# Software license can be changed?



## RodrigoBSD (Sep 19, 2019)

Something that I would like to know would be if the software license can be changed, obviously being the owner of the software or perhaps this is not allowed? What I ask is if someone decides that they want to change their license, a permissive license such as MIT For the ISC, for example, can you do it or are you required to continue using the same license?


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## 6502 (Sep 19, 2019)

If you are the copyright owner, you can change the license for the new versions or new users of old/current version.


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## mark_j (Sep 19, 2019)

Yes, if you own the software you can do anything with it. You can re-license in any way that makes you happy.

I'm never sure of the original license's status - does it continue for those that perhaps copied it when your license was license X and that it does not change to license Y.

For example, you go from BSD 3 clause to GPL v3 (YUCK!) in a project you ran on Github. If contributors added under BSD, they would still be BSD and your code would be GPL. You would then have to seek those contributors permission to re-license, I would think. Murky.

(I think I'm making it more complex than it has to be...  )


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## D-FENS (Sep 19, 2019)

A license agreement is a contract. So you can change the contracts you make with future customers in any legally permissible way, because they are not signed yet.

For current customers the contracts are already signed, so you can change them only in ways that are provided for. The license agreement could provide for contract changes, such as allowing the vendor to relicense the product under new conditions.

That's my common sense (non-lawyer) opinion.

By the way, you could license your product only for a particular period of time, for example, 2 years. After the period has passed, you could change the license.


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## mark_j (Sep 19, 2019)

Nope, what you're describing is a *license agreement* like Microsoft EULA. That's because something changed hands: money. Now it's a contract (albeit where Microsoft can spy on you, provide you with bug-riddled software and you have no recourse and no rights [ you just signed them away when you installed the software] - but that's another story  ).

A license is just what I, the software owner, give you permission to do with my software. It is not an agreement and certainly isn't a contract (at least in my jurisdiction) unless you bought it off me.

As you state though, you can specify anything in a license. Whether it's enforceable or contradicts the law of another country is only for you and the courts to find out (at great expense to all).

Stick to permissive; no problems, no courts.


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## D-FENS (Sep 19, 2019)

Thanks for the insights ^^
It's a good addition that the contract requires exchange of value to be in force.


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## 6502 (Sep 19, 2019)

mark_j said:


> A license is just what I, the software owner, give you permission to do with my software. It is not an agreement and certainly isn't a contract (at least in my jurisdiction) unless you bought it off me.


I think it is not necessary to pay for software to have "contract" and use a license. The license defines limitations and rights to do a copy or copies (redistribute). When you install the software, you make a copy and have to accept the license. Before you make any copy of software, the license is like offer - describes the conditions. About EULA, I am not a lawyer and not sure but I think there is difference between copyright violation and breach of agreement. Probably with the agreement is easier to start a lawsuit.


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## unitrunker (Sep 20, 2019)

Consideration / compensation / payment need not be in the form of money.


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## mark_j (Sep 25, 2019)

6502 said:


> I think it is not necessary to pay for software to have "contract" and use a license. The license defines limitations and rights to do a copy or copies (redistribute). When you install the software, you make a copy and have to accept the license. Before you make any copy of software, the license is like offer - describes the conditions. About EULA, I am not a lawyer and not sure but I think there is difference between copyright violation and breach of agreement. Probably with the agreement is easier to start a lawsuit.



Yes, perhaps, but what I'm getting at is this:

If you pay for a piece of software, you technically enter into a contract, providing all conditions of entering a contract are present. If you don't you may be implicitly in a contract but it's basically unenforceable. Either way, for general software you and I use, it's not a contract as your country's contract law would define. It's more of an "obligation" than a contract. It is more enforceable when money changes hands because there's an incentive to seek compensation though the courts.

If I enter an agreement to purchase a 1000 copies of Windows 10 (eek!) for my business, I sign a contract with M$ that I will pay them. The EULA is secondary "protection" for M$ for all those who do not sign a contract with M$, like the average user who gets it with their laptop or works at my business.

Look at all the EULAs around.  Most EULAs I have glanced through are full of attempts to protect the issuer. They don't mention anything about contracts, because they aren't. Contracts (in most jurisdictions) have a test of capacity: you must be able to understand what you're signing, not be mentally impaired, not be a minor and so on. None of these conditions exist. A lot of EULAs breach consumer laws because they attempt to reduce your rights. Most have never been tested in court.

That's why a software license, a là EULAs, are mainly unenforceable and rely on pressure from their creators, like Microsoft, Adobe, Apple et al to influence governments to protect them via copyright protection and enforcement. They don't want to do any of the enforcement because it's basically impossible. Try enforcing a "contract" with a 12 year old minor who bought a laptop with M$ Windows installed. It's much easier to use copyright law because it's got a much vaguer set of rules for what "infringement" means.

Anyway, when all is said and done, that's why permissive licenses are superior. They're not viral like GPLv1-1000 and by-and-large their only requirement is keeping of the license message in the software.

(Wow this got sort-of off-topic-sort-of).


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## 6502 (Sep 25, 2019)

mark_j said:


> If you pay for a piece of software, you technically enter into a contract, providing all conditions of entering a contract are present. If you don't you may be implicitly in a contract but it's basically unenforceable.


If you make copy of software (get file from one site/storage media and put it on other media/site) and its license says "All rights reserved" without exceptions you make copyright violation. It is not important that there is no payment.


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## kpedersen (Sep 26, 2019)

Where I used to work there was a really useful library that we wanted to use for our software. It was under the GPLv2 and our project was intended to be proprietary; we simply contacted the developer and paid him a little bit to get an exclusive "dual license".

In my mind this was a bit of a win-win. The developer got paid, the world still gets access to his code; we complete our project.

Difficulty could arrise if multiple developers worked on the project and some do not agree to the exclusive license however.


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## toorski (Oct 2, 2019)

Good article related to this thread:





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						Licenses Versus Contracts | Inside the GPL | InformIT
					

David Gulbransen clarifies the concepts of "free" and "open source" software, and explains why you probably don't actually own any software you've bought.




					www.informit.com


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