The JED Terms of Service Draft #1

[mattbaylor]

Discuss the Terms of Service Draft #1 here.

Blog post: http://community.joomla.org/blogs/leade ... ision.html

[johans]

404 - Article #1750 not found ???

[Tonie]

Probably not published yet, it's indeed getting a 404. Matt's in a meeting now, should be there soon

[birnik]

A brief of the major changes will be welcome

[mattbaylor]

We had to take it down briefly to fix a formatting issue. The numbers were all off when it was copied over. It's good now.

[horus_68]

I will consider some changes on new JED TOS:

- 4.1 "or shared file hosting websites such as RapidShare and MediaFire."
Do we really need to advertise those? Why not Dropbox and so on?

- 4.1 Anything that is not installable within Joomla
This will remove the Tools section? http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/tools

- "4.5 Changing from Free to Paid"
should be: Changing distribution model
This is to also include paid to free changes. So no discussions on why this or that: One listing = one distribution model

[dhuelsmann]

11. Governing Law

Any dispute with respect to the JED shall be governed by the laws of the State of Maryland, excluding its conflicts of the laws and rules. All visitors to the JED submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the state and/or federal courts of the State of Maryland.

Since OSM is the only legal entity in the Joomla community and it is incorporated in the State of New York, what is the legal reasoning behind using the State of Maryland?

[infograf768]

2 remarks:

A. We had an important discussion on a rule which has been implemented recently and caused many older extensions to be suddenly unpublished without warning.
FYI, that rule does not exist in the present TOS. It is only displayed when someone proposes a new extension which obviously could not be known by the 3pd maintaining extensions proposed earlier.

This rule forbids any proposed extension to link to a specific forum.joomla.org topic for users to get help about the extension.

The Global Moderators have proposed that this rule be amended to concern only Commercial Extensions and that be created on forum.joomla.org a specific sub-forum for these help topics for free extensions.

Therefore, the suggestion is:
1. Any specific rule should be in the TOS, and not "hidden" later in the process.
2. Non-commercial extensions from 3pd who only propose such type of extensions should be allowed to link for help on the forum.joomla.org as it was accepted formerly. Coordination with Forum Administrators/Global Moderators should be done to create this sub-forum.

-----------

B. Also, I had a discussion with Sander about the Translation category which, according to this draft, will be deleted.
Indeed the Translation Team Coordination Working Group has asked for long to only list there sites proposing Registered language packs as these sites most of the time propose custom translations for 3pd extensions, or even modified 3pd extensions including in their pack the language concerned.
I was told that it was projected to list Community Sites in a specific category (maybe not on JED).
I proposed that the specific Language-Oriented Community sites proposing Registered core language packs as well as other translations be listed separately and in a prominent way to help users find out the translations they need.

I do not see any feedback on this. Can we have some?

[mattbaylor]

what is the legal reasoning behind using the State of Maryland?

Honestly, I have no clue. Nor does anyone else. Maryland is what is in the current ToS and we just left it as is. We will change it to NY though.

[WP4J]

This rule forbids any proposed extension to link to a specific forum.joomla.org topic for users to get help about the extension.

The Global Moderators have proposed that this rule be amended to concern only Commercial Extensions and that be created on forum.joomla.org a specific sub-forum for these help topics for free extensions.

It is a good idea to let non-commerical extensions have support in the forums, although it should be something opted into as many 3PD could get irritated if support posts get fragmented to the Joomla forums when they already have their own support system in place.

Also I was thinking that it could be a good idea to have a subforum or something for "orphaned" projects as well. A kind of place where a dev can announced that their code is up for adoption (not sure if you already have such a thing in place). This could even be a category of the JED it's self maybe, idk.

[mattbaylor]

- 4.1 "or shared file hosting websites such as RapidShare and MediaFire."
Do we really need to advertise those? Why not Dropbox and so on?

The idea is to prevent the use of warez file sharing sites or the commercial advertising sites. If you can think of a term that describes those in a way that is universally understandable we could drop the examples.

- 4.1 Anything that is not installable within Joomla
This will remove the Tools section? http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/tools

Correct, the tools category will be dropped, as well as translations.

- "4.5 Changing from Free to Paid"
should be: Changing distribution model
This is to also include paid to free changes. So no discussions on why this or that: One listing = one distribution model

It's always been that way. Changing from non-commercial to free you lose the reviews. Going from commercial to non-commercial the reviews remained.

The only thing we changed was the language. Non-Commercial will be referred to as Free and Commercial will be referred to as Paid.

[WP4J]

- 4.1 "or shared file hosting websites such as RapidShare and MediaFire."
Do we really need to advertise those? Why not Dropbox and so on?

Before my component went commercial I was distributing via Dropbox (I didn't actually notice that condition). The thing is that with Dropbox you can use a direct URL to download so the user doesn't really notice or have to go to another site, etc.

It would seem that Dropbox would be a good solution to distribute files and I am not really sure why it would not be allowed, it is probably more reliable than many user run servers out there.

[zanderp]

HI JM,

Thanks for the feedback.

A. We had an important discussion on a rule which has been implemented recently and caused many older extensions to be suddenly unpublished without warning.
FYI, that rule does not exist in the present TOS. It is only displayed when someone proposes a new extension which obviously could not be known by the 3pd maintaining extensions proposed earlier.

This rule forbids any proposed extension to link to a specific forum.joomla.org topic for users to get help about the extension.

The Global Moderators have proposed that this rule be amended to concern only Commercial Extensions and that be created on forum.joomla.org a specific sub-forum for these help topics for free extensions.

Therefore, the suggestion is:
1. Any specific rule should be in the TOS, and not "hidden" later in the process.
2. Non-commercial extensions from 3pd who only propose such type of extensions should be allowed to link for help on the forum.joomla.org as it was accepted formerly. Coordination with Forum Administrators/Global Moderators should be done to create this sub-forum.

It is indeed correct that there is no rule in the new TOS. Also, we will rewrite the Extension Checklist which currently list the rule preventing the use of using the Joomla forum, and it will be removed. So no 'hidden' rule about that.

B. Also, I had a discussion with Sander about the Translation category which, according to this draft, will be deleted.
Indeed the Translation Team Coordination Working Group has asked for long to only list there sites proposing Registered language packs as these sites most of the time propose custom translations for 3pd extensions, or even modified 3pd extensions including in their pack the language concerned.
I was told that it was projected to list Community Sites in a specific category (maybe not on JED).
I proposed that the specific Language-Oriented Community sites proposing Registered core language packs as well as other translations be listed separately and in a prominent way to help users find out the translations they need.

I do not see any feedback on this. Can we have some?

This topic is mainly to discuss the new TOS that is proposed. It is indeed correct that we will list community sites, but not on the JED. So therefore nothing refers to the community sites in this TOS, which is only for the JED.

[horus_68]

- 4.1 "or shared file hosting websites such as RapidShare and MediaFire."
Do we really need to advertise those? Why not Dropbox and so on?

If you can think of a term that describes those in a way that is universally understandable we could drop the examples.

A TOS need to be neutral and timeless:
4.1 "shared cloud storage or file hosting websites"

[horus_68]

- "4.5 Changing from Free to Paid"
should be: Changing distribution model
This is to also include paid to free changes. So no discussions on why this or that: One listing = one distribution model

It's always been that way. Changing from non-commercial to free you lose the reviews. Going from commercial to non-commercial the reviews remained.

I know but it gained several disputes. Make this a clear "one entry = one model" and it will plain simple to explain later (for developers and users)!

[horus_68]

The only thing we changed was the language. Non-Commercial will be referred to as Free and Commercial will be referred to as Paid.

- why changing from "Commercial" to "Paid"?
Non-Commercial = Free? Why complicating?!
And there we go again with the "Free as a bear" / "free as in freedom". This was not a good statement form all other opensource movements in the past and this will not be good in the future too!
Not all commercial extensions (on JED) require real payment!
Lets stay clear: this is a business plan, so: non-commercial // commercial.

[horus_68]

- 4.1 "or shared file hosting websites such as RapidShare and MediaFire."
Do we really need to advertise those? Why not Dropbox and so on?

It would seem that Dropbox would be a good solution to distribute files and I am not really sure why it would not be allowed, it is probably more reliable than many user run servers out there.

Until you find that several cloud storages websites are blocked on the corporate/school internet!

[infograf768]

HI JM,
It is indeed correct that there is no rule in the new TOS. Also, we will rewrite the Extension Checklist which currently list the rule preventing the use of using the Joomla forum, and it will be removed. So no 'hidden' rule about that.

Thanks for the reply.
Does that mean that we are going back to the older status where any extension can link to a specific topic in forum.joomla.org (was formerly in the GPL sub-forum)?
Or/and does that mean that a decision was taken in coordination with Forum admins to create a specific sub-forum for these?
Or/and does it mean that a link is accepted Only if the extension is non-commercial?

This topic is mainly to discuss the new TOS that is proposed. It is indeed correct that we will list community sites, but not on the JED. So therefore nothing refers to the community sites in this TOS, which is only for the JED.

Agree, I just thought it should be stated in this topic as the JED Translation category is proposed for deletion.

[infograf768]

The only thing we changed was the language. Non-Commercial will be referred to as Free and Commercial will be referred to as Paid.

- why changing from "Commercial" to "Paid"?
Non-Commercial = Free? Why complicating?!
And there we go again with the "Free as a bear" / "free as in freedom". This was not a good statement form all other opensource movements in the past and this will not be good in the future too!
Not all commercial extensions (on JED) require real payment!
Lets stay clear: this is a business plan, so: non-commercial // commercial.

++, horus

[mattbaylor]

- why changing from "Commercial" to "Paid"?
Non-Commercial = Free? Why complicating?!
And there we go again with the "Free as a bear" / "free as in freedom". This was not a good statement form all other opensource movements in the past and this will not be good in the future too!
Not all commercial extensions (on JED) require real payment!
Lets stay clear: this is a business plan, so: non-commercial // commercial.

This has nothing to do with the Free as in beer argument. There are a large number of end users that see commercial and non-commercial and think they cannot use an extension marked as non-commercial on a commercial website.

The extensions that "don't require a real payment" actually do require a form of payment. "Pay with a Tweet or Like" is still a payment.

There's no reason to use confusing language. Either it's free to download or you have to pay or trade something to download.

[garyjaybrooks]

I think using he word "Paid" and "Free" is perfect idea and HUGE one +++. We need to be clear with our end users. Changing these words does not take away the Open source nature of the code.

Good job team.

[JacquesR]

what is the legal reasoning behind using the State of Maryland?

Honestly, I have no clue. Nor does anyone else. Maryland is what is in the current ToS and we just left it as is. We will change it to NY though.

As far as I'm aware, the reference to Maryland has been in the Joomla! directories' Terms of Service for a number of years, and should remain unchanged.

Here's the official answer:
(we will put it in a FAQ on OSM)

Question:
The following phrase is often at the end of a Terms & Conditions document on the joomla.org directories:

"Any dispute with respect to our Site shall be governed by the laws of the State of Maryland, excluding its conflicts of laws rules. All visitors to our Site submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the state and/or federal courts of the State of Maryland."

Open Source Matters, Inc. (OSM) is incorporated in the State of New York, so why does it mention the State of Maryland?

Answer:
Dispute settlement is something OSM seeks to avoid whenever possible. It is expensive and we believe that our scarce resources are better spent on productive issues that help drive our collective mission and goals. But sometimes disputes do arise. And when they do, OSM seeks to balance the competing demands of minimizing costs while also obtaining the most advantageous forum.

In dispute settlement, the legal concept of personal jurisdiction permits the parties to select the forum they would like to settle their dispute. So although New York is OSM's state of incorporation, OSM is not bound to litigate exclusively in New York.

In fact, pursuing a case in New York courts is often expensive and can take a long time. Working with OSM's legal counsel, we considered various issues, including expected costs, the size of existing court dockets, the experience of the judges and their familiarity with issues relevant to OSM, etc.

Balancing these various issues, we believe that selecting Maryland as the forum to decide OSM's disputes best serves the community and protects OSM's interests.

---
Jacques Rentzke
Open Source Matters

[WP4J]

In relation to my post here: http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=262&t=807035

I would like to propose that the following requirement (or something like it) be added to the Terms of Service:

Code: Select all

That all all materials / assets distributed with the extension (images, css, javascript, etc) be GPL or of a licence that is GPL compatible.

I propose this because I feel that differently licensed CSS and Javascript provide a loop hole which developers can use to circumvent the freedoms provided by the GPL as well as this TOS rule:

4.1 General Rules

Entries must be licensed as GPL in order to be listed. Additional restrictions may not be placed on top of the GPL. Please note that the GPL does allow developers to charge for their products.

Proprietary licensed CSS and Javascript seems to violate: "Additional restrictions may not be placed on top of the GPL", but there is ambiguity so appending the rule about css and javascript to the TOS will properly clarify this.

I bring this up because the Spirit of the GPL seems in the interest of being able to reuse existing code/features and even fork if you would like. Having a loop hole like that which is present with Javascript and CSS seems against this spirit of freedom and collaboration, it also exposes developers basing code on that of existing extensions listed in the JED to the danger of getting sued for doing something that they thought entirely legal under the GPL.

It is also worth noting that this does not stop the developer from distributing proprietary CSS and such, it just means that these proprietary assets cannot be part of the functional package posted to the JED and that proprietary assets must be offered in a separate package.

It is really a case of doing this or allowing split licensed packages such as that found here, otherwise there is just too much confusion.

I would like to add that to me it seems this css, javascript issue was actually worked out in the GPL with this cause:

But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.

I'm not lawyer... but then I don't have to be one to understand what the above implies, especially with it's relevance to a Joomla extension zip/package.

Thank you for considering this.

[JTema]

- 4.1 Anything that is not installable within Joomla
This will remove the Tools section? http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/tools

I think that will not include toolbars installable as modules. I was working on a non-commercial toolbar can be installed as a joomla module.

[mattbaylor]

- 4.1 Anything that is not installable within Joomla
This will remove the Tools section? http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/tools

I think that will not include toolbars installable as modules. I was working on a non-commercial toolbar can be installed as a joomla module.

If it's installable in Joomla it's OK. We are just eliminating the tools category which is mostly stuff that doesn't install i.e. desktop apps, stand alone scripts etc.

[JTema]

Ok thankyou matt.

[paulsimonrough]

What if you have an extension that has to be currently installed manually like my offline page could be set it up to install within Joomla!

http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions ... line/17000

What category would I put it in? it not a module, component or plugin.

I could set it up so the XML copies the files across to be where they need to be... but is the tools category going to be replaced with an "other" category?

I wonder if there are some perfectly good extensions going to be removed simply because they don't fall into a specific category.

[tavana]

In relation to my post here: http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=262&t=807035

I would like to propose that the following requirement (or something like it) be added to the Terms of Service:

Code: Select all

That all all materials / assets distributed with the extension (images, css, javascript, etc) be GPL or of a licence that is GPL compatible.

I propose this because I feel that differently licensed CSS and Javascript provide a loop hole which developers can use to circumvent the freedoms provided by the GPL as well as this TOS rule:

I'm agree with WP4J, we have this kind of problem,

[Radek Suski]

Some thoughts:

Additional restrictions may not be placed on top of the GPL.

How would it be related to the additional Terms according section 7 of GNU/GPL V3 is that a part of the GPL or not?

Regards,
Radek

[WP4J]

In relation to my post here: http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=262&t=807035

I would like to propose that the following requirement (or something like it) be added to the Terms of Service:

Code: Select all

That all all materials / assets distributed with the extension (images, css, javascript, etc) be GPL or of a licence that is GPL compatible.

I propose this because I feel that differently licensed CSS and Javascript provide a loop hole which developers can use to circumvent the freedoms provided by the GPL as well as this TOS rule:

I'm agree with WP4J, we have this kind of problem,

As per that link I posted (http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=262&t=807035), this is not evidently a problem for JED Management, in fact the wording of the TOS was changed to specifically allow for developers to effectively "limit" the distribution of their extensions via proprietary CSS and Javascript.

In my opinion this "allowance" is in direct conflict with the spirit of the GPL, but as witnessed the opinion of a "little developer" is of limited consequence here. I can remember many years ago protesting the prohibition of "non-redistributable" extensions in the JED - at that time I wanted the ability to shut down the redistribution of my code, I wanted to have my cake and eat it as well, in other words, I wanted to ride the back of Joomla without the fear of someone taking my work, enhancing it and then redistributing it!

In the end I came to understand that Software Freedom it is not such a bad thing, if someone enhances my work I can then use these enhancements in my product, if I should decide to discontinue my product then users would have the ability to pick it up and continue... the problem was still competition, but then I realized that competition is not such a bad thing either as it can spur innovation - it becomes imperative that I continue to innovate. Most importantly, it is not right that I have the ability to take the hard work of others given so freely, given with the belief of software freedom and apply massive restrictions in a parasitic way as opposed to working with the developer in a symbiotic way.

With the allowance of proprietary CSS and Javascript we have now come full circle and returned to that very situation which, after extensive debate, was found to be in contravention to the very principle for which Joomla was founded, that being on the mission and values behind the GPL.

Lets take a look at Joomla's official word on Extensions and GPL. Early on we see this statement:

About Joomla! and the GPL

The Joomla Project is a GPL community, which means not just that a particular Free and Open Source license is used for Joomla software, but also that we believe in the mission and values behind that license. These include collaboration, community, and freedom. The GPL license embodies these values.

"...but also that we believe in the mission and values behind that license"

Witnessed in the above is the declaration by Joomla that it believes in the "mission and values" behind the GPL license.

Lets take a look at the mission as stated by the GNU it's self:

Our mission is to preserve, protect and promote the freedom to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute(emphasis added) computer software, and to defend the rights of Free Software users.

Time and time again we see the emphasis from Joomla / Opensource Matters about "freedom of distribution" and we have to ask, what exactly does this imply. To most people it would seem to imply complete freedom of distribution as per the mission of the GPL (a mission which Joomla states as being in complete alignment). Yet, a short time ago, JED submission rules (that had been in effect for many years) were edited to make it possible for Developers to post extensions to the JED that have substantial restrictions on redistribution, allowing for the developer to effectively restrict redistribution that is not to their liking.

Now we need to ask ourselves, who made this important decision with such far reaching consequences, where was the debate, where was the community? How could this decision be made in such a unilateral way and passed off simply as:

"The wording was fixed to avoid the confusion." (http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f ... 5#p3048179)

"Fixed" seems to imply that there was a mistake in the wording, a mistake that managed to survive extensive debate and years of public scrutiny. Lets have a look at the mistake:

"5. Limit distribution of extension? Publishable on the JED: NO"

The above line was edited to make it this:

"5. Limit distribution of PHP files? Publishable on the JED: NO"

Such a small thing... yet with this change the door has been opened to shut down the redistribution of Joomla extensions in a way that specifically goes against the very mission statement of the GPL and Joomla itself. Where is the consistency?

It is now imperative that public debate be encouraged to explore this change to the Joomla Mission in regards to the redistribution of extensions. Most importantly some kind of official statement needs to be released to inform the community about these new restrictions on extension distribution. Those working on the core of Joomla need to know that any work that they do can be released with restrictions on distribution that go against the mission and spirit of the GPL even though official Joomla mission statements seem to deny this. Developers are now being effectively deceived into believing that they have the right to integrate any enhancements back into their project without restriction.

For example I could spend months creating a great extension, but being a coder my design is not so good... so then comes along Johnny designer who is a wiz at Javascript and CSS, he then creates an awesome frontend for my software and starts to distribute it with the restriction that "the CSS/Javascript distributed with this extension can only be used on servers owned by the user and cannot be redistributed to third parties". This means that I cannot use Johnny's enhancements, but he can use mine without restriction. In the end Johnny gets the popularity because I can't design for [censored], and people like nice design. In the end I get so disillusioned that I quit slaving for Johnny and end my project....

One also has to ask, for what reason are there restrictions on Joomla Templates being added to the JED, was it not for the fact that Templates ship with proprietary assets? That restrictions are routinely made on redistribution. With the "wording fix" is it not now allowable for templates to be listed on the JED? If not, why not?

There should also be a new flag added to the Jed, something along the lines of:

"This extension has restrictions on redistribution" - surely this is more important than: "this extension requires registration to download".....

People need to know exactly what they are getting!

It is understood that there are various legal precedents that "seem" to allow for the restriction of the distribution of CSS / Javascript running with GPL files, but for an organization that prides itself on the statement "Open Source Matters", legal precedents should always take second place to the "Mission" and "Spirit" that the project aspires to. The founder of the GPL itself, Richard Stallman, has grave concerns about Javascript and it's threat to free software that is embodied in this statement:

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html

And we have to ask ourselves as a community, do we really want to allow for proprietary assets to be distributed inside an Extension package that severely limits our rights under the GPL? And if so, should such a decision be made at the discretion of one person that may or may not have motivation inline with the spirit and mission of the GPL?

I leave you with Freedom 2:

The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Thanks for reading!