Yzena Licenses

This is the repository for the Free and Open Source licenses maintained by Yzena.

There are seven licenses, in order from least to most restrictive:

• Yzena Open License
• Yzena Copyleft License
• Yzena Copyleft User License
• Yzena Network License
• Yzena Network User License
• Yzena Viral License
• Yzena Viral User License

In general, the more restrictive licenses only add restrictions. Thus, every license could be considered to be a subset of the one that follows it.

Yzena Open License

The YOL is a permissive license with protections against patent litigation and trademark infringement. It also requires giving credit.

Yzena Copyleft License

The YCL is the most permissive copyleft Yzena license. It contains everything in the YOL.

Because it is copyleft, it also requires that changes to software under this license remain under the YCL or any of the more strict Yzena licenses.

This is not a viral copyleft license, however; only the changes to the software under this license must be under one of the Yzena copyleft licenses.

Yzena Copyleft User License

The YCUL is the Yzena Copyleft License with two extra clauses to preserve user agency.

Yzena Network License

The YNL is the Yzena copyleft license that is intended to close the SaaS loophole. It does this by changing the GPL definition of distribution from "making available to the public" to "making available for public use."

It is still copyleft, but it only allows relicensing under itself, the YVL, and the YNUL.

It also contains everything in the YCL as well.

Yzena Network User License

The YNUL is the Yzena Network License with two extra clauses to preserve user agency.

Yzena Viral License

This is the first viral copyleft Yzena license. It contains everything in the YNL, but changes the relicensing provision to require that all software combined with the licensed software be put under the YVL or the YVUL.

Yzena Viral User License

This is the most restrictive Yzena License. It requires everything in the YVL, except that the relicensing provision only allows relicensing under the YVUL, but it also requires that users be allowed to modify and use the modified software.

In other words, this is the license that prohibits tivoization and violating user agency.