Can I use library distributed under Creative Commons license in commercial app?

Question

Some guys here mentioned that they are using the HTML Agility Pack library. It is distributed under Creative Commons (Attribution-ShareAlike) license. Can I use it in the commercial closed-source application?

Thanks.

Answer 1

From: http://creativecommons.org/about/licenses/

Attribution

You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.

Share Alike

You allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs your work.

Answer 2

IANAL.

Take a look at the "Collective Work" section of the license, and compare it to the "Derivative" work section. Including their work in yours, unmodified, does not constitute "derivative work" under the license and does not fall under the share-alike provisions.

"Collective Work" means a work, such as a periodical issue, anthology or encyclopedia, in which the Work in its entirety in unmodified form, along with a number of other contributions, constituting separate and independent works in themselves, are assembled into a collective whole. A work that constitutes a Collective Work will not be considered a Derivative Work (as defined below) for the purposes of this License.

Compare vs:

"Derivative Work" means a work based upon the Work or upon the Work and other pre-existing works, such as a translation, musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation, or any other form in which the Work may be recast, transformed, or adapted, except that a work that constitutes a Collective Work will not be considered a Derivative Work for the purpose of this License. For the avoidance of doubt, where the Work is a musical composition or sound recording, the synchronization of the Work in timed-relation with a moving image ("synching") will be considered a Derivative Work for the purpose of this License.

As a collective work, that gives you the right to:

to reproduce the Work, to incorporate the Work into one or more Collective Works, and to reproduce the Work as incorporated in the Collective Works;

and

to distribute copies or phonorecords of, display publicly, perform publicly, and perform publicly by means of a digital audio transmission the Work including as incorporated in Collective Works;

It sounds like, as long as you

1. don't modify their library
2. Give credit and include the license / attribution info

then yes, you may use it in your commercial app. Your app would be considered a 'separate work' in that case.

If you modify their library, you must provide the same notices and distribute it with the same license. Your app would remain closed.

If you statically include their libraries (say, by taking their source and adding it into your assembly), your app would then have to be distributed under the same license.

Answer 3

As Robert says, CC is not intended for code and doesn't really fit very well. That being said, the variant they chose is intended to be "viral" -- to force people using your work to also use your license, and the license used for their work (Agility Pack) is a free one.

I think the intent is that Bob cannot charge money for something that includes Alice's work without compensating Alice. Since Alice released her work for free, she only wants her work to be included in other free projects. In your case, your commercial app would no longer be commercial if it were covered by a CC A-SA license. So bottom line, I don't think the Agility Pack people want you to use their code in your commercial app.