License GNU Affero General Public License

The GNU Affero GPL is a non-proprietary license (FLOSS or Free/Libre Open Source Software) that is authored by the Free Software Foundation and endorsed by the Open Source Initiative. Affero GPL licensed software is copyrighted. But rather than restrict the rights of others, the GPL uses the legal force of copyright law to hinder efforts by anyone to restrict the rights to use, copy, redistribute, study, modify, improve, and/or redistribute copies, improvements, and/or modifications, for any purpose, including the right to charge for services provided when exercising these rights and the right to make a profit from such services.

A 'loophole' in the GPL was being utilised by some application service providers (Steamplay is an example of an ASP, but not an example of the description that follows). Whereby they were using, copying, redistributing, and doing so with the original and their own modified versions of GPL software. Which they have the right to do, so long as they do not restrict these rights for others, which they were. They were restricting the rights of their customers by not distributing the GPL rights to them. As the customer was only using their copy of the GPL software on their server (not actually downloading the software), they reasoned they did not need to ensure full GPL rights be provided. This is certainly a violation of the spirit and intent of the GPL. But, it was not a legal violation, the original GPL is silent on the matter, therefore traditional copyright applies, therefore it is fair use for ASPs to not to distribute GPL rights to their customers. The GNU Affero GPL adds a clause to the GPL specifically stating that use of the software in any way via any network requires full compliance with the four freedoms of GPL (use, redistribute, modify, and all these also apply to modified versions and source code is required to ensure the last two).