The Ruling:
The appellate court reversed the lower court’s decision in an opinion that open source lawyers have dreamed about but never thought that we would see.
The court paid tribute to the diversity and importance of the open source, free software, and public license community:
“Public licenses, often referred to as “open source” licenses, are used
by artists, authors, educators, software developers, and scientists who
wish to create collaborative projects and to dedicate certain works to
the public…Open source licensing has become a widely used method
of creative collaboration that serves to advance the arts and sciences in
a manner and at a pace that few could have imagined just a few decades
ago.”
And after noting that “lack of money changing hands” does not equate to lack of economic value, it wholeheartedly endorsed enforcement of the Artistic 1.0 license:
“The clear language of the Artistic License creates conditions to protect
the economic rights at issue in the granting of a public license. These
conditions govern the rights to modify and distribute the computer
programs and files included in the downloadable software package. The
attribution and modification transparency requirements directly serve to
drive traffic to the open source incubation page and to inform downstream
users of the project, which is a significant economic goal of the copyright
holder that the law will enforce.”
