The Brandeis License is identical to the Apache 2.0 license with added restrictions forbidding addictive design and dark patterns.
Software authors can provide their software under the Brandeis License.
Benefits:
- Anyone can use the software for free.
- Companies can include the software in commercial products
- Discourages people from using the software in addictive or manipulative products
- Some protection from patent litigation
Limitations:
- Brandeis License is new. Companies and organizations must spend effort to evaluate and approve the license for internal use. This means that Brandeis-licensed software may have slower adoption than Apache-licensed software.
- Unknown enforcement. No organization exists specifically to find and sue companies that violate the Brandeis License. Various non-profits may perform this work. See GPL Open Source Litigation Could Open the Door to Other Suits - JD Supra.
The license is named for Louis Brandeis, was an American lawyer and U.S. Supreme Court justice. He helped develop the Right to Privacy concept in US law. Throughout his long career, he helped businesses to treat people fairly, protected freedom of speech, advanced states' rights, and tempered the power of big business.
In the field of modern business, so rich in opportunity for the exercise of man's finest and most varied mental faculties and moral qualities, mere money-making cannot be regarded as the legitimate end. Neither can mere growth of bulk or power be admitted as a worthy ambition. Nor can a man nobly mindful of his serious responsibilities to society view business as a game; since with the conduct of business human happiness or misery is inextricably interwoven.
-- Louis Brandeis. "Business — The New Profession", La Follette's Weekly Magazine, Volume 4, No. 47 (November 23, 1912), p. 7.
Today, massive companies are exploiting people all over the world with addictive software. Addicting software has a large negative effect on quality of life. Companies make their software addicting to increase profits. They invented new terms like "increasing engagement" so they don't have to say they are addicting the people who use their software.
Common addictive features:
- Social media likes
- Infinite scroll
- Loot boxes in games (gambling)
- Addictive game design
Largest & worst offenders:
- Snapchat
- TikTok
- WeChat. WeChat app includes a TikTok clone inside the app. WeChat is required for normal social life in China so every Chinese person has that sweet dopamine hit just one tap away and no way to uninstall it.
- Electronic Arts (EA)
- Blizzard
- King (Candy Crush)
- Zynga (FarmVille)
A dark pattern is a user interface that has been carefully crafted to trick users into doing things that help the software maker.
Common dark patterns:
- Re-checking the "subscribe to email newsletter" box after the user has un-checked it
- Allowing the user to filter by maximum cost, then showing them items that are more expensive than that cost
- Showing partial prices as if they were full price and revealing the full price after collecting user data (email, name, address, payment info, etc)
- Making privacy settings hard to find and confusing to use
- Replacing privacy settings with similar settings and automatically disabling those new settings
- Allowing users to sign up online but requiring them to make a phone call to cancel
- Requiring users to authorize recurring payments for time-based subscriptions
Requirements:
- Offer the same protections to authors as other popular licenses like Apache 2.0
- Apply restrictions to any product or service that is used with the software. This is similar to how the AGPL license works. This should apply to using Brandeis-licensed tooling to support a product. Tooling includes monitoring, alarming, deployment, CI/CD, offline data processing, admin consoles, etc.
- When the license is updated, all previous contributions automatically get licensed under the new version
Law must evolve to meet the changing needs of society. The Brandeis License will be updated periodically by the Brandeis License Committee.
We name versions of the license with the year, eg. Brandeis-2022.
When someone contributes to a Brandeis-licensed project, they implicitly grant anyone the right to use their contribution, under the latest version of the license published as of two years before the contribution or any later version of the license.
When a new version of the license is released with an added prohibition, people violating the new prohibition may continue to use the Brandeis-licensed software for 2 years, including updates and bug fixes.
- Link to https://ledger.humanetech.com/
- Consume all the content on https://www.humanetech.com/
- Contact https://www.tristanharris.com/ about collaborating
- Read Hooked
- Write specific prohibitions
- Archive linked articles.