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Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2017 6:54 am
by joepal
Just out of curiosity: what is your proposed alternative?

Note the following restrictions:

* PyQT is GPLv3
* MHX2 is GPL
* The code base including assets is currently AGPLv3, which is compatible with the above, but could theoretically be changed to something else

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2017 5:38 pm
by blindsaypatten
I am only guessing at what the aims of the MakeHuman team are but:

I would replace:
As a special and limited exception, the copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grants the option to use CC0 1.0 Universal as published by the Creative Commons, either version 1.0 of the License, or (at your option) any later version, as a license for the MakeHuman characters exported under the conditions that a) The assets were bundled in an export that was made using the file export functionality inside an OFFICIAL and UNMODIFIED version of MakeHuman and/or b) the asset solely consists of a 2D binary image in PNG, BMP or JPG format.

With:
MakeHuman assets that are included in the export that are binary images in PNG, BMP, or JPG format are licenced <insert terms here, AGPL?>. Exported 3D meshes that are unmodified or modified versions of a MakeHuman mesh are licensed <insert terms here, AGPL?>. The MakeHuman targets (morphs) are licensed <insert terms here, AGPL?>. The copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grant an alternate licence for the MakeHuman image and mesh assets allowing software which does not produce exports that include or rely on the MakeHuman assets to use exported image and mesh assets for the sole purpose of rendering images, including image sequences.


I have eliminated CC0 because it isn't a license and I don't think there is a workable way to meaningfully apply CC0 to the export but not the assets. If the MakeHuman team wants to CC0 any of the assets that isn't a problem. If AGPL is used for all the asset types then the first three sentences can be combined. The last sentence is a first draft and is likely to require revision, but I hope the intention is clear. It should probably say "Unless otherwise licensed MakeHuman assets..." .

My fundamental issue is that right now MakeHuman is a great tool for generating 2D works but you are extremely restricted when creating 3D works in that you can't distribute any work that has any component that isn't AGPL-compatible. By component I mean both graphic assets and the rendering environment.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2017 9:46 pm
by joepal
blindsaypatten wrote:My fundamental issue is that right now MakeHuman is a great tool for generating 2D works but you are extremely restricted when creating 3D works in that you can't distribute any work that has any component that isn't AGPL-compatible. By component I mean both graphic assets and the rendering environment.


We have explicitly stated that assets bundled in an export fall under CC0. Even with all that you write above I still don't see how anyone could understand "use CC0 ... under the condition that the assets were bundled in an export" in any other way than "hey, now I have these assets and they are CC0". Stupid MH crew for not understanding that once something is CC0:d, that's it, since CC0 isn't license that can be set per copy. So now those assets are CC0, and for everyone.

Thus the problem in this case would be trying to enforce AGPL for something that was already released as CC0 rather than a new export possibly falling under AGPL.

blindsaypatten wrote:The copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grant an alternate licence for the MakeHuman image and mesh assets allowing software which does not produce exports that include or rely on the MakeHuman assets to use exported image and mesh assets for the sole purpose of rendering images, including image sequences.


I'm pretty confident that this way of phrasing the exception isn't going to produce less arguments than the current one. For example the formulation would prohibit use of exported assets together with MakeTarget and MakeClothes, which most definitely rely on makehuman assets and which export mesh assets. And it would prohibit importing a mesh in blender for the purpose of polishing it so it can be re-exported to a game engine.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Fri Oct 27, 2017 2:06 pm
by blindsaypatten
I fear that I am again distracting you from your other work, but I'll respond to your points in case it is of interest to you.
joepal wrote:
blindsaypatten wrote:My fundamental issue is that right now MakeHuman is a great tool for generating 2D works but you are extremely restricted when creating 3D works in that you can't distribute any work that has any component that isn't AGPL-compatible. By component I mean both graphic assets and the rendering environment.


We have explicitly stated that assets bundled in an export fall under CC0. Even with all that you write above I still don't see how anyone could understand "use CC0 ... under the condition that the assets were bundled in an export" in any other way than "hey, now I have these assets and they are CC0". Stupid MH crew for not understanding that once something is CC0:d, that's it, since CC0 isn't license that can be set per copy. So now those assets are CC0, and for everyone.

Thus the problem in this case would be trying to enforce AGPL for something that was already released as CC0 rather than a new export possibly falling under AGPL.


The problem is that the license does not explicitly state that the bundled assets fall under CC0, it says that the "character" may optionally have CC0 applied to it, without defining what a "character" is. Consider the scenario where I write a book and you write an article about my book. Say I give you permission to include an excerpt from my book in your article. If you then decide to place your article in the public domain by applying CC0, what you have done is renounce your copyright rights on your article, but you have not affected my copyright on the excerpt and if someone uses the excerpt outside of a copy of your article then I can enforce my copyright rights on that use. The very fact that the MH license does not explicitly state that the assets are CC0, and includes terms differentiating modified and unmodified versions of MakeHuman, supports an argument that the assets are like the excerpt and still AGPL while the rest of the export is like the article and now in the public domain. Earlier in this thread you stated that the CC0 applied to the particular permutation not the individual assets. The problem is that if the license is interpreted this way then the CC0 on "the character" is meaningless.

Now, in the unlikely case that this ever went to court, neither of us could be certain of what interpretation the judge would accept. This is itself the problem. The purpose of a license is to make clear the rights of the various parties. If a potential user can't be confident of the interpretation of the license they may decide not to use the software, which is a waste, or they may waste time and/or money trying to determine the meaning of the license. In the end if they use the software they may suffer from uncertainty and possibly anxiety about whether they have interpreted the license correctly. If the license is ever contested in court both the MH team and the user will have wasted money on lawyers. It would be far better for everyone if the terms of the license were clear.

If the intention of the MH team is for the exported assets to be CC0, or if the MH team agrees that the assets have entered the public domain by virtue of the terms of the current license, then it would be in everyone's interest to simply change the license to explicitly state that CC0 has been applied to the assets and they are now in the public domain. Alternatively, the license could be changed to something along the lines of my suggestion, in which case it would be clear that the assets are covered by AGPL, but allow use of the assets for the sole purpose of rendering images without the AGPL-compatible issues and release obligations of the AGPL.

joepal wrote:
blindsaypatten wrote:The copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grant an alternate licence for the MakeHuman image and mesh assets allowing software which does not produce exports that include or rely on the MakeHuman assets to use exported image and mesh assets for the sole purpose of rendering images, including image sequences.


I'm pretty confident that this way of phrasing the exception isn't going to produce less arguments than the current one. For example the formulation would prohibit use of exported assets together with MakeTarget and MakeClothes, which most definitely rely on makehuman assets and which export mesh assets. And it would prohibit importing a mesh in blender for the purpose of polishing it so it can be re-exported to a game engine.


It would have been clearer if I had written:
The copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grant an additional licence for...

This would make it clear that assets can still be used under AGPL terms but that the user may also use them in any software for the sole purpose of rendering images, even if the software or other assets are not AGPL-compatible and without incurring the obligations required by AGPL. Since they still have an AGPL licence they can still be used in any AGPL program, including MakeTarget and MakeClothes. Likewise for use in Blender.

Regardless of whether you like my alternative, I think it is in everyone's interest for the "CC0 exception" portion of the license to be rewritten to clearly state the intended terms. Having said that I recognize that the MakeHuman team may not want to put the time and effort into such a rewrite. I will make the offer that if the MakeHuman team will provide a clear statement of what the desired effect of the licence is, I will make an effort to obtain a clear legal text that expresses them.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 2:42 am
by joepal
blindsaypatten wrote:The problem is that the license does not explicitly state that the bundled assets fall under CC0, it says that the "character" may optionally have CC0 applied to it, without defining what a "character" is.


the copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grants the option to use CC0 1.0 Universal as published by the Creative Commons, either version 1.0 of the License, or (at your option) any later version, as a license for the MakeHuman characters exported under the conditions that a) The assets were bundled in an export that was made using the file export

Ok, so we have a character editor.

The only thing the program in question does is to model and export a character.

If we call it toon, goon, character, model, dude, thingy or avatar doesn't change the fact that the only thing we do in the program is to model and export this.

Then we have a sum total of one button called export, which exports a number of files.

And a license that says that if you export a character using the file export, then the assets that were bundled fall under CC0.

So come on, really? If you want pick a single word from the license text and discuss it completely outside context and claim that the word isn't properly defined, then I'm not surprised you are able to find problems. But in actual real-world use, the context is there.

I could possibly sympathize with the argument that CC0 formally isn't intended to be used as a license in this fashion. However for the rest of the discussion, the only thing I see here is a large amount of effort put into seeing ghosts where there are none.

blindsaypatten wrote:user may also use them in any software for the sole purpose of rendering images


This is a very limited view of how exports from MH are intended to be used. For example it doesn't cover using the exported mesh in a game, teaching body language using posing, using it to simulate skin in archaeological simulations or any other of the vast array of uses MH have been put to. It simply isn't viable to list things the export is allowed to be used for, since these can't be predicted.

blindsaypatten wrote:I will make the offer that if the MakeHuman team will provide a clear statement of what the desired effect of the licence is, I will make an effort to obtain a clear legal text that expresses them.


Thanks, but no thanks.

If we change the license, it will be for doing a larger overhaul. It won't be for changing around the words a bit in the current license text as an intermediary step.

In actual practise, the license can only be changed at the point of making a new release. We can't retroactively change the license for the existing binaries that float around in linux distributions etc. And having two releases of MH with the same version number but with different licenses would be extremely unfortunate.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 12:53 pm
by RobBaer
blindsaypatten wrote:What's missing here is the recognition that using CC0 means that you are placing your work in the public domain,

No, you are contributing to the creative commons. Public domain lacks copyright in the first place.

Edit: here is the appropriate reference:
https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/C ... M.22.29.3F

The idea of MH has always been to make the world a nicer place, not to make its users rich. It is to serve as an early stop on a creative journey; not to serve as a producer of commercial output by itself. CC0 items do NOT impose license restrictions on the whole of the derived works that use them. They do keep you from preventing ANOTHER artist from using the same or similar component in THEIR work. Here are the founder's words, "The MakeHuman mission is to promote digital art and digital artists by providing a free, open source, high quality tool for every artist on the planet." Nothing about individual riches; nothing about providing work for lawyers.

the copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets[b] grants the option to use CC0 1.0 Universal as published by the Creative Commons, either version 1.0 of the License, or (at your option) any later version, as a license for the MakeHuman characters exported under the conditions that a) The assets were bundled in an export that was made using the file export [/b]


You want to avoid once CC0 always CC0 concept? :( Don't you see that CC0 is liberating and potentially protects the next artist who uses MH? "Oh, I made something just like that -- BEFORE Lindsay did ...? Let's sue him." Not good. Note that this is different than suing you if you steal a whole creative work from me.

blindsaypatten wrote:In the end, what is the status of the images that are included in the export? Have they been placed in the public domain, and if not, what are the terms of use for the images? It seems like they would still be AGPL, so what is the meaning of the export being in the public domain? After you take out the mesh and the images, what exactly is left?


Indeed, the images themselves probably ARE AGPL, if used by themselves for some other purpose than as part of the MH set you exported [like to dress a DAZ character (if that were even possible)]... This would be like compiling a program for the sole purpose of stealing the byte code for your own compiler. The tool gives you something "free" and wishes that you were willing to "play it forward" without mandating that you do so.

And of course copyright holders are free to create multiple licenses of their product for different uses/users. For the right price, Joel might be willing to sell you a special license phrased in many ways. All you need to do is offer him that price :mrgreen: If its high enough, he might rethink the value all the free time he has put into the project over the years.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 2:22 pm
by wolgade
RobBaer wrote:No, you are contributing to the creative commons. Public domain lacks copyright.

Well, Lindsay said that CC0 means exactly lacking copyright and therefore public domain. This might be a valid point of view, depending on the jurisdiction you're under.
RobBaer wrote:The idea of MH has always been to make the world a nicer place, not to make its users rich. It is to serve as an early stop on a creative journey; not to serve as a producer of commercial output by itself. CC0 items do NOT impose license restrictions on the whole of the derived works that use them. They do keep you from preventing ANOTHER artist from using the same or similar component in THEIR work. Here are the founder's words, "The MakeHuman mission is to promote digital art and digital artists by providing a free, open source, high quality tool for every artist on the planet." Nothing about individual riches; nothing about providing work for lawyers.

I don't think, that Lindsay didn't get the idea behind MH and the license. I'm pretty sure she knows exactly what is intended by the MH developers. She says, it doesn't work as intended.
RobBaer wrote:You want to avoid once CC0 always CC0 concept? :( Don't you see that CC0 is liberating and potentially protects the next artist who uses MH? "Oh, I made something just like that -- BEFORE Lindsay did ...? Let's sue him." Not good. Note that this is different than suing you if you steal a whole creative work from me.

Sorry, but we shouldn't start to get each other intentionally wrong. She never wanted to avoid CC0 staying CC0. She thinks that CC0 can't coexist with any other license, because she thinks that CC0 is no license at all. I personally don't subscribe to this point of view.
RobBaer wrote:And of course copyright holders are free to create multiple licenses of their product for different uses/users. For the right price, Joel might be willing to sell you a special license phrased in many ways. All you need to do is offer him that price :mrgreen: If its high enough, he might rethink the value all the free time he has put into the project over the years.

I didn't want to engage in this thread, because I'm sick and tired of these license discussions. You probably hate these discussions as much as I do, but I don't think that it is a good idea to get personal and attacking. Lindsay's not a troll. She's a valuable member of this community who tries to improve things. Improving things implies questioning things. I don't agree with her opinion, but I have to admit that she makes some valid points.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 3:08 pm
by RobBaer
wolgade wrote:Sorry, but we shouldn't start to get each other intentionally wrong.


wolgade wrote: I didn't want to engage in this thread, because I'm sick and tired of these license discussions. You probably hate these discussions as much as I do, but I don't think that it is a good idea to get personal and attacking. Lindsay's not a troll. She's a valuable member of this community ...


Points well taken, and apologies extended to Lindsay . [ a "he" I think]. .... but I'm feeling Joel's frustration in addition to my own and probably yours. I'm over and out on this thread.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 9:25 pm
by blindsaypatten
This discussion does appear to be fruitless. I will say it again, it is not my intention to tell you under what terms you should license MakeHuman under. I am merely trying to tell you that the current license is not as clear as you think it is, and that CC0 is, under most circumstances, not a license and can only be applied to a work not a copy of a work.

EDIT: After further research I found the following sentences to be incorrect, in several significant jurisdictions, including Germany, the CC0 waiver is not valid and the fallback license takes effect. Nonetheless, the end effect is the same, CC0 creates a public license to the WORK, not a specific copy of the work.
If you live in Europe or North America, with the possible exception of Belgium, the law in your jurisdiction allows you to place your work in the public domain and the effect of applying CC0 is to place your work in the public domain.[/s] The CC0 license was crafted to be applicable in any jurisdiction in the world and to take into account that some (minor) jurisdictions do no allow you to place your work in the public domain. That does not apply in this case.


And even if it did it would make no legal difference to the rights of any of the parties.

Here's what the CC wiki page Rob linked to says:

Copyright and other laws throughout the world automatically extend copyright protection to works of authorship and databases, whether the author or creator wants those rights or not. CC0 gives those who want to give up those rights a way to do so, to the fullest extent allowed by law. Once the creator or a subsequent owner of a work applies CC0 to a work, the work is no longer his or hers in any meaningful sense under copyright law. Anyone can then use the work in any way and for any purpose, including commercial purposes, subject to other laws and the rights others may have in the work or how the work is used. Think of CC0 as the "no rights reserved" option.
...
How does it work?

A person using CC0 (called the “affirmer” in the legal code) dedicates a work to the public domain by waiving all of his or her copyright and neighboring and related rights, if any, in a work, to the fullest extent permitted by law


From the CC CC0 page:
And while no tool, not even CC0, can guarantee a complete relinquishment of all copyright and database rights in every jurisdiction, we believe it provides the best and most complete alternative for contributing a work to the public domain given the many complex and diverse copyright and database systems around the world.
https://creativecommons.org/share-your- ... omain/cc0/


From the CC human-readable CC0 page:
The person who associated a work with this deed has dedicated the work to the public domain by waiving all of his or her rights to the work worldwide under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights, to the extent allowed by law.


From the CC legal-text:
2. Waiver. To the greatest extent permitted by, but not in contravention of, applicable law, Affirmer hereby overtly, fully, permanently, irrevocably and unconditionally waives, abandons, and surrenders all of Affirmer's Copyright and Related Rights and associated claims and causes of action, whether now known or unknown (including existing as well as future claims and causes of action), in the Work (i) in all territories worldwide, (ii) for the maximum duration provided by applicable law or treaty (including future time extensions), (iii) in any current or future medium and for any number of copies, and (iv) for any purpose whatsoever, including without limitation commercial, advertising or promotional purposes (the "Waiver"). Affirmer makes the Waiver for the benefit of each member of the public at large and to the detriment of Affirmer's heirs and successors, fully intending that such Waiver shall not be subject to revocation, rescission, cancellation, termination, or any other legal or equitable action to disrupt the quiet enjoyment of the Work by the public as contemplated by Affirmer's express Statement of Purpose.


It was even explicitly confirmed to me by the CC General Counsel that CC0 applies to a work and not a copy.

Now, if you can read all that and still think that CC0 does not place a work in the public domain then there truly is no point in talking further.

I have nothing against CC0, I would be delighted if MH were to explicitly apply CC0 to the various assets that may be exported. Then everyone would know where they stood.

My first point is that the idea that an asset can be CC0 if exported by an unmodified version of MH but AGPL if exported from a modified version of MH, is legally incorrect. Once CC0 is applied to a work you can no longer use copyright to enforce any other license on any copy of it. So, all that including the language about unmodified official versions does in confuse matters.

My second point is that it isn't at all clear what the effect of the CC0 exception is.
As a special and limited exception, the copyright holders of the MakeHuman assets grants the option to use CC0 1.0 Universal as published by the Creative Commons, either version 1.0 of the License, or (at your option) any later version, as a license for the MakeHuman characters exported under the conditions that...

Does "grants the option to use CC0" mean that MH will apply the CC0, or that the user will apply CC0? Which one makes a big difference. If MH applies the CC0 then all copies of the asset are covered and MH no longer has any copyright rights over the assets or any copies thereof. If you read it as "grants the option for the user to use CC0" then the user uses the option they have given up any copyright rights to the export but MH's copyright rights remain unaffected.

From the CC wiki:
Person(s) whose rights are affected upon application of tool: CC0: Rights of the affirmer only; no effect on the right(s) of third parties
This comes from this table: https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/C ... ison_chart


I don't think correct legal interpretation is at all clear, and if I were placing a bet on how a judge would read it I would have to go with the "grants the user the option for the user to use CC0". The upside of that would be that MH would not yet have given up its rights to the assets. The downside is that the CC0 exception is effectively meaningless, the bundled assets are still AGPL.

While I think it would be to MH's benefit to have clear license terms it is clear to me that there is no interest in fixing the license so that's about all that needs to be said here.

P.S. Thank you wolgade for recognizing that I don't have bad intentions. Sorry to everyone I have caused irritation, in my own mind my intentions were good.

Re: License of generated models from modified MakeHuman

PostPosted: Sun Oct 29, 2017 10:43 am
by joepal
As this discussion isn't leading anywhere, I'm not going to comment any of the above for now. I have read it and think I understand what is said, although I don't necessarily agree.

However, and as I said before, I think there are unfortunate side-effects with the current license quite apart from what has been discussed here. I'm investigating what options there are for remedying this. If I can get things the way I want them, the license would be changed to something a lot less restrictive overall, but it's possible this can't be done for reasons outside the control of the MH dev crew.

In any which way, I maintain that the license can only be changed at the point of making a new release. And as that is a way down the line, nothing is going to happen today or tomorrow.