Background
There are a wide range of open source / free software licenses which are both popular and widely used. These licenses have much in common but differ from each other in subtle ways.
Key Points
License Comparison:
| MIT license | BSD License | Apache License | GNU License | |
| Popular and widely used: | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Licence type | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Strong Copyleft |
| Jurisdiction: | Not Specified | Not Specified | Not Specified | Not Specified |
| Grants patent rights | No | No | Yes | No |
| Patent retaliation clause | No | No | Yes | No |
| Specifies enhanced attribution | No | No | No | No |
| Addresses privacy loophole: | No | No | No | No |
| Includes ‘no promotion’ feature | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Discussion Questions
1. Why are there so many types of licenses?
2. Who governs the licenses?
3. How can you choose the license type that is best for you?
Additional Resources
Free Software Foundation. (2014). gnu.org. Retrieved from https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
Berkeley Software Distribution. (2014). Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses
MIT License. (2014). Open Source Initiative. Retrieved from http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT
Apache License. (2014). apache.org. Retrieved from https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0.html
License Differentiator. (2014). OSSWATCH. Retrieved from http://oss-watch.ac.uk/apps/licdiff/