What license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain
I hope this forum is the correct place to ask this question. This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred. Thank you in advance for your answer.
On Dec 2, 2011, at 17:36, Fake name wrote:
This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred.
SQLite was released into the public domain, and it seems this caused all sorts legal confusion in certain companies and jurisdictions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giAMt8Tj-84&t=28m30s The current license is the public domain, so I'm not sure if it's possible to change it (IANAL). It was necessary to do this because tzdata et al was an official (?) function of a US Federal employee, and everything paid for by US taxpayers has to be given back to them.
The reason I was asking about BSD license was because of a reference in the following document: http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04 where it mentions it in conjunction with the code components of the timezone database. (I apologize for using fake name in the previous posting) Thanks On Fri, Dec 2, 2011 at 3:47 PM, David Magda <dmagda@ee.ryerson.ca> wrote:
On Dec 2, 2011, at 17:36, Fake name wrote:
This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred.
SQLite was released into the public domain, and it seems this caused all sorts legal confusion in certain companies and jurisdictions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giAMt8Tj-84&t=28m30s
The current license is the public domain, so I'm not sure if it's possible to change it (IANAL). It was necessary to do this because tzdata et al was an official (?) function of a US Federal employee, and everything paid for by US taxpayers has to be given back to them.
On Fri, Dec 2, 2011 at 7:36 PM, Kevin H <kjhdb2011@gmail.com> wrote:
The reason I was asking about BSD license was because of a reference in the following document:
http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04
where it mentions it in conjunction with the code components of the timezone database.
No, it doesn't. The only reference to BSD in draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04 is the current standard IETF Trust boilerplate for all IETF documents. The relevant text says Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License. There are, as far as I can tell, no code components of any sort included _in the text of draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04_, and so no code components to which this applies. (That is what that section is intended to handle, and all it is intended to handle.) Later on, in Section 6, there is Currently the maintainer of the TZ database also maintains reference code, most of which is public domain. Several files from this software are currently distributed under license. Where they exist, licenses SHALL NOT be changed. IANA SHALL allow for the downloading of this reference code. And in Section 7 7. Database Ownership The TZ database itself is not an IETF Contribution or an IETF Document. Rather it is a pre-existing and regularly updated work that is in the public domain, and is intended to remain in the public domain. Therefore, BCP 78 and BCP 79 do not apply to the TZ Database or contributions that individuals make to it. Should any claims be made and substantiated against the database, the IANA will act in accordance with all competent court orders. No ownership claims will be made by IANA or the IETF Trust on the database or the code. Any person making a contribution to the database or code waives all rights to future claims. Future database and code contributions should be in the public domain. Existing code components will be under whatever license they are currently in. Regards Marshall
(I apologize for using fake name in the previous posting)
Thanks
On Fri, Dec 2, 2011 at 3:47 PM, David Magda <dmagda@ee.ryerson.ca> wrote:
On Dec 2, 2011, at 17:36, Fake name wrote:
This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred.
SQLite was released into the public domain, and it seems this caused all sorts legal confusion in certain companies and jurisdictions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giAMt8Tj-84&t=28m30s
The current license is the public domain, so I'm not sure if it's possible to change it (IANAL). It was necessary to do this because tzdata et al was an official (?) function of a US Federal employee, and everything paid for by US taxpayers has to be given back to them.
Hi list, This problem was already discussed earlier (e.g.2009) loom for "License for the tzdata information" to get the 2009 discussion on this topic. re, wh Am 03.12.2011 15:20, schrieb Marshall Eubanks:
On Fri, Dec 2, 2011 at 7:36 PM, Kevin H <kjhdb2011@gmail.com> wrote:
The reason I was asking about BSD license was because of a reference in the following document:
http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04
where it mentions it in conjunction with the code components of the timezone database.
No, it doesn't. The only reference to BSD in draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04 is the current standard IETF Trust boilerplate for all IETF documents. The relevant text says
Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License.
There are, as far as I can tell, no code components of any sort included _in the text of draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04_, and so no code components to which this applies. (That is what that section is intended to handle, and all it is intended to handle.) Later on, in Section 6, there is
Currently the maintainer of the TZ database also maintains reference code, most of which is public domain. Several files from this software are currently distributed under license. Where they exist, licenses SHALL NOT be changed. IANA SHALL allow for the downloading of this reference code.
And in Section 7
7. Database Ownership
The TZ database itself is not an IETF Contribution or an IETF Document. Rather it is a pre-existing and regularly updated work that is in the public domain, and is intended to remain in the public domain. Therefore, BCP 78 and BCP 79 do not apply to the TZ Database or contributions that individuals make to it. Should any claims be made and substantiated against the database, the IANA will act in accordance with all competent court orders. No ownership claims will be made by IANA or the IETF Trust on the database or the code. Any person making a contribution to the database or code waives all rights to future claims.
Future database and code contributions should be in the public domain. Existing code components will be under whatever license they are currently in.
Regards Marshall
(I apologize for using fake name in the previous posting)
Thanks
On Fri, Dec 2, 2011 at 3:47 PM, David Magda <dmagda@ee.ryerson.ca> wrote:
On Dec 2, 2011, at 17:36, Fake name wrote:
This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred.
SQLite was released into the public domain, and it seems this caused all sorts legal confusion in certain companies and jurisdictions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giAMt8Tj-84&t=28m30s
The current license is the public domain, so I'm not sure if it's possible to change it (IANAL). It was necessary to do this because tzdata et al was an official (?) function of a US Federal employee, and everything paid for by US taxpayers has to be given back to them.
On Friday 02 December 2011 18:47:44 David Magda wrote:
The current license is the public domain
"public domain" isn't a license. it boils down to nothing -- you can do whatever you want since there is no copyright. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Domain
so I'm not sure if it's possible to change it
licenses are often based on copyright (e.g. BSD/GPL), and if there are no copyrights on the file, anyone can d/l the tarballs, make trivial modifications, add their own copyright onto i,t and thus put it under their own license. -mike
No license changes. The database and most of the code is in the public domain, and the remainder of the code remains under the license that was there before. IANA is a distribution point. See the latest draft for details. http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-lear-iana-timezone-database-04 Eliot Lear On 12/2/11 11:36 PM, Fake name wrote:
I hope this forum is the correct place to ask this question.
This question is intended for the people at IANA. I work for NetApp, and would like to know what license IANA is intending to distribute the timezone database under, BSD or public domain? BSD is referenced in some of the documentation, but in the past people were assuming this was in the public domain until the lawsuit occurred.
Thank you in advance for your answer.
participants (7)
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David Magda -
Eliot Lear -
Fake name -
Kevin H
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Marshall Eubanks -
Mike Frysinger -
walter harms