Open Source, Mods and You! (Forestry Mod)

[Loh]

Just had a few nosing about why the forestry mod was removed and found that the developer was upset by it being added to the technic and tekkit packs.

There are many rules in Open Source distribution (which Minecraft Mods, WoW Mods, Spring RTS Mods and other games which must abide to), one of them is to freely distribute, remain price free and say Yes to whomever wants to use it, no excuses, this includes Mod Packs.

The developer of Forestry does not own Forestry Mod, he just develops it, only credit he can take is the actual development of the mod.

[ramdor]

tbh, I would ask any mod dev permission to include in any pack, just common courtesy. Not sure if Sengir was asked before or after. I am sure he has it licensed in some way, and yes, he does own it.

I assume you have not developed any software?

O. License:

The code of "Forestry for Minecraft" in source or binary form is the intellectual property of SirSengir. You may not reproduce, redistribute or modify it.

Public Mod Packs: All mod packs I want to include Forestry already have my permission. Please refrain from asking permission via PM here on MFC. If you are maintaining an already released and established mod pack and want to include Forestry, you are still free to pitch it to me on IRC. Do not include Forestry without asking for permission first or I will not grant permission even if you ask after the fact.

Server Packs: Private server packs are granted permission to include past and the current client versions of Forestry in a mod pack tailored exclusively for that Minecraft server. The pack must be distributed in a way that ensures that only players currently active on that server can download it. Private server packs are only mod packs intended for use by a closed membership Minecraft server and distributed only to those members.Please refrain from asking for explicit permission if your server pack fulfills the above conditions, it clogs up my inbox.

[Korialstrasz]

if you quote it at lest leave a link from where you have it:

http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/700588-forestry-for-minecraft-trees-bees-and-more-updated-20072012-1486/

[ramdor]

ahh there was a lot more to this after some searching. Leave it at that I guess.

[Loh]

tbh, I would ask any mod dev permission to include in any pack, just common courtesy. Not sure if Sengir was asked before or after. I am sure he has it licensed in some way, and yes, he does own it.

I assume you have not developed any software?

Yes, I have developed open source software before, Courtesy is all that is needed, maybe or not if Sengir did ask before or not, still an appoligy then to ask again should be sufficent. You cannot own software that is freely distributed unless you purchase and register a liscense which requires a permission to be made.

Definition

The first formal definition of free software was published by FSF in February 1986.[11] That definition, written by Richard Stallman, is still maintained today and states that software is free software if people who receive a copy of the software have the following four freedoms.[12] (The numbering begins with zero since many computer systems use zero-based numbering.)

• Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program for any purpose.
  
• Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it to make it do what you wish.
  
• Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor.
  
• Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits.
  

Freedoms 1 and 3 require source codeto be available because studying and modifying software without its source code is highly impractical.

Thus, free software means that computer users have the freedom to cooperate with whom they choose, and to control the software they use. To summarize this into a remark distinguishing libre (freedom) software from gratis (zero price) software, the Free Software Foundation says: "Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech', not as in 'free beer'".[13] See Gratis versus libre.

In the late 1990s, other groups published their own definitions which describe an almost identical set of software. The most notable are Debian Free Software Guidelines published in 1997,[14] and the Open Source Definition, published in 1998.

The BSD-based operating systems, such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, do not have their own formal definitions of free software. Users of these systems generally find the same set of software to be acceptable, but sometimes see copyleft as restrictive. They generally advocate permissive free software licenses, which allow others to use the software as they wish, without being legally forced to provide the source code. Their view is that this permissive approach is more free. The Kerberos, X11, and Apache software licenses are substantially similar in intent and implementation.

Freeware License

Main article: Free software license

All free software licenses must grant users all the freedoms discussed above. However, unless the applications' licenses are compatible, combining programs by mixing source code or directly linking binaries is problematic, because of license technicalities. Programs indirectly connected together may avoid this problem.

The majority of free software falls under a small set of licenses. The most popular of these licenses are:

• the GNU General Public License
  
• the GNU Lesser General Public License
  
• the BSD License
  
• the Mozilla Public License
  
• the MIT License
  
• the Apache License
  

The Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative both publish lists of licenses that they find to comply with their own definitions of free software and open-source software respectively.

• List of FSF approved software licenses
  
• List of OSI approved software licenses
  

The FSF list is not prescriptive: free licenses can exist which the FSF has not heard about, or considered important enough to write about. So it's possible for a license to be free and not in the FSF list. The OSI list only lists licenses that have been submitted, considered and approved. All Open Source licenses must meet the Open Source Definitionin order to be officially recognized as open source software. Free software on the other hand is a more informal classification that does not rely on official recognition. Nevertheless, software licensed under licenses that do not meet the Free Software Definition cannot rightly be considered free software.

Apart from these two organizations, the Debian project is seen by some to provide useful advice on whether particular licenses comply with their Debian Free Software Guidelines. Debian doesn't publish a list of approved licenses, so its judgments have to be tracked by checking what software they have allowed into their software archives. That is summarized at the Debian web site.[15]

It is rare that a license announced as being in-compliance with the FSF guidelines does not also meet the Open Source Definition, although the reverse is not necessarily true (for example, the NASA Open Source Agreement is an OSI-approved license, but non-free according to FSF).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software#Definition

The forestry mod is licensed under; Public domain software – the copyright has expired, the work was not copyrighted, or the author has released the software onto the public domain (in countries where this is possible). Since public-domain software lacks copyright protection, it may be freely incorporated into any work, whether proprietary or free.

Also considering when a developer creates a mod, all rights and privilidges go towards the game developer, in this case, Mojang. This happens upon releasing the mod, so once the mod is released, the ownership is signed off to Mojang.

[ramdor]

As per your quote.... It is free software IF the people who receive it have the following four freedoms.

Well, the forestry guy doesn't give anyone the freedom to give it away or redistribute, or modify it. So breaking freedom 1,2+3 and consequently therefore is not freeware.

Didn't read any more of it beyond that tbh.

[Loh]

I dropped Sengir a message, so we can look forward to having Forestry back soon :)

[Loh]

Minecraft Mod Public License

============================

Version 1.0.1

0. Definitions

--------------

Minecraft: Denotes a copy of the Minecraft game licensed by Mojang AB

User: Anybody that interacts with the software in one of the following ways:

- play

- decompile

- recompile or compile

- modify

- distribute

Mod: The mod code designated by the present license, in source form, binary

form, as obtained standalone, as part of a wider distribution or resulting from

the compilation of the original or modified sources.

Dependency: Code required for the mod to work properly. This includes

dependencies required to compile the code as well as any file or modification

that is explicitely or implicitely required for the mod to be working.

1. Scope

--------

The present license is granted to any user of the mod. As a prerequisite,

a user must own a legally acquired copy of Minecraft

2. Liability

------------

This mod is provided 'as is' with no warranties, implied or otherwise. The owner

of this mod takes no responsibility for any damages incurred from the use of

this mod. This mod alters fundamental parts of the Minecraft game, parts of

Minecraft may not work with this mod installed. All damages caused from the use

or misuse of this mod fall on the user.

3. Play rights

--------------

The user is allowed to install this mod on a client or a server and to play

without restriction.

4. Modification rights

----------------------

The user has the right to decompile the source code, look at either the

decompiled version or the original source code, and to modify it.

5. Derivation rights

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The user has the rights to derive code from this mod, that is to say to

write code that extends or instanciate the mod classes or interfaces, refer to

its objects, or calls its functions. This code is known as "derived" code, and

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Is subject to distribution rights this entire mod in its various forms. This

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The user is allowed to redistribute this mod partially, in totality, or

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All distributions of this mod must remain licensed under the MMPL.

All dependencies that this mod have on other mods or classes must be licensed

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Minecraft code and the mod loading framework (e.g. ModLoader, ModLoaderMP or

Bukkit).

Modified version of binaries and sources, as well as files containing sections

copied from this mod, should be distributed under the terms of the present

license.

[Jay?]

Oh FFS. Not only is this nonsense, it's irrelevant nonsense. Even if we really super didn't need sengirs permission at all, there are two very good reasons why we still wouldn't have forestry in the pack.

1) Technic is playing nice now and getting all its permissions

2) Sengir has proven that he is willing to insert malicious code without warning or communication. Forestry is now a landmine.

[ramdor]

This has been talked over before and is pointless. He develops the mod, it is his work. He decides if he is going to release it as 'freeware' or not. He decides what public mod packs can and can not use it.

Like has been mentioned before I would not drag up the implications of licence/freeware/copyright when talking about mod's that people write for fun or as a hobby. You will end up with mod writers saying 'screw it' and you'll be back to vanilla before the sun sets. He doesn't want it part of tekkit, and that is fair enough imo.

[Loh]

1>I like that, but Forestry ignores the basic rules for Minecraft mod distribution

2>Then his project is nullified and Forestry becomes Abandonware.

[ramdor]

yeah Jay, I agree especially with 2). I much prefer trying to use tekkit as is without a single block that just does all the work. Our wheat and rubber tree farms are so sweet. I'll post a vid up at some point :)

[Mar1k]

tbh, I would ask any mod dev permission to include in any pack, just common courtesy. Not sure if Sengir was asked before or after. I am sure he has it licensed in some way, and yes, he does own it.

I assume you have not developed any software?

If you code a mod that is freely distributed (100% of Minecraft mods) the point is to get it out there and distribute it. Therefore you WANT it to be distributed by any means necessary. Unless you're well, dimwitted. Which is unfortunately the case for many Minecraft modders who say "Don't include this in mod packs".

But let's no go using logic on the Internet. That wouldn't do at all.

And as far as any "rights" they may have: they have none. If someone wants to take their mod and put it wherever they want, they have that right. Only one with any say in the matter is Mojang. So in my opinion, if I want to make a mod pack. Modders can shove it. I'll do whatever I want.