# Systemless Contributor Agreement
Version 1.0
Effective: 21 August 2026
Thanks for contributing to Systemless.
Systemless is an open-source project maintained by Ben Letchford. The public
project is GPL-licensed and is intended to remain open source.
## Why are these terms needed?
Ben may also publish polished, paid versions of Systemless, such as a Mac App
Store app, to help support the ongoing development and maintenance of the
open-source project.
Because contributors keep copyright in the work they contribute, Ben needs
permission to include those contributions in separately licensed releases as
well.
These terms do not transfer ownership of your work and do not remove or reduce
any GPL rights.
### Example
Suppose you contribute a fix that improves compatibility with a classic Mac
application.
That fix remains part of the public GPL-licensed Systemless project.
It may also be included in a paid Systemless app on the Mac App Store. Revenue
from that app can help support continued development, testing, compatibility
work, hosting, and maintenance of Systemless.
You still own your contribution, and the open-source Systemless project remains
GPL-licensed. This is one example; the terms below also cover other separately
licensed Systemless distributions.
## Terms
By contributing to Systemless and accepting this agreement, you agree to the
following:
1. You keep ownership of your contribution.
2. You grant Ben Letchford a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, irrevocable,
and royalty-free licence to use, reproduce, modify, distribute, sublicense,
and relicense your contribution.
3. This permission includes distributing your contribution as part of
open-source, commercial, or proprietary versions of Systemless.
4. Your contribution to the public Systemless project remains available under
the project's open-source licence. This agreement does not remove or reduce
any GPL rights already granted to anyone.
5. You confirm that you have the right to submit the contribution and grant
these permissions.
6. To the extent you can grant such rights, you grant Ben Letchford a
perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free patent
licence to make, use, sell, offer for sale, import, and otherwise distribute
Systemless where doing so would otherwise infringe patent claims you control
that are necessarily practised by your contribution.
7. Ben Letchford may assign or transfer his rights under this agreement in
connection with a transfer of his ownership or stewardship of Systemless,
including to a company established to own or operate Systemless or to a
successor that acquires the project. Any such assignment or transfer does
not reduce your ownership of your contribution or any GPL rights already
granted.
Unless explicitly agreed otherwise, this agreement applies to your past,
present, and future contributions to Systemless once you accept it.
This agreement does not transfer your copyright to Ben Letchford. Placing this
agreement in the repository does not by itself make an existing contributor
subject to it; each contributor must accept it separately.
## In short
**You keep ownership of your contributions. Systemless stays open source. These
terms simply allow your work to also be included in paid Systemless releases
that can help support continued development of the project.**