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NPL VERSION 1.0M
FAQ

1.    Why did we make changes to the license agreement?

    To encourage greater adoption, correct bugs in the license, add a multiple license feature, and incorporate other comments from the development community. Broadly speaking, we've made changes to the license in three areas with the overall goal of making alterations that encourage more people and groups to join us in the open source development effort.  These three areas are:

    a. Changes to the sections dealing with the granting of intellectual property rights.  Here we've tried to:

    • More narrowly and precisely define the IP grants made by contributors to the Mozilla code base
    • Provide a defensive mechanism in case a contributor is sued for patent infringement by someone who is benefiting from NPL code that contributor wrote.
    b. A change to the license framework that allows an Initial Developer to permit code to be used under multiple licenses.
    c. Incorporation of other comments we've received from the development community over the past 11 months.
2.    Do the changes apply to both the NPL and the MPL?
    Yes, the proposed changes are applicable to both the NPL and the MPL.
3.    Why did you change the patent license grants in Section 2.1(b) and 2.2(b)?
    Some developers, most notably some large institutions and public companies, were concerned that participation could cause them to grant patent rights beyond the Mozilla code base and beyond the scope of their contribution.  This limited their ability to participate.
4.    What patent licenses are now granted in proposed Sections 2.1(b) and 2.2(b)?
    When someone contributes code under the license, they are granting rights to their modifications alone and to the combination of their modifications with the version of code they created.
5.    What patent licenses are not granted in proposed Sections 2.1(b) and 2.2(b)?
    a. Rights to the combination of  modifications with software or hardware other than the version of code the contributor created.
    b. The right to license a patent right alone, removed from the NPL code.
    c. Rights to subsequent modifications.
6.    How do Sections 8.2, 8.3, and 8.4 work?
    The rationale is that someone should not be able to benefit from your contribution to the Mozilla code base and also sue you for patent infringement.  So this section allows you to revoke that person's rights to use the code you contributed to Mozilla or to receive payment for your contribution.  In addition, if someone sues you for patent infringement for code that's not in the Mozilla code base, you can revoke the  patent grant you made to that person under the NPL.  This allows you to use such patent rights defensively to respond to a claim made against you.
7.    Why did you add the concept of "Commercial Use" to the license?
    This is a mechanism to allow a developer to experiment with NPL code and make modifications in private without having to grant  patent rights.  Patent rights would be granted if and when the developer decides to release the code to others or use the code for purposes other than research and development.
8.    What does the Multiple License clause mean?
    This clause gives an initial developer the ability to release code under more than one license.  For example, an initial developer of a new module has the option to license it under the MPL as well as the GPL.
9.    Why is this right limited to the initial developer?
    This is to ensure that someone downstream from the initial developer is not able to take the initial developer's code, make minor modifications, and then release the new version under multiple licenses without the initial developer's consent.
10.    Are developers who modify the code also required to release their modifications under multiple licenses?
    No.  However, we strongly encourage this, because in this way the maximum number of people can receive the benefits of the modification.
11.    Will Netscape be releasing any code under multiple licenses?
    Yes.  Netscape will be releasing its interpreter for the JavaScript language under the NPL as well as the GPL.
12.    Have you discussed this with the open/free source community?
    Yes we have, and we've received the following from Richard Stallman:

    "On behalf of the GNU Project, I would like to thank Netscape for making the interpreter for the JavaScript language available under the terms of the GNU GPL as well as under the NPL.  I would like to ask all programmers who make changes in this interpreter to give Netscape their fullest cooperation in mutual use of these changes, and to release these changes under the NPL as well as the GPL."

13.     Isn't there a danger that the code under the two licenses will branch and the two implementations will be at odds?
    There is this danger, but in conversations with the GPL development community, we have agreed that we all have interests in seeing this experiment succeed.   Therefore, we are jointly encouraging anyone doing development on the codebase for the JavaScript language to release modifications under the NPL as well as the GPL.
14.    What does "contributes to the creation of" mean in the definition of Contributor in Section 1.1?
    Although this is not a change to the prior version, there were questions about this language.  The intent is to prevent someone from avoiding the license requirements by technicalities. For example, two developers are sitting at a machine jointly creating modifications to NPL code, although only one person is actually typing the code.  In this case, both developers should be considered contributors.  On the other hand, if a person posts some ideas on a website relating to a modification of NPL Code, and another developer, not working in concert with the first developer, actually develops the proposed modifications, the first person did not "contribute to the creation of the modification" within the meaning of the NPL.