Charityware/CSL

This is a proposal for a Charity Software License.

Intent of the License

The intent of the license is to offer an alternative to open source software as specified by the OSI open source definition. Software licensed under the CSL can be made available in source code but there is no obligation to do so. The software is made available with guarantees about the use of revenue generated by software sales. The license will include a list of trusted third parties, usually non-profit organizations, who can sell software licensed under the CSL. A group of authors cannot sell their own software under the CSL without first becoming a trusted reseller in the sense of the license. The rationale is that the CSL is intended as a unique selling point for software licensed under the CSL and arbitrary software authors are not expected to reliably handle the financial resources in the intent of the license. Thus the CSL can increase the trustworthiness of authors without any disadvantages for software authors who mean to take the CSL seriously. Trusted resellers in the sense of the license require external auditors, as, for instance, the Deutsche Zentralinstitut für soziale Fragen (dzi.de)