Open Source Indemnification: Why You Should Care
With the recent rise in software copyright claims filed (such as Oracle’s lawsuit against Google for copyright/patent infringement related to Java), companies are realizing more than ever that indemnification protection against costly lawsuits is important. Oracle is just one example among many - see more IP infringement cases put together by Protecode here.
With many of ActiveState’s customers, the discussion around levels of indemnification in an Enterprise or OEM contract often gets passed to compliance officers or lawyers. But even legal counsel in companies aren’t always well-versed in the differences between indemnification for proprietary products and those based on open source.
With open source products, there are multiple contributors to the code, making it all that much more important for companies to protect themselves. However, when a product is based on open source (like ActivePerl, ActivePython, or ActiveTcl), the vendor can’t provide indemnification “out-of-the-box” the way the proprietary vendor can because a lot of added checks need to happen to protect both the vendor and the vendor’s customers. For example, there are many contributors to open source Perl, which ActivePerl is based on (with additional code and compiling then added, to give ActivePerl its own license). Perl has thousands of third-party modules, with each module having its own creator/contributors and its own licenses that may
With many of ActiveState’s customers, the discussion around levels of indemnification in an Enterprise or OEM contract often gets passed to compliance officers or lawyers. But even legal counsel in companies aren’t always well-versed in the differences between indemnification for proprietary products and those based on open source.
Indemnification: Proprietary vs. Open Source
With proprietary software, a vendor can very simply provide indemnification as part of a standard agreement, because they have full control and copyright over the product and underlying code.With open source products, there are multiple contributors to the code, making it all that much more important for companies to protect themselves. However, when a product is based on open source (like ActivePerl, ActivePython, or ActiveTcl), the vendor can’t provide indemnification “out-of-the-box” the way the proprietary vendor can because a lot of added checks need to happen to protect both the vendor and the vendor’s customers. For example, there are many contributors to open source Perl, which ActivePerl is based on (with additional code and compiling then added, to give ActivePerl its own license). Perl has thousands of third-party modules, with each module having its own creator/contributors and its own licenses that may
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