AGPLv3 alterations may be key in database legal battle • The Register

Bradley Kuhn, coverage fellow on the Software program Freedom Conservancy, claims a California federal courtroom has misinterpreted model 3 of GNU Affero Common Public License (AGPLv3) by permitting it to be mixed with the Widespread Clause software program license.

Kuhn, who created the Affero clause within the AGPLv1 and co-drafted v3, expects to function an skilled witness for defendants PureThink and founder John Mark Suhy, who had been sued by database biz Neo4j in November 2018, for alleged trademark and competitors legislation violations.

PureThink on the time distributed database software program known as ONgDB, which was marketed as an open-source licensed model of Neo4j EE.

Neo4j EE is underneath a mixed AGPLv3+Commons Clause license – the Commons Clause modified the APGLv3 by including a restriction that forbids the sale of the software program. Nevertheless, PureThink provided a forked model of the Neo4j EE database software program underneath the APGLv3 alone, having eliminated the Commons Clause from its model of the software program.

So Neo4j and its Swedish subsidiary sued PureThink and others claiming that that they had violated the license phrases and had infringed Neo4j’s emblems.

In Might 2021, Neo4j received a partial abstract judgment [PDF] when the decide overseeing the case granted the corporate’s request for a short lived injunction primarily based on its trademark and unfair competitors claims.

PureThink was enjoined – till the matter may be resolved – from “promoting, selling, representing or referring to ONgDB as a free and open supply drop-in substitute for Neo4j Enterprise Version” and making false representations about ONgDB to prospects.

The US Ninth Circuit Court docket of Appeals subsequently upheld that injunction, and the case has continued thus far.

Among the many remaining disputed points to be resolved, an important for the Free and Open Supply Software program (FOSS) neighborhood is whether or not Neo4j’s concatenation of the AGPLv3 and Commons Clause is allowed.

Kuhn, in an expert report [PDF] ready for the case, acknowledges that the AGPLv3 language may be re-mixed and utilized in one other license, so long as that license shouldn’t be known as the AGPLv3. He cites MongoDB’s modified AGPLv3 license, known as the Server-Aspect Public License, for instance of how the AGPLv3 may be altered into one thing that is not a FOSS license.

But when the license is known as the AGPLv3, then its Additional Restrictions Clause – which permits customers of APGLv3 licensed software program to take away added licensing phrases – ought to apply. If the courtroom accepts that argument, it might be a major reversal: PureThink could be allowed to fork Neo4J EE underneath the AGPLv3.

A trial date has but to be set however a number of prospects in July, 2023, have been proposed. ®