Demystifying the telerik RadControls re-distribution rights and limitations
A prospective customer recently commented on our distribution policies and it prompted me to write a blog post and try to explain things in not-so-legal terms.
Possibly because of improper wording on our part many ISVs do not feel comfortable with our terms and conditions when it comes to using our products in a commercial product.
Here's what our agreement says:
"You are not allowed to integrate and distribute the SOFTWARE as part of branded commercial products meant for mass distribution. This is subject to a redistributable license. For more information and inquiries, please contact sales@telerik.com."
I've been re-reading this paragraph over and over while writing my post. and I have to agree that it is quite misleading and certainly does not reflect telerik's actual licensing policies for the last year or so. It is a fact, however, that we put the agreement in place awhile ago and many things have changed since then, especially our understanding of what's acceptable and what's not.
Unfortunately (or fortunately), we've been focusing mostly on the very products and supplementary services rather than neatly worded agreements which narrowly spell out the customer's rights and limitations. Our genuine intent has always been to make our products available to as many developers as possible by following a licensing model that will not get in the way of widespread deployments. After all, we have no intentions of excluding developers working for ISVs as they are a good deal of our customer base as a matter of fact.
So, leaving the legal wording aside, here is a common sense explanation of what's OK from our point of view as a component vendor and what's not OK.
I would like to stress that the above-mentioned limitations are default limitations. By "default" I mean that unless you contact us you will have to abide by those stipulations. We can always try to find a custom arrangement which provides value to both parties.
If anyone feels unsure about the current license agreement, please drop us a line. We are working on an update and we will be glad to modify the wording in such a way as to let you guys to feel more comfortable. All comments are welcome.
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