Govern
What you may do with the material.
A licensing model an enterprise buyer can read in five minutes. Draft, pending legal review; the terms of use prevail until then.
GOVBRM licensing model
Status: draft v0.1, GOVBRM original, not yet validated.. The draft wording at the end is a starting point for a solicitor, not a licence in force.. The terms currently in force are the ones on govbrm.com/terms.
Purpose
GOVBRM has one licensing statement today, inside the terms of use. It works for a newsletter with a toolkit attached. It does not answer the questions an enterprise, a consultancy, a public body, a university or a translator will ask before they adopt the method. This document sets out a plain model that answers those questions, in three tiers: allowed, allowed with a licence, not allowed. It then gives draft wording for a solicitor.
The model does not change the price list. Personal and internal use come with membership. Everything in the middle tier is a separate written licence, normally granted on attribution terms and sometimes on commercial terms. The bottom tier is refused.
Principles
- Ideas are free; expression is licensed. Anyone may run a demand front door with six gates. What is licensed is GOVBRM's text, canvases, diagrams, courses, names and arrangement.
- Use inside your own organisation is the point of the method and is never charged beyond membership.
- Anyone who makes money by delivering GOVBRM to others shares that with GOVBRM, or gets written permission not to.
- Attribution is always required and is never enough on its own to permit commercial delivery.
- Public bodies get the widest terms, because the method was written for them.
- Nothing GOVBRM publishes may be used to train a machine learning model without a written licence, and the default answer is no.
Definitions used here
- Material: the AI Demand Framework, the twenty canvases, the AI Demand Toolkit, the Value Orchestration Workbook, the course units, diagrams, badges, certificate templates, the method specification and every other work published by GOVBRM
- Marks: the names GOVBRM, GOVBRM Academy, the credential names, and the wordmarks and lockups
- Your organisation: the legal entity that employs you or engages you, and its subsidiaries; for a public body, the department, agency or authority and its arm's-length bodies
- Internal use: use by and for your organisation, its staff and its contractors working on its business, not shown to third parties as a product or service
- Client delivery: using the Material in work for a third party who pays you or your organisation
Summary table
| Use | Position | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Personal use: read, learn, practise, print for yourself | Allowed | With membership at the tier that includes the item |
| Internal enterprise use: run the front door, fill canvases, adopt the gates and lanes inside your organisation | Allowed | With one paid membership held by the person leading it; enterprise membership is not yet offered |
| Internal training: teach your own staff using the Material | Allowed | Attribution kept; no charge to attendees |
| Consulting use: a consultant uses the Material to shape advice to a client, without giving the client the Material | Allowed with licence | Practitioner licence, attribution terms; discounted or free for Tier 2 credential holders is not yet decided |
| Client delivery: the Material, canvases or workshops delivered to a paying client as part of a service | Allowed with licence | Delivery partner licence, commercial terms |
| Modified canvases for internal use | Allowed | Attribution kept, "adapted from" wording, no GOVBRM mark on the modified version |
| Modified canvases published or given to others | Allowed with licence | Derivative works licence; the modified version must say it is not GOVBRM |
| Translations | Allowed with licence | Translation licence on attribution terms; GOVBRM reviews before release; translator credited |
| Derivative works: a new method, tool or course built on GOVBRM | Allowed with licence | Case by case; must not use the Marks; must state the lineage |
| Screenshots and short quotations in articles, talks, reviews, training slides | Allowed | Attribution and a link; no more than a short passage or one canvas image per work |
| Incorporation into software, a template library, a platform or a service | Allowed with licence | Software licence, commercial terms; the software must not present the canvases as its own |
| Redistribution of the Material, in whole or in substantial part, free or paid | Not allowed | Except the free workbook, which may be shared unchanged with attribution |
| Public-sector reuse: a public body adapts and publishes the Material for its own staff or other public bodies | Allowed with licence | Public body licence, attribution terms, normally free; the published version says it is adapted and is not GOVBRM's edition |
| Academic use: teaching, research, citation, reproduction of a canvas in a paper or thesis | Allowed | Attribution; a course that charges fees to teach GOVBRM needs the commercial training licence |
| Attribution | Required in every case | The wording is set out below |
| Commercial training: paid courses, workshops or certification by anyone other than GOVBRM Academy | Allowed with licence | Training partner licence, commercial terms; no certification or credential may be issued by the partner |
| AI ingestion and machine learning training: crawling, scraping, fine-tuning, embedding for retrieval by a third party | Not allowed | A written licence could be granted for a closed internal retrieval index; the default is no |
| Resale of memberships, access codes, seats, credentials or certificates | Not allowed | Access codes are personal; sharing one breaches the terms |
What each licence in the middle tier contains
All written licences share the same skeleton: who the licensee is, which Material and which version, what use is permitted, the attribution wording, the term, the fee if any, what happens on a new version, no use of the Marks beyond attribution, no certification or credential issuing, no sublicensing, GOVBRM's right to withdraw for breach, and no warranty beyond what the terms of use give.
| Licence | Who it is for | Terms in brief |
|---|---|---|
| Practitioner licence | An individual consultant or contractor | Attribution terms; personal, non-transferable; covers advice shaped by the method; does not cover handing the Material to clients |
| Delivery partner licence | A consultancy or firm delivering the method to clients | Commercial terms; named practitioners; per-engagement or annual fee; attribution on every deliverable; no credentials issued |
| Training partner licence | An organisation teaching GOVBRM for a fee | Commercial terms; approved trainers; approved materials; learners directed to GOVBRM Academy for credentials |
| Public body licence | A department, agency, authority or public health body | Attribution terms; normally free; permits adaptation and publication within the public sector; the adapted edition carries a "based on GOVBRM" line and no GOVBRM mark |
| Translation licence | A translator or organisation | Attribution terms; GOVBRM reviews; the translation is credited to the translator and remains GOVBRM's Material under licence |
| Derivative works licence | Anyone building on the method | Case by case; lineage stated; no Marks |
| Software licence | A vendor incorporating canvases or logic into a product | Commercial terms; the product credits GOVBRM; the canvases are not presented as the vendor's; no lock-in of GOVBRM's users |
Attribution wording
For any permitted use, one of these lines, unchanged:
- For unmodified use: "GOVBRM AI Demand Toolkit, govbrm.com. Used under licence."
- For adapted material: "Adapted from the GOVBRM AI Demand Toolkit, govbrm.com. This adaptation is not published or endorsed by GOVBRM."
- For quotation or screenshot: "Source: GOVBRM, govbrm.com."
The version number of the Material used should follow the line where the Material is a canvas or the framework.
How this fits with the current terms of use
Draft licence wording for a solicitor
GOVBRM material licence (draft, not in force)
- Parties. This licence is between GOVBRM, a sole trader trading as GOVBRM (the Licensor), and the person or organisation named in the schedule (the Licensee).
- What is licensed. The Licensor grants the Licensee a non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use the Material listed in the schedule, at the version listed, for the permitted use listed, in the territory listed, for the term listed.
- Permitted use. The permitted use is one of: practitioner use; delivery partner use; training partner use; public body use; translation; derivative work; incorporation into software. The schedule states which, and any limits on named people, engagements, learners, languages or products.
- Attribution. The Licensee will place the attribution wording in the schedule on every copy, adaptation, deliverable, slide, page or screen that contains or is based on the Material. The Licensee will not remove any notice the Licensor has placed on the Material.
- Marks. The Licensee may use the Licensor's names only within the attribution wording and only to identify the Material. The Licensee will not use the Licensor's names, wordmarks or lockups on its own products, services, certificates or promotional material, and will not suggest that the Licensor endorses, certifies or is affiliated with the Licensee.
- Adaptations. Where the permitted use allows adaptation, the Licensee may adapt the Material. Every adaptation will carry the adapted-material attribution wording and will not carry the Licensor's marks. The Licensee owns the changes it makes and grants the Licensor a non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free licence to use those changes in future versions of the Material, with credit. The Licensee's ownership of its changes does not extend to the underlying Material.
- Credentials. The Licensee will not issue any certificate, badge, credential or qualification that refers to the Material, the Licensor or the Licensor's credentials. Learners are directed to GOVBRM Academy for credentials.
- Restrictions. The Licensee will not: redistribute the Material or a substantial part of it outside the permitted use; sublicense; sell or share access codes, memberships or seats; use the Material or any adaptation to train, fine-tune, evaluate or build a machine learning model or a retrieval index for use outside the Licensee's own organisation; or present the Material as its own work.
- Fees. The Licensee will pay the fee in the schedule, if any, in the manner and currency stated. Fees are stated in GBP as a reference and may be charged in local currency by the payment provider.
- New versions. The Licensor may publish new versions. The licence covers the version in the schedule and any later version the Licensor makes available to the Licensee. The Licensor will give notice of major and minor versions. Nothing obliges the Licensee to move to a new version during the term.
- Term and ending. The licence runs for the term in the schedule. Either party may end it by written notice of the period in the schedule. The Licensor may end it at once, by written notice, for a breach that is not put right within fourteen days of notice, or that cannot be put right. On ending, the Licensee stops the permitted use, keeps only internal copies already made for record purposes, and keeps attribution on any adaptation that remains in use internally.
- Ownership. The Material and the Licensor's names remain the Licensor's. Nothing in this licence transfers ownership.
- No warranty. The Material is provided as general professional information and not as legal, regulatory, financial or other professional advice. The Licensor gives no warranty as to accuracy, completeness or fitness for a purpose, beyond any that cannot lawfully be excluded.
- Liability. To the extent the law allows, the Licensor's total liability under this licence is limited to the fees paid under it in the twelve months before the claim, and the Licensor is not liable for indirect or consequential loss. Nothing limits liability that cannot lawfully be limited.
- Data protection. Where the permitted use involves personal data, each party is responsible for its own compliance. The Licensor does not receive personal data from the Licensee's use of the Material unless the schedule says otherwise.
- Governing law. The schedule states the governing law and the courts. In the absence of a statement, the law of England and Wales applies and its courts have exclusive jurisdiction.
- Whole agreement. This licence, its schedule and the terms of use at govbrm.com/terms are the whole agreement for the Material. Where they conflict, this licence prevails.
Schedule (to be completed for each licence): Licensee; permitted use; Material and version; territory; term and notice period; named people, engagements, learners, languages or products; fee (GBP reference); attribution wording; governing law and courts; data protection statement if any.