The SMITE license is a modified version of the MIT license that includes an additional clause that prohibits individuals or organizations that have ever released original software under a non-commercial license, or are currently part of an organization that has ever released original software1 under a non-commercial license, from using the software2. This license is intended to prevent large corporations from releasing models or software under non-commercial licenses and then using them for commercial gain. If the user(s) have never released anything with a non-commercial license, then it is just the standard MIT license.
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This license can benefit the open source community by encouraging companies who "openly" release software under a noncommercial license to do so on "intrinsic" grounds, as opposed to using noncommercial licenses as a universal pseudo-noncompete clause. From some points of view, this can be seen as a form of exploitation of the open source community. By helping to prevent companies from using non-commercial software for commercial gain, the SMITE license promotes fairness and equity within the open source community, and encourages companies to release software under more permissive licenses that allow commercial use or not at all, instead of a "I want the best of both worlds".
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In addition, this license may also encourage companies to be more transparent about their licensing practices, which will ultimately be to the benefit of the open source community as a whole.
If it's open, it should be fully open.
- S - Scrupulous: Reflects the license's intent to promote ethical and fair behavior within the open source community.
- M - Moral: Reflects the license's goal of promoting moral principles within the open source community.
- I - Integrity: Reflects the license's goal of promoting transparency and honesty in licensing practices.
- T - Transparency: Reflects the license's goal of promoting transparency in licensing practices and ensuring that companies are clear about their use of non-commercial software.
- E - Equality: Reflects the license's goal of promoting fairness and equality within the open source community.
Footnotes
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Here, the goal of clauses related to "original software under a non-commercial license" is to denote released software that A) didn't need to use a non-commercial license (i.e. due to dependencies of their software, etc.) and B) chose to add a non-commercial license/clause on top of it. ↩
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As the goal here is to encourage rather than punish, the license should be updated/mention somehow that the restrictions apply w.r.t. the current status of their works, so if the license is updated to no longer use a non-commercial clause that entity is free to use the Software. this is a TODO at time of writing ↩
why
Imagine you design a new tool to help you hunt. You want other people to be able to use your tool, too, so you give away the design for free. But, you don't want big groups of people who make tools for a living and keep their designs secret to use your tool design and sell it to make money. That's not fair to you, right?
This new license we made is called SMITE, and it's like a rule for how people can use your tool. It says that big groups of people who make tools for a living and don't release their tool designs for others to use however they want can't use your tool design. This is important because it makes sure that big groups of people can't take advantage of you and your design.
The previous licenses like cc-by-NC do not have any repercussions for companies from using them always; that's why we made this new license SMITE, to have a rule that prevents companies from taking advantage of the open-source community.