“Explain me like I’m 5!” Imagine you made a cool toy, and you want to share it with your friends. But you also want to set some rules for how they can play with it. These rules are like licenses for open source projects. Here are some popular ones:
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public domain: This is like saying, "Play with my toy however you like! You can even say it's your own."
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mit license: You say, "You can play with my toy and even change it, but you have to say I made the first version."
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gnu general public license (gpl): This one's like, "You can play and change my toy, but if you share your changed toy, you must use the same rules I did."
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apache license: It's like the MIT license, but you also say, "If you make a new version of my toy, tell everyone what you changed."
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bsd license: You say, "Play with my toy and change it if you want. Just remember to say I made the first one. And don't use my name to say your toy is the best."
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mozilla public license (mpl): It's like saying, "You can play and change my toy, but if you make a new part, you need to share that new part with the same rules."