BioLicense
BioLicense is a public-domain dedication. If a work is under BioLicense, you can use it, copy it, change it, teach from it, and sell it. You need no permission and you owe nothing.
Why
Sharing information is the source of creativity, independence of mind, and productivity. Knowledge should not be exclusively owned by a small number of companies, classes, races, or economic groups. BioLicense exists to make sharing the default rather than the exception, and to support entrepreneurship rather than obstruct it.
Four notes by material type
These do not change the licence. They record what else applies.
Software. BioLicense waives copyright. It does not grant patent rights. If you hold patents that read on the code, state separately that you will not assert them, or apply a licence with an express patent grant. Software also carries the section 6 disclaimer, which matters more here than anywhere else.
Databases. The waiver in section 2 covers database rights where they exist, such as the EU sui generis right. Note that in many countries raw facts carry no copyright at all, so much of a dataset was never restricted to begin with.
Human and genomic data. Section 5 governs. A licence cannot authorize a use that the donor's consent did not cover. Publish the consent scope alongside the data. Where data are identifiable, BioLicense is not sufficient on its own and must not be treated as if it were.
Papers, slides, and websites. The waiver is complete, and citation is a norm rather than a legal condition. Academic credit works through citation practice, not through licensing, and BioLicense does not interfere with it.
How to apply it
Website footer:
Openfree under BioLicense 2.0. No rights reserved. biolicense.org/2.0
Book or paper:
Openfree under BioLicense 2.0 (biolicense.org/2.0). All property claims in this work are waived. Copy it, translate it, quote it, teach from it, sell it. No permission needed. The waiver covers the author's own work only; some images and quoted passages belong to others and stay under their terms.
Dataset:
PhilosophyReleased under BioLicense 2.0, a public-domain dedication (biolicense.org/2.0). Where the data derive from identifiable human subjects, use is additionally governed by the original consent and by applicable data protection law.
BioLicense treats every living and computing thing as an information processor, and treats unrestricted exchange between them as the condition under which information accumulates fastest. It is the licensing half of Biosophy.
Knowledge is made by recombination. Nobody produces an idea from nothing, which is why BioLicense gives up ownership. But recombining is still doing something, and the person who did it is still its author, which is why BioLicense does not pretend authorship away.
Ownership is a claim. Authorship is a fact. BioLicense releases the first and records the second.
That distinction is the thing that took longest to get right. Earlier versions said BioLicense does not acknowledge originators at all. That went too far. It confused a property claim, which can be waived, with a historical fact, which cannot. Giving up ownership while standing behind what you made is the stronger position, not the weaker one.
Version history
2.0 (20260804). One licence replaces three. Adds a fallback clause, a warranty disclaimer, and carve-outs for third-party material, personal data, trademarks, and patents. Moves attribution from an implied requirement to an explicit non-binding norm. First version with a number and a date.
1.0 (1994 to [date], archived at biolicense.org/1.0). Three licences, undated, edited in place. Retained for reference. Work published under it is treated as being under 2.0 unless a specific earlier text is cited.
Related
CC0 1.0 Universal, Creative Commons, Public Domain Mark, Unlicense, MIT, Apache 2.0, GNU GPL, Open Data Commons, Budapest Open Access Initiative, Project Gutenberg.
BioLicense 2.0 is closest to CC0. If a collaborator's institution will not accept a licence they have not seen before, CC0 is a fully equivalent substitute and we recommend it without reservation.
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