ADR-0001: Apache 2.0 + Commons Clause license

• Status: Accepted
• Date: 2026-05-08
• Deciders: Mesh-America

Context

The project's license affects: who can use it, who can contribute, which dependencies are compatible, and what business models third parties can build on top.

The maintainer's stated goals:

• Anyone should be able to use and modify the software
• No one should be able to make a profit from selling the software itself, or from selling hosted services derived primarily from its functionality

These goals are mutually incompatible with OSI-approved open source. The OSI definition explicitly forbids "discrimination against fields of endeavor" - i.e., you cannot say "you may not use this commercially." The license has to live outside the OSI tent.

Decision

License the project under Apache License 2.0 with the Commons Clause v1.0 appended as a restriction. The full license text lives in LICENSE.

Alternatives considered

MIT, BSD-3-Clause, Apache 2.0 (without Commons Clause)

OSI-approved permissive licenses. All explicitly allow commercial use and resale. Rejected because they fail the "no profit from selling" requirement.

GPL family (GPLv3, AGPLv3)

OSI-approved copyleft. Allows commercial use; requires source disclosure for distributions (and for AGPL, network use). Doesn't prevent profit; just requires sharing modifications. Rejected for the same reason as the permissive licenses.

PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0

Source-available, written in plain English, drafted by serious IP lawyers. Forbids any commercial use. Considered closely. Rejected as broader than the maintainer's actual concern: PolyForm NC blocks "I run this BBS for my coworkers and we are a for-profit company" even though no resale is happening. The Commons Clause is narrower

• it specifically blocks resale, not commercial use generally.

Forklift Certified License (mesh-citadel's existing license)

Idiosyncratic. Has a resale clause but also adds employer-pay-ratio caps, headcount caps, and an industry-exclusion list. Maintainer explicitly wanted "least restrictive possible," so the FCL's scope expansion is wrong for this project.

BSL (Business Source License)

Commercial-restriction license that auto-converts to a permissive license after a configurable time delay (typically 4 years). The auto-conversion is interesting but adds complexity and uncertainty for downstream users planning long-running deployments. Rejected as overkill for the maintainer's stated goal.

Functional Source License (FSL)

Similar to BSL, simpler. Auto-converts to MIT or Apache 2.0 after 2 years. Rejected for the same reason as BSL: complexity not warranted by the stated goal.

Consequences

Positive

• Anyone can read, fork, modify, and redistribute the code for any purpose other than selling it
• Hobbyist sysops, mesh nonprofits, research, education, in-house commercial use are all unambiguously permitted
• Apache 2.0's patent grant protects users against patent retaliation by contributors
• Apache 2.0 base is well-understood by every IP lawyer; only the Commons Clause delta is novel

Negative

• Not OSI open source. Cannot land in Debian main, Fedora's packaging, or Arch's community repo. Some FOSS-purist contributors will refuse to participate on principle.
• Commons Clause has a contentious history (Redis Labs, MongoDB SSPL). Some operators will be wary on reputation grounds even if the semantics are fine for their use.
• Cannot be combined with GPL-licensed code. If a future feature needs a GPL-only library, we either find an alternative or carve the code out behind an FFI boundary.

Neutral

• The CLA in CONTRIBUTING.md grants the project owner the right to relicense contributions under different terms in the future. This is the escape hatch if the license proves to be the wrong choice - we can move to PolyForm NC or full Apache 2.0 (dropping Commons Clause) later.

Notes for downstream users

If you want to use Supply Drop BBS for a product or service whose value derives substantially from its functionality, and you intend to charge for that - contact the licensor for a separate commercial arrangement. The Commons Clause text is explicit that this is the intended carve-out path.

If you're a hobbyist sysop, a school, a research lab, a mesh-radio nonprofit, a co-op, or even a for-profit company using it internally without selling access - you're fine under the existing license. No separate arrangement required.