What I Learned About The MIT License From A Lawyer

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The MIT License is one of the most common license attributions used in Software Development, but what does it really mean?  How is it supposed to be used?  Are companies and dev's able to use it without having to worry about liability or lawsuits?

These are all questions I have, and I'm glad I was able to get answers.

Let's start with where I got the answers and a little disclaimer.  The breakdown of the MIT license was done by Kyle. E. Mitchell in this article.  Right in the header, there is a line that stands out above all the rest.

"All content by Kyle E. Mitchell, who is not your attorney."

Therefore, the content in this article, to me, is Kyle's interpretation of the law.  He is educated to be able to provide this information as lawfully correct as possible (which I believe he has), but is not necessarily responsible for how reader's interpret this information.  Therefore, the disclaimer I am giving here is that IANAL (I Am Not A Lawyer) and my interpretation of the material may be incorrect so please, don't take my word for the following content.  Let's start. 

Right Off The Bat

I learn something new. I had no idea that the MIT License was a family of licenses. Before reading this, I always assumed that licenses were always singular and from what I've learned through my coursework thus far, that they were simple as well. I guess I was wrong. The MIT License is actually derived from many different project releases from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Over time, organizations like the Open Source Initiative have taken the time to standardize a simple, generic MIT-style license that is suitable for common Open Source projects.

Even so, Mitchell does state that a responsible review is good practice, and that a comparison of a projects LICENSE file should be made against the standard form to be sure that they match. Interesting enough. Let's see what else I can scrounge up here...Found it.

Grant Scope

A license is obviously given to ensure that no one gets sued for copyright or patent infringement, but the wording of a license is also really important. Take a look at this excerpt:

 "to deal in the Software without restriction"

Neither Copyright or Patent law uses the phrase "to deal in."  According to Mitchell, this phrase has no specific meaning in court.  As a result of this phrase being used, any court that must decide on a dispute between licensor and licensee would have to ask what each party meant and how they interpreted the language.  Essentially, it is so vague of a phrase that you're likely not going to have to give your right kidney and 10 million dollars if you were to get sued by the licensor.  It's really strange, yet intriguing, that three words, THREE, can make your life that much easier in the competitive business environment on Earth...But are there limitations to this?

Limitation of Liability

Let's read this excerpt from the MIT License:

"In no event shall the authors or copyright holders be liable for any claim, damages or other liability, whether in an action of contract, tort or otherwise, arising from, out of or in connection with the Software or the use or other dealings in the Software."

For the most part, this is pretty straight forward.  It's a promise not to sue and is in place to protect the licensor, not the licensee.  Suing can go both ways.  

What I didn't know is that you could actually put a cap on the amount of money you can sue for.  I thought that even with a license, MIT or not, that the amount is nearly infinite based on damages done to your company or otherwise.  However, for open-source projects, the limit is always $0. Lovely.

Conclusion

When I was younger, I wanted to pursue law really badly and then move into politics after that.  It's funny how things change, but what's even funnier, is how I am still interested in how it works.  The world is so interconnected because of technology that even when I'm done here at Seneca, my original pursuit in Law might spark up again.

Until next time,
Jiel Selmani