OVN License for Digital Resources

Status: v1.0 -- Early development. This license is a working draft seeking community review from legal experts, open-source practitioners, and commons-oriented organizations. It has not been reviewed by a lawyer and is not OSI-approved. See CHANGELOG.md for known issues.

What Is This?

The OVN License for Digital Resources is a copyleft license designed for commons-based peer production. It ensures that software remains free and open while requiring users who derive material benefits to share a portion of those benefits with contributors, proportional to their contributions as recorded in a Contribution Pie-Chart.

Quick Start

To apply this license to your project:

1. Copy LICENSE.md into your project root.
2. Create a pie-chart.json file listing contributors, their shares, and roles. See spec/contribution-pie-chart.md for the format and spec/examples/ for templates.
3. Add a header to each source file (or your README):

   This work is licensed under the OVN License For Digital Resources v1.0
   Redistribution and Use require compliance with reciprocity terms.
   See LICENSE file and accompanying Contribution Pie-Chart.
   Copyright (c) [year] [your name or organization]
   

Key Concepts

• Contribution Pie-Chart -- A machine-readable file that records each contributor's share of the project. It travels with the source code and governs benefit distribution. See the specification.

• Reciprocity Tiers -- The license distinguishes between non-commercial entities (cooperatives, nonprofits, commoners) who owe a minimum of 0.5% of material benefits, and commercial entities who owe at least 2%. Both tiers distribute according to the pie-chart.

• Cure Period -- If you violate the license terms, you have 30 days to cure the violation and have your rights reinstated by the contributor community. This encourages good-faith compliance over punitive enforcement.

Repository Contents

LICENSE.md                   The license text (v1.0)
README.md                    This file
CHANGELOG.md                 Version history and known issues
RATIONALE.md                 Design choices and legal context
CONTRIBUTING.md              How to propose changes

spec/
  contribution-pie-chart.md          Pie-Chart specification (draft v0.1)
  contribution-pie-chart.schema.json JSON Schema for validation
  examples/                          Example pie-chart files

compatibility/
  README.md                  Compatibility overview
  CAL-1.0.md                 Cryptographic Autonomy License analysis
  AGPLv3.md                  AGPL v3 interaction analysis
  GPLv3.md                   GPL v3 relationship clarification
  MIT-Apache2.md             Permissive license interactions

examples/
  holochain-happ/            Applying the license to a Holochain hApp
  python-service/            Applying the license to a Python service
  documentation/             Applying the license to documentation

Related Projects

• Sensorica -- The Open Value Network that originated the principles behind this license.
• OVN Wiki -- Documentation on OVN governance, contribution accounting, and the pie-chart concept.
• NRP-CAS -- Network Resource Planning / Contribution Accounting System, the software that pioneered contribution tracking in value networks.

Contributing

We welcome contributions, especially from legal professionals, open-source license experts, and practitioners of commons-based peer production. See CONTRIBUTING.md for the process.

License for This Repository

The contents of this repository (documentation, specification, examples) are licensed under CC-BY-SA-4.0. The license text itself (LICENSE.md) may be freely copied and applied to your projects as described in Section 6 of the license.