Theft of Intellectual Property and reputation

I have already had my hissy fit. Jihad has certain financial risks as well as being morally problematic. Adopting the moral high ground and practicing my most sanctimonious smile appear to be the only viable option.

Mike

Can someone please help me with this issue i have? i dont undestand how this license works!

I want to make prusa i3 single frame, p3steelmm and p3steelmm large. i have a printshop in argentina, but now i want to sell machines, can i do it? obviously given credit to the rigth people.

PLEASE HELP!!

Which license?

Prusa i3 is GPL, you can sell that without problem.

The "P3 steel" variants appear to be CC BY-NC 3.0, so I would contact the designer to see how they feel about it. Legally, you don't need permission to make it, but you might attract a very bad reputation.

The CC BY-NC license is about the worst thing that has happened to Open Source Hardware. It's not Open Source, doesn't apply to hardware and provides no practical protection unless you have an army of lawyers. It's misleading to everyone.

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What is Open Source?
What is Open Source Hardware?
Open Source in a nutshell: the Four Freedoms
CC BY-NC is not an Open Source license

On the wiki page of P3 steel [reprap.org] it is indicated that the P3 steel is a derivative of Prusa i3 [reprap.org], which is licensed under GPL.

Someone making a derivative work cannot modify the licence if the original licence requires derivative to propagate the license (which GPL do, so called 'viral' license) and making it NC (non commercial) is against the will of the original Prusa creator.

from the GPL :

Quote

You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.

This license modification and added non-commercial restriction is abusive and author can only apply such license on totally original work or derivative of public domain work.

Maybe I will make a note about that in the wiki page.

Also, the use of software license on hardware is a bit problematic and you may have a look here:
[www.publicknowledge.org]

Quote
bobc
Which license?

Prusa i3 is GPL, you can sell that without problem.

The "P3 steel" variants appear to be CC BY-NC 3.0, so I would contact the designer to see how they feel about it. Legally, you don't need permission to make it, but you might attract a very bad reputation.

The CC BY-NC license is about the worst thing that has happened to Open Source Hardware. It's not Open Source, doesn't apply to hardware and provides no practical protection unless you have an army of lawyers. It's misleading to everyone.

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Pierre

- Safety [reprap.org]
- Embedded help system for Duet and RepRap Firmware [forums.reprap.org]
- Enclosed delta printers Lily [rouzeau.net] and Lily Big [rouzeau.net]
- OpenScad delta printer simulator [github.com]
- 3D printing on my site [www.rouzeau.net]

In regards to 'b' of the GPL, my understanding has been you are allowed to sell a physical item, or compiled program, based on GPL as long as you make the information freely available that allows someone else to be able to make the same item without having to pay for that information. You are charging for the parts and labor to produce the work, not for the work itself.

Although the Creative Commons - Non Commercial license has little enforcability there are good pragmatic reasons for crediting the designers of the P3Steel and pointing to any Reprap.org, Thingiverse, Github etc. sources:-

• From a selling point of view, telling your customers where to get the drawings and files for the printer will allow them to make replacement parts should you not be in a position to make parts for them.
• Crediting the designer may keep them on your side and they may then keep you updated about worthwhile modifications.
• The Non-Commercial is almost always selected either by default or in the vague hopes of preventing large scale abuse - as in the case of various extruders and hotends. As the "Categories" section of the [reprap.org] starts by describing it as a Clone ware I think that it was just the default selection.

Just doing a quick segue from the P3Steel: The bell model on Thingiverse that caused my to start this thread back in November is now correctly attributed to me on the Sterling Applications website so I am a happy bunny.

Mike

The b) clause is not about commercial, fees or money exchange or source availability. This is the 'viral' part of the license, which oblige the person using the work, whatever the context, to release under GPL the ensemble if any sub-ensemble work is already licensed in GPL. So, this is why the work shall mention the license to have subsequent work being still GPL licensed.

The source availability is mentioned elsewhere in the license.

Quote
ElmoC
In regards to 'b' of the GPL, my understanding has been you are allowed to sell a physical item, or compiled program, based on GPL as long as you make the information freely available that allows someone else to be able to make the same item without having to pay for that information. You are charging for the parts and labor to produce the work, not for the work itself.

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Pierre

- Safety [reprap.org]
- Embedded help system for Duet and RepRap Firmware [forums.reprap.org]
- Enclosed delta printers Lily [rouzeau.net] and Lily Big [rouzeau.net]
- OpenScad delta printer simulator [github.com]
- 3D printing on my site [www.rouzeau.net]

So, I added a paragraph 'License' in The Prusa steel page here : [reprap.org]

I also created a page 'Licenses' [reprap.org] to clarify a bit the topic and try to avoid confusion between software, hardware and documentation licenses. Some cleanup shall be done in the text of the associated category.

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Pierre

- Safety [reprap.org]
- Embedded help system for Duet and RepRap Firmware [forums.reprap.org]
- Enclosed delta printers Lily [rouzeau.net] and Lily Big [rouzeau.net]
- OpenScad delta printer simulator [github.com]
- 3D printing on my site [www.rouzeau.net]