IDK-Attribution License

I Don't Know — Attribution License — Version 0.0.1, February 2026

SPDX: LicenseRef-IDK-Attribution-0.0.1 Permissive Attribution Required Not Attorney-Reviewed
Download LICENSE-IDK-Attribution

About This License

The IDK-Attribution License is a permissive license with an attribution requirement, similar to MIT or Apache-2.0 but designed for works created with AI assistance. It requires that copyright and license notices be preserved in redistributions but otherwise allows commercial use, modification, and closed-source derivatives.

What You Can Do

  • Use, copy, modify, and distribute
  • Create closed-source derivatives
  • Use commercially
  • Sublicense under different terms

What You Must Do

  • Preserve copyright and license notices
  • Include the license in source distributions
  • Include notice in binary distributions

Key features beyond traditional attribution licenses:

  • 9 fallback licenses — simultaneously granted under MIT, Apache-2.0, BSD-2/3-Clause, ISC, Boost, zlib, Blue Oak, and CC-BY-4.0
  • Copyleft compatibility grant — one-way compatibility with GPL, LGPL, AGPL, MPL, and EPL
  • AI authorship uncertainty acknowledgment — honestly addresses the unknown copyright status of AI-assisted work
  • Patent non-assertion + grant with defensive termination
  • 30-day cure provision for attribution failures (Blue Oak-inspired)
  • "To the extent" grants — only claims to grant what the author actually has
Important: This license was drafted with AI assistance. It has not been reviewed by a licensed attorney. There is no warranty that it works as intended. This is not legal advice.

Quick Start

  1. Copy the license file to your project root: 
    curl -o LICENSE-IDK-Attribution https://idklaw.net/license-attribution/0.0.1/LICENSE-IDK-Attribution
  2. Add SPDX identifiers to your source files: 
    // SPDX-License-Identifier: LicenseRef-IDK-Attribution-0.0.1
  3. Mention it in your README: 
    ## License
This project is released under the [IDK-Attribution License](https://idklaw.net/license-attribution/0.0.1),
Version 0.0.1. See LICENSE-IDK-Attribution for details.

If your project includes third-party dependencies, use the IDK-Attribution-WTF License instead.

Full License Text

This is the complete, legally operative text of the IDK-Attribution License v0.0.1. The authoritative copy is the plain-text file.