Open-source licenses: Tips, Tricks and Concerns

Ignorance Is Not Bliss Jason Ayers and Julian Fitzell

Many people develop open source software out of a desire to contribute to a community. Copyright ownership and licensing are often the last things on these contributors’ minds, but they may be the first thing a commercial user will consider. Do you understand the liability issues that make this so important to them? It’s tempting to say “we’ll worry about that when it comes up” but do you fully understand the risks of doing so?

This session will encourage you to consider what you want to achieve through your contributions to open source and how this affects your approach to the specific challenges of software copyright and licensing. In the second half, we will assemble a panel with an Intellectual Property lawyer and representatives from commercial vendors and open source projects such Seaside, Squeak, and Pharo.

Bios: Jason Ayers

With 20 years working with Smalltalk and Agile techniques, Jason currently looks after the Smalltalk business in Europe and Africa for Cincom.

Julian Fitzell

Best known as one of the creators and current maintainers of the Seaside web framework, Julian has recently joined Cincom as a consultant, where he is kept busy working with customers and feeding the wolves.