect the Unlicense initiative or whether existing Unlicense adopters would be compatible with CC0 code as well; the answer is simple, due to the public domain being the superset of all more restrictive licensing arrangements.

Firstly, should CC0 come to be considered an exception to the more general Creative Commons policy regarding applicability to software, Mr. Linksvayer sees that as complementary to the Unlicense, not competitive. Further, both approaches are fully compatible and interoperable, since both are at base intended as explicit public-domain dedications and copyright waivers, not licenses per se. And it's naturally very easy to remix code that has no strings whatsoever attached to it: there's just nothing to get tangled up in.

If the Unlicense and CC0 both become viable options for publishing public-domain code, then the choice of which one to use becomes almost just a question of personal brand preference: those more comfortable in the mainstream might perhaps be expected to go with CC0, yet others might still prefer the explicit and strong "opt-out" subtext of the Unlicense. In any case, both will amount to the same thing: copyright-free code that anyone can use freely for any purpose without restriction.

[haacked]

@bhuga I wish I had seen this earlier! /cc @hoolio @benbalter.

I was a bit taken aback at how long the CC0 license was. I definitely think this license is more in the spirit of choosealicense.com.

I'm not a fan of having both CC0 and Unlicense here. I'd rather have one or the other. Presenting a non-choice to people not familiar with licensing helps nobody.

[haacked]

This sentence reads weird to me.

The Unlicense is a template for disclaiming copyright interest in software you've written, a template for dedicating your software to the public domain.

How about:

The Unlicense is a template to relinquish copyright interest in software you've written and dedicate your software to the public domain.

[bhuga]

Good call, I was pulling too tightly from unlicense.org. s/relinquish/waive/, though 😸

Try it now; genuinely interested in feedback.

[haacked]

Also, I liked the original starting phrase: "Because copyright attaches automatically in many countries..."

We're trying to educate people that having no license != public domain (which you'd be surprised at how many people mistake this, though given your work on the UNLICENSE maybe you wouldn't be surprised.)

Mind taking another crack at it? I'd really like to merge this in. :)

[artob]

@haacked, by the way, Ben and I wrote a piece about this license-free business some years back: Licensed, License-Free, and Unlicensed Code ...in case it comes helpful to link in somewhere. Also, at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License-free_software

[bhuga]

This is fun :) Try it now. I see why you are attached to that sentence; the idea of copyright "attaching" seems wrong but I can't come up with anything both as brief and as clear.

I really want the second sentence to be "Use the Unlicense to opt out of the copyright game entirely." but I have a feeling that's a more playful tone than the site is going for.

@bendiken take a look too.

[bhuga]

For the record, I'm all about letting this pull sit for a day or two if it means @hoolio gets a second to take a look at it. That feedback would be 👍 no matter what he says :)

[haacked]

For the record, I'm all about letting this pull sit for a day or two if it means @hoolio gets a second to take a look at it.

Sounds good to me. Also, /cc @benbalter since you can never have too many Ben's looking at something and he's been quite the wordsmith!

This is fun :)

It has been! I like to think I'm pretty well versed in licenses but I'm shocked I never heard of the UNLICENSE. I love that I'm learning something new every day on it. Thanks for bringing this up!

[hoolio]

What about:

"Depending on your country of origin, your work may be protected by local copyright law by default at the moment of creation. If you'd like to signal to the community that you want to expressly put your work in the public domain -- i.e., relinquish your default copyright interests to it -- the Unlicense may be a good option for you. The Unlicense also includes a no-warranty statement from the widely-used MIT/X11 license that protects you by making clear that you're not providing any warranties to this public domain work."

It's too long, maybe, but hits the main points.

[bhuga]

😊 I was pushing to the wrong branch. New version correctly pushed.

[haacked]

Love it!

[artob]

@haacked, thanks for merging this!

@bhuga, one minor nitpick: the last line is corrupted over at http://choosealicense.com/licenses/public-domain/. It seems like an escaping issue due to the text <http://unlicense.org/> being passed through without proper HTML escaping.

[haacked]

@bendiken thanks for pointing that out! I just fixed it.