What non-commercial license options are there for projects you want to share?

Posted by apatheticonion on Sunday November 16, 2025 @10:02PM
from the self-post dept.

I want to share my projects and encourage contributions - however I'd prefer it if that code wasn't used for training AI models or repackaged and charged for.

It's not "open source" in the conventional sense, but source-available.

Or if it is monetized, the proceedings distributed amongst the contributors.

Any suggestions for licenses to consider?

( 3 comments | 2 points | on HN )

Re:What non-commercial license options are there for project... by Adam2025 on Sunday November 16, 2025 @10:50PM (#45950705)

Polyform’s non-commercial licenses are probably the closest fit. They keep the code public but block commercial use. CC BY-NC is another option, though it’s more for content. There isn’t a perfect “no AI training” license yet, but Polyform gets you most of the way there.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What non-commercial license options are there for project... by pabs3 on Sunday November 16, 2025 @10:45PM (#45950682)

People training AI models don't consider licenses, the only way to prevent them from training on your code is to block them from downloading it, and block everyone who can download it from putting it somewhere that the AI folks can download it.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What non-commercial license options are there for project... by gus_massa on Monday November 17, 2025 @10:31PM (#45961101)

AGPL is open source and AWS will not use i, so it's close enough.

> Or if it is monetized, the proceedings distributed among the contributors.

I expect that to cause a lot of nightmares. Proportional to number of commits or LOC?

[ Parent | on HN ]