A primer about licenses Matthieu Bruneaux

2016-11-21

Plan

What we’ll talk about I

Intellectual property

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A quick tour of licenses

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Recommendations for Open Science

Disclaimer I

I am not a lawyer!

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Those notes represent my understanding of licenses, mostly based on searching other people’s material on the Internet

Intellectual property: what is it?

What is intellectual property? I

creations of the mind that are monopolized by owners designated by law

Intellectual property: what is it?

What is intellectual property? I

creations of the mind that are monopolized by owners designated by law

What does intellectual property include? I

copyrights

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patents

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trademarks

Intellectual property: three main components

Intellectual property: three main components Copyrights I

"Appears" automatically when creative work is done

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Does not need to be registered

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Limited in time

Intellectual property: three main components Copyrights I

"Appears" automatically when creative work is done

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Does not need to be registered

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Limited in time

Patents I

To protect inventions (software?)

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Needs to be registered

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Limited in time

Intellectual property: three main components Copyrights I

"Appears" automatically when creative work is done

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Does not need to be registered

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Limited in time

Patents I

To protect inventions (software?)

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Needs to be registered

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Limited in time

Trademarks I

To protect brand names, logos, reputation

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Kind of needs to be registered

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Limited in time

Intellectual property: why do we care (as researchers)?

Intellectual property: why do we care (as researchers)? Things created in research I

Scientific writings (articles, blog posts, . . . )

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Data

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Software

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Other media (photos, videos, audio, . . . )

Intellectual property: why do we care (as researchers)? Things created in research I

Scientific writings (articles, blog posts, . . . )

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Data

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Software

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Other media (photos, videos, audio, . . . )

Why do we need licences? I

To tell what other people can do with our work: I

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To allow people to use our work (no license > strictest copyright retained) To control how our work is used (commercial use? attribution?)

http://choosealicense.com/

Licenses tour: Creative Commons

Licenses tour: Creative Commons creativecommons.org I

Initiated by Lawrence Lessig

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Allows to distribute a work with various levels of flexibility

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"We recommend against using Creative Commons licenses for software."

Licenses tour: Creative Commons creativecommons.org I

Initiated by Lawrence Lessig

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Allows to distribute a work with various levels of flexibility

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"We recommend against using Creative Commons licenses for software."

Different flavours I

CC0: public domain

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Attribution (CC-BY)

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Share alike (CC-BY-SA)

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No derivatives (CC-BY-ND)

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Non-commercial (CC-BY-NC)

Licenses tour: Creative Commons

Licenses tour: open source software Licenses for code I

Code: include a warranty disclaimer in the license!

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For open source code: https://opensource.org/licenses

Licenses tour: open source software Licenses for code I

Code: include a warranty disclaimer in the license!

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For open source code: https://opensource.org/licenses

Permissive licenses I

Guarantees freedoms to use, modify and redistribute software

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Allows proprietary derivative works

Licenses tour: open source software Licenses for code I

Code: include a warranty disclaimer in the license!

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For open source code: https://opensource.org/licenses

Permissive licenses I

Guarantees freedoms to use, modify and redistribute software

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Allows proprietary derivative works

Copy-left licenses I

Guarantees freedoms to use, modify and redistribute software

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Modified versions of software must use the same license

Licenses tour: permissive licenses

MIT license I

Preserves copyright and license notices

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Commercial use, distribution and modification allowed

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Warranty disclaimer

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One of the most popular open-source software license

BSD license I

Very similar to MIT license

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Includes a non-endorsement clause (contributors names cannot be used to endorse derived work without permission)

Licenses tour: copyleft licenses

GPL3 I

GNU General Public License, originated by Richard Stallman

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Commercial use, distribution and modification allowed

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Warranty disclaimer

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Source disclosed

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Derived works must be released under the same license

Some examples: softwares

Some examples: softwares R I

R is GPL2

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Packages can have different licenses (mostly, if not all, open source licenses)

Some examples: softwares R I

R is GPL2

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Packages can have different licenses (mostly, if not all, open source licenses)

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Under the Python Software Foundation license

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BSD-style, compatible with the GPL, but not copyleft itself.

Python

Some examples: softwares R I

R is GPL2

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Packages can have different licenses (mostly, if not all, open source licenses)

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Under the Python Software Foundation license

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BSD-style, compatible with the GPL, but not copyleft itself.

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Proprietary software

Python

MATLAB

Some examples: data

Data from Duplouy et al. 2013 (Dryad) I

Duplouy A, Ikonen S, Hanski I (2013) Life history of the Glanville fritillary butterfly in fragmented versus continuous landscapes. Ecology and Evolution http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.2v3p5

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CC0

Some examples: data

Data from Duplouy et al. 2013 (Dryad) I

Duplouy A, Ikonen S, Hanski I (2013) Life history of the Glanville fritillary butterfly in fragmented versus continuous landscapes. Ecology and Evolution http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.2v3p5

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CC0

LTER network (Long Term Ecological Research) I

Most data released to the public under a general data use agreement

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In this agreement: restricted to not-for-profit use

Some examples: data

GenBank I

Unclear: "NCBI places no restrictions on the use or distribution of the GenBank data. However, some submitters may claim patent, copyright, or other intellectual property rights in all or a portion of the data they have submitted. NCBI is not in a position to assess the validity of such claims, and therefore cannot provide comment or unrestricted permission concerning the use, copying, or distribution of the information contained in GenBank."

Recommendations for research

Recommendations for research Who has the intellectual property rights? I

In general, the author of the work

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But can be transferred to Uni (e.g. collaborative project with external funding) or to customer (e.g. commissioned work)

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When in doubt, check!

Recommendations for research Who has the intellectual property rights? I

In general, the author of the work

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But can be transferred to Uni (e.g. collaborative project with external funding) or to customer (e.g. commissioned work)

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When in doubt, check!

In Finland I

JyU: about intellectual property rights

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Academy of Finland: handbook of IPR

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Most empirical datasets are not protected by copyright (not "creations")

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A curated dataset might still be protected by copyright

Different licenses for different objects

Different licenses for different objects Data I

Make it open and easy to reuse: CC0

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Using CC-BY makes it less convenient to use

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Large, expensive datasets: when to release?

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Caution if it contains human data (e.g. medical data)

Different licenses for different objects Data I

Make it open and easy to reuse: CC0

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Using CC-BY makes it less convenient to use

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Large, expensive datasets: when to release?

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Caution if it contains human data (e.g. medical data)

Code I

Avoid Creative Commons

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Good permissive license: MIT license

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If you want copyleft: GPL (but do you want it?)

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Try to use GPL-compatible licenses

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Remember to put a LICENSE file

Different licenses for different objects

Different licenses for different objects

Papers I

You retain the copyright of your manuscript

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Publisher has the copyright to the typesetted form of it

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CC-BY license

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Also for blog posts, . . .

Different licenses for different objects

Papers I

You retain the copyright of your manuscript

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Publisher has the copyright to the typesetted form of it

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CC-BY license

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Also for blog posts, . . .

Other content: pictures, videos, . . . I

CC-BY can be a good option

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CC-BY-NC is you are worried people might use them commercially

Resources

Here be a list of useful links!