@@ -150,8 +150,8 @@ particular reason as to why it makes a particular contribution. In
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other words, a company needs an explanation of how its contribution
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will specifically benefit the company. However, most OSS products are
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not designed to benefit a specific company. OSS projects cannot be run
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- solely by participants from companies that only care about their own
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- convenience. It is not surprising that contributions made under a
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+ only by members who participate from companies who think only of their
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+ own convenience. It is not surprising that contributions made under a
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declaration that only contributions beneficial to a particular
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organization can be made are less appreciated.
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@@ -183,27 +183,26 @@ to OSS projects, we can expect that there is little risk of companies
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completely ignoring it. A code of conduct is a set of rules that
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defines the normative behavior and responsibilities of individuals,
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parties, and groups. In other words, a code of conduct is a definition
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- of the behaviors of participants that are desirable and undesirable
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- for a project. By having each participant in the project agree to a
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- code of conduct, the participants are made aware that certain
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- behaviors are undesirable for the project. In other words,
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- participants will not be able to openly engage in behavior that is
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- undesirable for the project. Since a code of conduct is not legally
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- binding, participants would be able to continue to participate in the
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- project without agreeing to the code of conduct or while violating
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- it. However, even in that case, the fact that a particular participant
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- did not agree to or violated the code of conduct is visible. The
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- purpose of having participants make a pledge not to engage in
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- undesirable behavior is not to exclude participants who disagree or
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- violate the code from the project, but to make other participants
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- aware of it. This allows the "name and shame" approach to discourage
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- participants from taking undesirable actions. If a particular
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- participant engages in an undesirable behavior, other participants
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- become aware of it, and the participant with the undesirable behavior
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- is excluded from participation in the overall decision-making process
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- of the project. In other words, participants with undesirable behavior
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- will have difficulty participating in decision-making within the
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- project. This assumes, of course, that participants do not lie.
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+ of the behaviors of members that are desirable and undesirable for a
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+ project. By having each member in the project agree to a code of
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+ conduct, the members are made aware that certain behaviors are
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+ undesirable for the project. In other words, members will not be able
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+ to openly engage in behavior that is undesirable for the
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+ project. Since a code of conduct is not legally binding, members would
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+ be able to continue to participate in the project without agreeing to
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+ the code of conduct or while violating it. However, even in that case,
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+ the fact that a particular member did not agree to or violated the
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+ code of conduct is visible. The purpose of having members make a
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+ pledge not to engage in undesirable behavior is not to exclude members
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+ who disagree or violate the code from the project, but to make other
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+ members aware of it. This allows the "name and shame" approach to
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+ discourage members from taking undesirable actions. If a particular
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+ member engages in an undesirable behavior, other members become aware
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+ of it, and the member with the undesirable behavior is excluded from
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+ participation in the overall decision-making process of the
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+ project. In other words, members with undesirable behavior will have
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+ difficulty participating in decision-making within the project. This
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+ assumes, of course, that members do not lie.
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### How our guidelines work
@@ -213,20 +212,20 @@ code of conduct aiming to alleviate the burnout problems of OSS
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developers. Our guidelines use the nature of the code of conduct
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described above to discourage free-riding on OSS projects. Since a
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code of conduct defines desirable and undesirable behaviors of project
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- participants , it is not possible to directly ask companies to comply
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- with the code. Therefore, our guidelines ask participants representing
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- a company to pledge that they will make effort to ensure that the
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- company to which they belong does not free-ride. If a participant's
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- company continues to free-ride, that participant can be regarded as
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- not making sufficient efforts to ensure that the company does not
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- free-ride. In addition, our guidelines do not require only that each
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- company does not free-ride on projects that have adopted our
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- guidelines, but also that they do not free-ride on OSS projects in
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- general. As there becomes greater public awareness of the importance
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- of discouraging free-riding in order to sustain OSS projects, it will
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- become more difficult for companies to openly disagree with our
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- guidelines. As more projects adopt our guidelines, we can expect that
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- free-riding on OSS projects in general will be discouraged.
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+ members , it is not possible to directly ask companies to comply with
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+ the code. Therefore, our guidelines ask members representing a company
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+ to pledge that they will make effort to ensure that the company to
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+ which they belong does not free-ride. If a member's company continues
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+ to free-ride, that member can be regarded as not making sufficient
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+ efforts to ensure that the company does not free-ride. In addition,
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+ our guidelines do not require only that each company does not
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+ free-ride on projects that have adopted our guidelines, but also that
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+ they do not free-ride on OSS projects in general. As there becomes
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+ greater public awareness of the importance of discouraging free-riding
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+ in order to sustain OSS projects, it will become more difficult for
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+ companies to openly disagree with our guidelines. As more projects
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+ adopt our guidelines, we can expect that free-riding on OSS projects
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+ in general will be discouraged.
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Now, based on the above, will this scheme really work? What is most
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concerning is the part that although prohibiting commercial use of
@@ -239,10 +238,10 @@ license at this point. Distribution licenses are supposed to be
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legally binding, which is incompatible with asking licensees to take
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some action without legally binding them to do so. On the other hand,
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a code of conduct, by its very nature, only prescribes the desired
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- behavior of project participants , not the conditions for the use of
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- the software. The existence of a code of conduct makes it possible to
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- check whether each participant is behaving in a way that is desirable
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- for the project. If companies continue to free-ride on OSS, this will
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+ behavior of project members , not the conditions for the use of the
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+ software. The existence of a code of conduct makes it possible to
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+ check whether each member is behaving in a way that is desirable for
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+ the project. If companies continue to free-ride on OSS, this will
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become visible to the public and subject to social criticism. It would
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be a serious PR loss for a company if it were to make the news that
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the company gets disciplined in a prominent OSS project. Therefore, we
@@ -261,8 +260,8 @@ appropriateness of each decision made within the project. Transparency
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in project management would also have positive results in terms of
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ensuring diversity in the project.
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- What our guidelines require is that each participant takes action to
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- discourage free-riding. Thus, even if a participant 's company is
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+ What our guidelines require is that each member takes action to
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+ discourage free-riding. Thus, even if a member 's company is
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free-riding, that company will not be immediately denounced. A
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company's free-riding will only be brought to attention if it becomes
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a problem over some extended period of time. For companies, it is only
@@ -298,17 +297,18 @@ You might be wondering why our guidelines target only companies, even
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though individuals are also free-riding. This is due to the
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limitations of how our guidelines work. The basic stance of our
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guidelines is to request uniformly the same content regardless of
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- whether the participant belongs to a company or not. This is because
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+ whether the member belongs to a company or not. This is because
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confusion arises in the definition of the terms if we try to
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- distinguish between companies and individuals. If individual
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- participants are asked to donate to the project, they would
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- effectively be excluded from participating in the project. Thus, what
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- individual participants can do to deter free-riding is to call out to
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- their friends not to free-ride, which is practically nothing. If
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- donations were collected from individual users in a thin and broad
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- base, the total amount could be large. However, it would be too costly
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- to track the amount of each individual user's donation, and it would
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- be difficult to establish a practical mechanism for this purpose.
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+ distinguish between companies and individuals. If members
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+ participating as individuals were asked to donate to the project, they
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+ would effectively be excluded from participating in the project.
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+ Thus, all that a member participating as an individual can do to deter
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+ free-riding is to call out to their friends not to free-ride, which is
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+ effectively the same as doing nothing. If donations were collected
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+ from individual users in a thin and broad base, the total amount could
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+ be large. However, it would be too costly to track the amount of each
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+ individual user's donation, and it would be difficult to establish a
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+ practical mechanism for this purpose.
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You might also wonder whether educational and research institutions
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are also included in the scope of free-ride deterrence. It is
@@ -333,10 +333,10 @@ do the same with OSS maintenance, we will undoubtedly see terrible
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results. Because it is difficult to evaluate which OSS is useful,
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large amounts of taxpayer money will be spent on maintenance of
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software that no one has ever heard of. There is also a problem that
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- it is difficult to coordinate among the countries to which the
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- participants belong, since the development of OSS takes place across
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- countries. By having companies fund software that is valuable to them,
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- we can expect that truly valuable software will be funded.
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+ it is difficult to coordinate among the countries to which the members
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+ belong, since the development of OSS takes place across countries. By
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+ having companies fund software that is valuable to them, we can expect
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+ that truly valuable software will be funded.
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## Positioning and purpose of the guidelines
@@ -352,12 +352,12 @@ there is no provision in the software distribution license prohibiting
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the removal of the guidelines in a derivative project, you can fork
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the project to remove the guidelines.
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- The guidelines ask participants representing companies to pledge that
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- they will make efforts to ensure that their companies do not engage in
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- free-riding. However, this is nominal and participants are not
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- actually asked to take any specific action. What actually matters is
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- the attitude of the company to which the participant belongs, not the
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- specific actions of the participant .
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+ The guidelines ask members representing companies to pledge that they
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+ will make efforts to ensure that their companies do not engage in
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+ free-riding. However, this is nominal and members are not actually
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+ asked to take any specific action. What actually matters is the
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+ attitude of the company to which the member belongs, not the specific
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+ actions of the member .
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## The guidelines
@@ -386,11 +386,12 @@ and smooth discussions.
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* Project members strive to promote the awareness that it is natural
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for companies that make a profit from the commercial use of open
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- source or free software to make contribution commensurate with their
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- profit to relevant projects, where the purpose of the contribution
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- is for the project to serve society as a whole, not just particular
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- organizations. Here, contribution to a project refers to the
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- following items.
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+ source or free software to make contribution commensurate with the
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+ increased profits from the use of the software to relevant projects,
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+ where the contribution is made in order for the project to serve
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+ society as a whole. This contribution must not be biased to benefit
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+ any specific organizations. On top of that, the contribution herein
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+ refers to providing the following items.
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* Financial support
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* Contributing code or documentation
@@ -424,18 +425,22 @@ and smooth discussions.
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### Maintaining transparency in project operations
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- * Each participant in the project should disclose information
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- regarding his or her identity and affiliation when necessary to
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- carry out the project. If a project participant is asked to disclose
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- information regarding his or her identity and affiliation, an
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- explanation should be provided as to why such disclosure is
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- necessary for the execution of the project.
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+ * Each member in the project should disclose information regarding his
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+ or her identity and affiliation when necessary to carry out the
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+ project. In requesting disclosure of the identity and affiliation of
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+ each member, an explanation should be given as to why this is
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+ necessary to carry out the project.
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* In engaging in activities within the project, each member should
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- make an effort to explain the basis for decisions in a manner that
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- the general public can understand. If the basis for a decision
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- cannot be disclosed, the reason why it cannot be disclosed should be
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- explained as much as possible.
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+ make an effort to disclose the basis for decisions in a manner that
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+ the general public can see and understand.
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+ * If the basis for a decision cannot be disclosed, the reason why it
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+ cannot be disclosed should be explained as much as possible.
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+ * If each member notices that the basis for a decision or the reason
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+ why it cannot be disclosed has not been explained in the project,
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+ the member should prompt the person who made the decision to
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+ explain it, even if the matter is not directly related to the
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+ member's own, or if it is a past matter.
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### Keeping calm and logical discussion
@@ -452,9 +457,9 @@ and smooth discussions.
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time of the person's birth and cannot be changed)
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* Ideology or beliefs that are not relevant to the purpose of the
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project
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- * Whether or not each participant belongs to an antisocial group
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- or cult is always regarded as relevant to the purpose of the
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- project. The project may ban a participant who is found to be a
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+ * Whether or not each member belongs to an antisocial group or
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+ cult is always regarded as relevant to the purpose of the
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+ project. The project may ban a member who is found to be a
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member of an anti-social organization or cult for the sole
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reason of his/her membership in such an organization.
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* Inequalities that existed in the past
@@ -481,3 +486,13 @@ and smooth discussions.
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privileges of the websites related to the project and basically
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what you cannot do is not possible for the maintainers either.
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+
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+ ### Not taking the guidelines as an absolute
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+
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+ * Each member should understand that each item of these guidelines is
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+ merely a means to achieve the objectives of the guidelines and to
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+ respect basic human rights.
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+ * Each member should always consider first how to achieve the
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+ objectives of the guidelines and respect basic human rights, and
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+ for this purpose, allow deviations from each item of these
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+ guidelines.
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