On 15/11/2013 14:05, Paul Wise wrote:
> Will copyright assignment to POV-Ray Ltd be required for contributing to
> POV-Ray?

No, it is not a requirement, provided of course that the contribution
is released under the requisite license. The most convenient (for us)
way to do that would probably be to fork and release an updated
version on github. However direct contributions would also work
provided we had a way to ensure the contribution is licensed
appropriately.

> Are there any other requirements for contributions to the new AGPLv3 POV-Ray?

It depends on what you mean by 'contributions'. If you mean 'something
that will be merged into the official distribution' then it's both a
legal (as above) and logistical question; specifically, is the
contribution both suitable for inclusion and a desirable addition?

> Is there a contributor agreement? Is there any guarantee that code contributions
> will remain under the AGPLv3+ or other FLOSS licenses?

If they are provided under said license, I am not aware of any way
they could be re-licensed short of the contributor granting rights to
do so.

> What is the business model and structure of POV-Ray Ltd?

The company is registered here in Australia as a regular incorporated
Pty. Ltd. It does not have any 'business model' per se as it does not
sell anything nor receive funds.

> Is POV-Ray Ltd a registered non-profit? 

No. Ironically one of the reasons it is not is that it doesn't make
enough money (specifically, none at all), meaning it would not make
sense to spend the money to try to gain such registration.

> Can we donate towards server development and other costs?

Historically we have not solicited funds. On the occasions people have
kindly offered to help, we have either declined or pointed them
towards other means of assistance (e.g. purchasing hardware). We do
from time to time feature wish lists for team members on the site
(usually for things such as programming books or whatever).

> What are POV-Ray Ltd plans for license enforcement?

Any issues would be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.

> What is the reason for the documentation being under a non-commercial-only
> license? Is there any chance of adopting CC-BY-SA-3.0 for the documentation?
> 
> The CC-BY-SA-3.0 license requires that all derivative works are licensed under
> the same license. As far as I can tell this means that all scenes rendered with
> POV-Ray that use the SDL includes, macros or are derived from the sample scenes
> must be CC-BY-SA-3.0. I expect this would be problematic for some users of
> POV-Ray who might want to use different licenses for their scenes. The CC0
> license might be more appropriate since it is intended to be equivalent to
> public domain where possible and extremely permissive where not possible. Is
> there any chance of adopting CC0 for the SDL includes, macros and sample scenes?
> 
> https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/

I'd have to look into this.

> Is there a trademark policy? Either way I would like to suggest adopting
> something like the Debian trademark policy, which aims for maximum use by the
> community while protecting the community from misuse of the trademarks.
> 
> http://www.debian.org/trademark
> 
> While there are probably no patent concerns, I would like to point out Debian's
> patent policy and patent FAQ.
> 
> http://www.debian.org/reports/patent-faq
> http://www.debian.org/legal/patent

Thanks for the pointers, I'll take a look at them.

regards,

-- Chris

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