Illustration of Stephen Colbert in Red, White & Blue armor and wielding a flaming sword

Unlicense.org

I came across an exciting site today, unlicense.org. Below is the intro and license text from the site. Visit them for the full documentation, links, etc

Illustration of Stephen Colbert in Red, White & Blue armor and wielding a flaming sword
haha, IDK, I Google’d “Unlicense” and this image of Stephen Colbert “fighting for freedom” came up. Illustration by Todd Lockwood

Say No to Copyright

Unlicense Yourself: Set Your Code Free

What is the Unlicense?

The Unlicense is a template for disclaiming copyright interest in software you’ve written; in other words, it is a template for dedicating your software to the public domain. It combines a copyright waiver patterned after the very successful public domain SQLite project with the no-warranty statement from the widely-used MIT/X11 license.

Why Use the Unlicense?

Because you have more important things to do than enriching lawyers or imposing petty restrictions on users of your code. How often have you passed up on utilizing and contributing to a great software library just because its open source license was not compatible with your own preferred flavor of open source? How many precious hours of your life have you spent deliberating how to license your software or worrying about licensing compatibility with other software? You will never get those hours back, but here’s your chance to start cutting your losses. Life’s too short, let’s get back to coding.

The Unlicense

To opt out of the copyright game altogether and set your code free, put your next software project into the public domain using the following (un)licensing statement:

This is free and unencumbered software released into the public domain.

Anyone is free to copy, modify, publish, use, compile, sell, or
distribute this software, either in source code form or as a compiled
binary, for any purpose, commercial or non-commercial, and by any
means.

In jurisdictions that recognize copyright laws, the author or authors
of this software dedicate any and all copyright interest in the
software to the public domain. We make this dedication for the benefit
of the public at large and to the detriment of our heirs and
successors. We intend this dedication to be an overt act of
relinquishment in perpetuity of all present and future rights to this
software under copyright law.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR
OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE,
ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR
OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

For more information, please refer to <http://unlicense.org/>
As a virtual public artist my work invites avatar communities to express their identity, explore their culture, and demand their civil rights.

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