Variation of BSD-4-Clause-UC

[xsuchy]

During Fedora license review
https://gitlab.com/fedora/legal/fedora-license-data/-/issues/684
we found a new variation of https://spdx.org/licenses/BSD-4-Clause-UC.html

Link to file: https://github.com/jsommers/pytricia/blob/master/patricia.c#L33-L67

License text:

Copyright (c) 1997, 1998, 1999
The Regents of the University of Michigan ("The Regents") and Merit Network, Inc. All rights reserved. Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:


        
      Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.

        
      Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

        
      All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software must display the following acknowledgement: This product includes software developed by the University of Michigan, Merit Network, Inc., and their contributors.

        
      Neither the name of the University, Merit Network, nor the names of their contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission. THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

The difference is in the copyright holders. But that text is not copyrighttext tag, so this license does not match.

Current definition is:

The Regents of the University of California.

The new license file has:

The Regents of the University of Michigan ("The Regents") and Merit Network, Inc.

I suppose that we should add XML markup to accommodate this variant. I only hesitate if I should <alt> that allows only these two variants of if I should <alt name="authors" match=".*"> that allows any text?

Suggestions?

[swinslow]

Thanks @xsuchy -- interesting.

So, I would not use BSD-4-Clause-UC as the base of comparison for this. The reason is because BSD-4-Clause-UC is intentionally used solely with University of California software. That's because UC announced their revocation of the requirement to comply with the "advertising clause" -- see https://ipira.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/amendment_of_4-clause_bsd_software_license.pdf (I think there was an earlier notice prior to 2012 as well).

UC Berkeley can waive that requirement on their own behalf. But they presumably can't waive it on behalf of other non-UC licensors who happen to be using a similar license text.

Because of that, BSD-4-Clause also exists on the license list with templating to accommodate other licensors besides UC Berkeley.

From a very quick comparison, it looks to me like BSD-4-Clause matches the text above, with one exception: In the 4th clause, "its contributors" may also need to have a second option for "their contributors".

If that change were made to the markup, would BSD-4-Clause otherwise be a match for the license text you shared here?

[xsuchy]

/me checking the allowed alt in BSD-4-Clause.... yes, that would work too.

If you give me +1 I will create a PR to change the markup in BSD-4-Clause.

[swinslow]

+1 :) Thank you!