A Suggestion to Authors/WoWI on Future-Directed Licencing

[Seerah]

I apologize, but unlike Haleth, I didn't read through the entire OP. (I is tired and ADD atm. But I tried!)

But I did want to point out that while someone is well within their rights to update/modify an addon that has a license allowing such, the authors themselves are also *well within their rights* to not include any such license at all. Be it out of ignorance or on purpose, there is absolutely nothing that says that they cannot do this. As you already pointed out, at least in the US, addons are automatically ARR unless specifically licensed differently. Why should authors be forced to license their creative works as something else? If I don't want 3 different variations of PocketPlot floating around the interwebs (either modified or old, redistributed versions) then that is my right to limit such a thing.

Some users say that authors *should* make their addons open source. The usual argument for this is "What will I do when they move on with their life and stop updating the addons that I want to use? Why do they have to make my life hard?" (emphasis mine, of course) This, however, is a selfish argument. If an author didn't release their creative works to the public domain upon leaving the game/authoring or arrange for someone to take over the project then either A) they didn't want to or B) they didn't think it was important. In either case, users can put forth a small fraction of the effort that the author expended in writing and upkeeping the addons and find themselves something new to use.

This is also a misunderstanding by you:

the addon is usually All Rights Reserved - despite the fact that WoW addons are inherently open-source after a fashion (as the form of Lua accepted by WoW is solely a text based scripting language with no human-unreadable bytecode) and that the use of addons for profit is frowned upon to put it mildly

Just because you can read the text in a book does not mean that it cannot/should not be ARR. The same applies to code. Just because you can read my Lua script does not mean that it cannot/should not be ARR. And just because the addon has to be offered for free does not mean that you should also be free to do whatever you please with it. Have you heard the phrase in software, "Free as in free beer, not as in free speech"?

I do not include a license with any of my addons. Is this because I hate users, want them to become attached to my addons, and then will laugh incessantly when they cry after I let the addons die a fiery death? No. Do I sit at home staring at my addon code in Notepad++ repeating "My preciousssssss"? No. I put my addons up for download because I'm nice like that. But they are still mine. I do still have the option of saying "No" to a feature request and I do take enough pride in my work to hate to see it copied or years old versions stolen off WoWI and redistributed elsewhere. Hell, even current versions. WoWI is where I want my addons to be so that they get the traffic, I keep comments and bug reports in one place, and users know how/where to contact me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I could probably find a license to suit all my needs or write something up myself. But instead of me going through all of that additional effort and wading through legal jargon, would it kill you to ask me how to change something or to take over the addon when/if I'm gone? I'm usually known to be pretty amiable. And if I instead say "Bugger off!", well, I'm within my rights to do so.

[Arrowmaster]

You weren't around when stealing of Addons and rehosting them for profit (advertisement impressions) was rampant. Most of the formerly open-source addons I worked on were switched to ARR so we could send DMCA take down notices and threaten to take their domains if they didn't comply.

[Kendian]

Originally Posted by Seerah Is this because I hate users, want them to become attached to my addons, and then will laugh incessantly when they cry after I let the addons die a fiery death? No. Do I sit at home staring at my addon code in Notepad++ repeating "My preciousssssss"?

Off topic: This gave me the giggle fits~

[Talyrius]

Originally Posted by Seerah ... Do I sit at home staring at my addon code in Notepad++ repeating "My preciousssssss"? No. ...

I'm sorry, it had to be done.

[Seerah]

Originally Posted by Kendian Off topic: This gave me the giggle fits~

You are very welcome, sir.

[Farmbuyer]

Originally Posted by Seerah Do I sit at home staring at my addon code in Notepad++ repeating "My preciousssssss"?

I see that Seerah's discovered my software development model.

[sakurakira]

Originally Posted by Seerah Why should authors be forced to license their creative works as something else? If I don't want 3 different variations of PocketPlot floating around the interwebs (either modified or old, redistributed versions) then that is my right to limit such a thing.

Wouldn't a fair compromise be to include various license options, including the ARR, when they submit an addon? Currently, the only thing WoWI has in the way of this is...

Allow Updates & AddOns Do you want to allow other authors to submit optional patches and addons for your interface? Patches/addons will not change your main download file, it will only show these files other people submit for your interface as optional downloads on your file info page. This option will be enabled on interfaces that have been abandoned or not updated for a length of time automatically. Yes/No

I don't see why you couldn't include a license section as well, perhaps in the way deviantART does, which is the optional Creative Commons license on submission, including various options of non-commercial, derivative, and share alike, as well as the ARR.

To my way of thinking this lets all authors be informed of what exactly can and cannot be done with their work, and also displays this information for users of the site.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I could probably find a license to suit all my needs or write something up myself. But instead of me going through all of that additional effort and wading through legal jargon, would it kill you to ask me how to change something or to take over the addon when/if I'm gone? I'm usually known to be pretty amiable. And if I instead say "Bugger off!", well, I'm within my rights to do so.

If WoWI had a submission based license option you, nor any other author, wouldn't have to go through the trouble of doing a specialized thing just for your addons.

Finally, while it is really great that you are able to be contacted, take suggestions and so forth, and while I have seen authors who very clearly announce that they are leaving WoW and calling for others to take up the reigns of their addon(s), one of the OP's points is that authors sometimes drop out of the community for various reasons and never return. Those people can't just be contacted and asked if someone else can take over.


I'm certainly not advocating that everything should be open, as I greatly value the work that addon authors put into their craft, without compensation other than relative fame on sites like these. Also, having 55 versions of whatever addon floating around is/can be a huge nuisance as ignorant users find their way back to the real author and report problems the poor author has no way of knowing about in a broken addon obtained on some random site.

However I do think that a solution could be reached that would satisfy everyone in this matter.

Also, I think there might be authors who might not even be aware of their rights regarding code or artwork when they submit it to sites like these. Having a more detailed submission process would help those authors as well.

[Cairenn]

Originally Posted by sakurakira Wouldn't a fair compromise be to include various license options, including the ARR, when they submit an addon? Currently, the only thing WoWI has in the way of this is...<snip>

It's on our list, has been for quite some time. Unfortunately, it's a fairly long list. =/

[zohar101]

I have no thoughts on this particular issue not being an addon author, but I did read the first post and I thought I'd mention a few good pieces of news. Shefki has come back in fact (he even dropped a word at the UI forums) and is working on Pitbull updates for MoP. There is an alpha that's MoP ready up on wowace though he's still tweaking it.

Same goes for XPerl though XPerl is lagging a bit behind as XPerl had a lot of issues in 4.3 even that went unfixed a while. The authors seem to be catching up with the bugs (at least from what I can tell from the changelogs, also on wowace) and the outlook on MoP readiness is looking good right now.

Perl Classic MoP version has been up a while and there's also been Perl Lite which is an oUF look-alike version of XPerl (this one also on wowace).

oUF and many oUF layouts seem to be MoP ready as well though only MoP ready version of oUF I could find was on github.

It seemed pretty dismal at the start of the MoP beta I admit, and I've been on the side compiling a list of MoP ready addons by category (http://www.plusheal.com/forum/m/1833...p-ready-addons), trying to keep track of this, but I looked at it recently and it's grown quite a bit. I hold out hope that most of the essential addons will be MoP ready. There still will be those that get left behind I'm sure but so far I've been able to find alternatives to everything I was looking for.

So far the most dismal category has to do with talent/glyph/actionbar switching on profiles/talent/ability switch (only actionbar saver is up) and also LDB displays (only DockingStation which is a bit of a shock considering number of LDB plugins which are already MoP ready).

Oh and regarding buffbar mods, you can try Raven which has a MoP ready version out, in place of EBB.

[Phanx]

Originally Posted by sakurakira ... lets all authors be informed of what exactly can and cannot be done with their work ...

While I wouldn't mind seeing this information listed on the addon's download page, the reality is that every licensed addon includes a copy of that license inside its folder, right next to its .TOC and other files. It's freely viewable by anyone who downloads that addon. Since downloading is implicitly allowed by the author's act of uploading the addon to a public distribution site, anyone is free to download the addon and view the license file.

Besides, you can't copy code from an addon you don't have, and if you have a copy of an addon to view its code, you also have a copy of its license.

Originally Posted by sakurakira If WoWI had a submission based license option you, nor any other author, wouldn't have to go through the trouble of doing a specialized thing just for your addons.

Many addon authors use the GPL, MIT license, BSD license, or another well-established license that requires no more effort on their part than copying and pasting a file. Even if WoWI displayed an addon's license on its download page, the addon itself would still need to include a copy of the license.

The authors who "go through the trouble" of writing their own license are almost certainly aware that the GPL et al. exist, and have intentionally chosen not to use them. I don't think it's very likely that WoWI adding an optional "pick one of these popular licenses" select box to the addon submission form would change their mind about how to license their work.

Originally Posted by sakurakira ... while it is really great that you are able to be contacted, take suggestions and so forth, ... authors sometimes drop out of the community for various reasons and never return. Those people can't just be contacted and asked if someone else can take over.

If the addons left behind by those authors are truly indispensible, the fact that their code can't be reused verbatim is not likely to be much of a sticking point; someone will write a new addon that provides the same features. If nobody does write such an addon, it probably means the addon is not as indispensible as you think.

It sucks when an addon you really liked gets left by the wayside, but if it turns out you're one of only 10 people who were using the addon, there's not much motivation for strangers to go out of their way and spend their time writing addons just for you. If you really can't play without the addon, I guess your choices are (a) quit WoW, (b) reexamine your gameplay style, or (c) learn Lua and write your own addon.

I think Unbelievable said it pretty well:

Originally Posted by Unbelievable The main issue is that some players seem to think that they are somehow entitled to unlimited, unpaid support ad infinitum. They aren't. They also seem to believe that they have some god given right to use a mod forever and that it should always work. They don't and it won't. ... Instead of berating the author for ceasing development perhaps it would be better to thank them for the many months/years of support in the past.

[sakurakira]

Originally Posted by Phanx While I wouldn't mind seeing this information listed on the addon's download page, the reality is that every licensed addon includes a copy of that license inside its folder, right next to its .TOC and other files. It's freely viewable by anyone who downloads that addon.

Where? I downloaded the most recent version of Grid on WoWI and don't see one in there. The Readme for Grid has the same text as the main page description, and I even did a folder search for the word "license" and got nothing, I also searched for WTFPL.

For kicks, I downloaded some addons on the "What's Hot?" list here. Carbonite and DBM both have license files, while Bartender4 and GearScore do not.

I think Unbelievable said it pretty well...

I don't think I said anything that contradicted this statement... And I also tried to specifically phrase my post in such a way as to not get the "go and learn to code yourself" response...

I'm certainly not advocating that everything should be open, as I greatly value the work that addon authors put into their craft, without compensation other than relative fame on sites like these. Also, having 55 versions of whatever addon floating around is/can be a huge nuisance as ignorant users find their way back to the real author and report problems the poor author has no way of knowing about in a broken addon obtained on some random site.

I also don't believe that every single person who uploads an addon or downloads an addon on this site is as aware of licensing issues as you and some of the other authors in this thread. I also suggested that picking a license when you upload could be optional.

[Othgar]

This kind of discussion is why I just upload all of my addons as Copyleft All Rights Reversed (pardon the old discordian phrasing). The way I look at it, no matter what some one, some where, will probably use some of my code without asking, so instead I use Copyleft so that no one has to track me down to ask.

[Phanx]

Originally Posted by sakurakira Where? I downloaded the most recent version of Grid on WoWI and don't see one in there.

I think you missed the important part of what I wrote, even though you underlined it when you quoted it:

While I wouldn't mind seeing this information listed on the addon's download page, the reality is that every licensed addon includes a copy of that license

Grid is not distributed under a license. It's simply "all rights reserved". That is the default state for any work. If an addon -- or any other work covered under copyright -- does not specifically waive some/all rights via a license, then it defaults to "all rights reserved". Copyright law (at least for works created in the United States) does not require that the work include a specific copyright notice or document explaining what copyright means. If there is no notice stating otherwise, it's "all rights reserved", and "all rights reserved" is not a license.

Originally Posted by sakurakira Carbonite and DBM both have license files, while Bartender4 and GearScore do not.

Yep. That means that the authors of Carbonite and DBM allow you to redistribute, modify, and/or reuse portions of those addons under the terms specified in their respective licenses. By contrast. BT4 and GearScore are not licensed, so they are "all rights reserved" and you are not allowed to redistribute them, modify them, or reuse code from them unless you have gotten specific permission from their authors in writing beforehand. That's how copyright works.

Originally Posted by sakurakira And I also tried to specifically phrase my post in such a way as to not get the "go and learn to code yourself" response...

Well, there's not really any way you can word a post like that where "go and learn to code yourself" isn't going to come up. No author is obligated to maintain and support their addon forever. No author is obligated to release their work into the public domain, license their work as open-source, or give someone else permission to continue it. If they stop maintaining the addon, and don't give anyone permission to continue it or use the code verbatim, then your only options are, realistically, (a) hope someone else writes a new addon in the same spirit, and if they don't (b) move on or (c) "go and learn to code yourself". I'm not sure what other answer you think is possible.

Look at it another way -- let's say you find a trilogy you really, really like, but the third book isn't out yet. Now let's say the third book never comes out. Do you think the author is obligated to spend months or -- more likely -- years of their life writing another book that they don't really have any interest in writing? Do you think the author should be forced to put their work into the public domain, or give another writer permission to use their characters, their world, and their story to write the third installation in the trilogy?

Originally Posted by sakurakira I also don't believe that every single person who uploads an addon or downloads an addon on this site is as aware of licensing issues as you and some of the other authors in this thread.

Yes, and your belief is likely correct. I'd guess that more addon authors are ignorant of their copyright rights than are knowledgable. But, it doesn't matter whether people who downloads an addon know how copyright applies to addons. Copyright has nothing to do with obtaining a legally distributed copy of an addon (buying a book, or checking it out from the library) or using the addon (reading the book).

It only matters whether people trying to upload an addon know what's allowed, and WoWI already includes a statement on the upload page about this, and has always been very good about removing uploads that violate someone else's copyright when notified by the copyright holder. If someone ignores the "don't upload other people's work without permission" notice, or doesn't understand what it means, adding an optional "pick a license" field on the upload page probably would not change anything.

[Phanx]

Originally Posted by zohar101 It seemed pretty dismal at the start of the MoP beta I admit ...

I've been around for every expansion's beta phase, and I'm always surprised by this kind of attitude. So many people seem to expect that every addon author gets into the beta right away, that every addon author has time to spent hours and hours updating all of their addons right away, and/or that updating addons just doesn't take any time at all. Most addon authors have a host of other obligations -- a day job, a family, a raid schedule to keep, a personal life outside of WoW -- that limit how much time they can -- or want to -- spend updating addons for a beta test that's months away from a release.

Another consideration that usually gets overlooked is that many addons don't need to be updated at all. You likely won't ever see a special "beta version" of such addons; you can just check the "Load out of date addons" box and you're good to go.

Originally Posted by zohar101 ... and also LDB displays (only DockingStation which is a bit of a shock considering number of LDB plugins which are already MoP ready).

I think most LDB displays fall under the umbrella of "addons that work without any updates". Bazooka and Barrel work just fine.

[zohar101]

I've been around for every expansion's beta phase, and I'm always surprised by this kind of attitude. So many people seem to expect that every addon author gets into the beta right away, that every addon author has time to spent hours and hours updating all of their addons right away, and/or that updating addons just doesn't take any time at all. Most addon authors have a host of other obligations -- a day job, a family, a raid schedule to keep, a personal life outside of WoW -- that limit how much time they can -- or want to -- spend updating addons for a beta test that's months away from a release.

Eh touchy topic. I didn't mean by that that authors should jump on their updates right away.
I meant there was a lot of grumbling about the MoP as an expansion in general, not quite as much interest in it (likely due to the fact it's 4th expansion) and a few authors leaving mid-cata (with no real word whether they'll be back), that I thought, this expansion may be problematic addon wise if a lot of addon authors lose interest in the game. Recent comebacks and updates have made me hopeful as I've tried to convey with the previous post.

Bazooka and Barrel work just fine.

I realize there are addons that make it into beta with few changes. Some are on that list and have the note that release version also works on the beta. But unless an author specifies it in a forum topic or addon description or even changelog (or a user mentions it), I don't know to add it. I was not able to test this myself for the longest time cause addons weren't working properly on mac beta. Thanks, added to the list. Didn't even know Barrel existed.