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Did 37Signals Just Accidentally Make Writebook Open Source?

When 37Signals launched Writebook in 2024, it was under their ONCE License Agreement. Notably, that license “does not include the rights to publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, source code or products derived from it.”

If you visit once.com/writebook today, you’ll see these in the FAQs:

However, the software license “does not include the rights to publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, source code or products derived from it.” Further, you can not, for example, sell a separate hosted service on top of Writebook using Writebook code.

Can we white label or resell Writebook?

No. Please be sure to review the license agreement for further details.

Can we reuse any of the code in another product?

No. While you are free to review the code and make modifications to Writebook for your own use, you can not use or repurpose the code for your own purposes outside Writebook. Please be sure to review the license agreement for further details.

Right beneath the “Get it for free” button, you’ll also see this text:

Please review the software licensethe FAQs and explore the simple manual prior to downloading.

If you “buy” Writebook today for $0, the download does not include a license file. There is also no public GitHub repository for Writebook, even though there is one for Campfire. But if you click any of the links to the license agreement on the Writebook website, all you see is the MIT License. It does not restrict the Software in those ways.

I am not a lawyer, but it looks like 37Signals just released Writebook under the terms of the MIT License. Is that true?

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