[goodpoint]

> clearly communicate intent

Again, this is not how a license work. You can express your intents, ideas and desires in a README file and in many other ways.

The license is nothing more than a contract that provides rights to the recipient under certain conditions. Standing up in court is its real power and only purpose.

That's why we should prefer licenses that stood up in court and have been written by lawyers rather than developers or scientists.

[skrebbel]

I strongly disagree. Contracts very much primarily communicate intent, ideally in such a way that they also stand up in court. People regularly argue over details in contracts, people regularly look up things in contracts, also when there is no court to be seen and no intention anywhere to go to court. The vast vast vast majority of contracts never make it to court.

Plenty of contracts aren't even written down. When you buy a loaf of bread at the bakery, you make an oral contract about that transaction.

The idea that contracts, or licenses, need to be written in dull legalese and be pretty much impenetrable to be useful or "valid" or whatever, is absolutely bonkers. Lawyers like you to think that but it's not true. It's an urban legend.

If you need to make sure that you can defend your rights in court, then sure, you're probably going to need some legalese (but even then there's little harm in also including some intent - it's just not very common). Clearly that's not the goal here. No scientist is gonna sue another scientist who asked for support and got angry about not getting any even though the code was CRAPL licensed.

[goodpoint]

> Plenty of contracts aren't even written down.

That's a well known fact. And it's besides the point.

> Lawyers like you to think that but it's not true.

Is that a conspiracy theory? Writing long, detailed contracts on a persistent medium is safer: it lowers the risk of he-said-she-said scenarios and ambiguities.

That is meant to save you tons of legal expenses.

> No scientist is gonna sue another scientist

Then there is no need for such license in the first place. Just a readme file.