extended MIT license

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I’m currently developing some plugins. Due to the fact that they should also be available via the wp.org plugin repo, i need to license them properly.

My decision so far is to use a modified MIT/Expat license, which is compatible to the GNU GPL license. I modified/extended the license in two places (bold quote parts). I now would like to know if

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  • This could conflict with the GNU GPL license.
  • The grammar, vocabulary and else is correct.

(c) Copyright 2011 – by … me

Area of jurisdication: Austria.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software
and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction,
including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense,
and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so,
subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice, and every other copyright notice found in this software,
and all the attributions in every file, and this permission notice shall be included
in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED “AS IS”, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED,
INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
PURPOSE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE
FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE,
ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

I’m aware that none of you is a lawyer, so it’s more about your opinion. If you got additions (of any kind), feel free to tell me.

Thank you!

EDIT: So far I got to the point that I

  • can’t write anything about “legal content” and
  • the area of jurisdication says nothing about any right restrictions and therefore is ok & non conflicting with the GPL.
  • About “and every other copyright notice” does not conflict, because it’s no restriction. It’s (in my case) mostly about css & graphics.
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3 comments

  1. A popular choice is the Duel license BOTH GPL AND (non-modified) MIT. The non-modified MIT license is on the list of Compatible licenses though (See:Expat License)

    Area of jurisdiction: Austria.

    This is interesting to me, I’m not sure that line violates any license but to me part of Open Source is just giving up some rights.

    and every other copyright notice found in this software, and all the
    attributions in every file,

    Copyright in the source code is protected however, requiring public copyright notices violates both licenses.

    The Software may be used to publish and/or display legal content.

    This is implied with the MIT/GPL as you aren’t limited in what you can do with the software so there should be no need to state that they can use it for legal content

  2. My non-lawyer opinion is that your license has clauses not present in GPL and more restrictive than GPL and as such cannot be released as combined under GPL.

  3. I’m pretty sure this modified license is not compatible with the GPL, since it contradicts freedom 0: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose:

    http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

    RE “and every other copyright notice found in this software, and all the attributions in every file”:

    As long those packages’ respective licenses require that the copyright and attribution notices remain intact and you correctly include them, there’s no need to “protect” them again.