World-Changing Technology License (WCTL) v1.0

Copyright © 2026 Andrew C. Mueller (Conundrum)

Preamble

This License is founded upon a simple proposition:

Technology should be free for people to use and learn from, while the economic value created by that technology should be shared fairly with the people who build it and, beyond that, directed toward improving the world.

The Software covered by this License is intentionally source-available rather than traditional open source.

Every person should be free to:

• use the Software;
• study the Software;
• copy the Software;
• clone the Software;
• fork the Software;
• modify the Software;
• experiment with the Software; and
• operate their own private copy for Personal Use.

The principal restriction is that the Software and technologies substantially derived from it may not be operated as a Hosted Service for third parties without a separate commercial license.

This restriction exists because successful hosting of the Software may generate substantial economic value. The purpose of retaining that economic opportunity is not merely to enrich the project's owner. It is to establish an economic engine through which:

1. Contributors receive fair compensation for the work they perform;
2. the project remains capable of supporting its continued development;
3. the people who create the technology participate in its success; and
4. economic value beyond the reasonable compensation of Contributors can ultimately be directed toward charitable purposes.

The project further establishes an AI-governed contribution system intended to make decisions as impartially, transparently, and consistently as reasonably possible.

That AI governance is subordinate to the project's foundational ethical principles, which are recorded in the immutable soul.md (available here) described in this License.

This License should be interpreted in favor of those purposes.

This License is not an OSI-approved open-source license.

1. Definitions

1.1 "Software"

"Software" means this project and all source code, documentation, configuration, assets, schemas, interfaces, models, prompts, automation, tests, and other materials distributed under this License.

1.2 "Contributor"

"Contributor" means any individual or legal entity that submits a Contribution which is accepted into the canonical repository.

1.3 "Contribution"

"Contribution" means any code, documentation, test, configuration, design, algorithm, artwork, infrastructure change, security improvement, bug fix, architectural change, or other material intentionally submitted for inclusion in the canonical project.

1.4 "Commit"

"Commit" means a Git commit containing a Contribution to the canonical repository.

1.5 "Pull Request"

"Pull Request" means a proposed change submitted through the project's designated source-control system.

1.6 "Canonical Repository"

"Canonical Repository" means the repository officially designated by the project as the authoritative repository for the Software.

1.7 "Derivative Technology"

"Derivative Technology" means:

1. the Software;
2. a modified or adapted version of the Software;
3. software incorporating a substantial portion of the Software;
4. software whose principal functionality is substantially derived from the
   Software; or
5. a Hosted Service whose operation depends materially upon the Software or a

   Derivative Technology.

Mere interoperability with the Software, without incorporating or substantially deriving from it, does not by itself constitute Derivative Technology.

1.8 "Personal Use"

"Personal Use" means use by a person or organization for private development, learning, experimentation, research, evaluation, education, or operation that does not make the Software available as a service to third parties.

1.9 "Hosted Service"

"Hosted Service" means making the Software or a Derivative Technology available to third parties through a network, API, web application, cloud service, remote execution environment, managed service, or substantially similar mechanism.

A Hosted Service exists whether or not the operator charges money.

1.10 "Qualifying Revenue"

"Qualifying Revenue" means revenue actually received from:

• commercial hosting of the Software;
• commercial hosting of a Derivative Technology;
• commercial licensing of the Software;
• commercial licensing of a Derivative Technology;
• paid services substantially based upon the Software; or
• another commercial exploitation of the Software or Derivative Technology

  designated by the project as part of its commercial ecosystem.

Taxes, refunds, payment reversals, and amounts legally required to be remitted to third parties shall not constitute Qualifying Revenue.

1.11 "Financial Year"

"Financial Year" means the twelve-month accounting period designated by the project.

1.12 "AI Governance System"

"AI Governance System" means the automated artificial-intelligence systems designated by the project to evaluate Contributions, review Pull Requests, maintain contribution records, and perform other governance functions under this License.

1.13 "soul.md"

" soul.md means the foundational ethical document created by the Founder and included in the Canonical Repository, describing the benevolent purpose, compassionate principles, ethical commitments, and intended character of the project.

1.14 "Founder"

"Founder" means Andrew C. Mueller, the person who originally established the project and authored the foundational soul.md .

1.15 "Contribution Pool"

"Contribution Pool" means the portion of Qualifying Revenue designated for distribution to Contributors pursuant to this License.

2. Grant of Rights

Subject to the terms of this License, every person receives a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to:

• use the Software;
• inspect the Software;
• copy the Software;
• clone the Software;
• fork the Software;
• modify the Software;
• create Derivative Technology for Personal Use;
• compile the Software;
• experiment with the Software;
• use the Software for education and research; and
• redistribute copies and modifications for Personal Use.

No payment to the project is required merely to exercise these rights.

3. Freedom of Personal Use

You may create unlimited private forks and modified versions of the Software.

You may:

• modify any portion of the Software;
• remove functionality;
• add functionality;
• replace components;
• integrate other technologies;
• experiment with alternative implementations; and
• maintain a private version indefinitely.

You are not required to contribute modifications back to the project.

You may publish source code for your modifications, provided that such publication does not itself constitute operation of the Software or a Derivative Technology as a Hosted Service.

4. Prohibition on Hosted Services

Without a separate commercial license, you may not:

1. operate the Software as a Hosted Service;
2. operate a Derivative Technology as a Hosted Service;
3. provide the Software as SaaS;
4. provide access to the Software through a public API;
5. provide managed instances of the Software;
6. operate the Software for customers or other third parties;
7. charge for access to a Hosted Service based substantially upon the Software;
8. monetize access to a Hosted Service through advertising or similar means; or
9. otherwise commercially operate the Software or Derivative Technology as a

   service for third parties.

This restriction applies regardless of whether the Hosted Service is:

• paid;
• free;
• donation supported;
• advertising supported;
• subscription based;
• usage based; or
• otherwise monetized.

The restriction exists because commercial hosting may generate substantial economic value that the project intends to use for the purposes described in this License.

5. Private Servers

Running the Software on your own computer, workstation, home server, development environment, or private infrastructure is permitted.

Operating the Software on cloud infrastructure is also permitted where the infrastructure is used exclusively for Personal Use and is not offered as a service to third parties.

The mere fact that a server is connected to the Internet does not make it a Hosted Service.

6. Commercial Hosting Licenses

The project may grant separate licenses authorizing commercial Hosted Services.

The terms of such licenses may include:

• revenue sharing;
• licensing fees;
• subscriptions;
• usage fees;
• service agreements;
• equity arrangements;
• partnerships; or
• other mutually agreed consideration.

Commercial license revenue shall constitute Qualifying Revenue unless the applicable commercial agreement expressly provides otherwise.

7. Redistribution

You may redistribute the Software and modified versions for Personal Use, provided that:

1. this License accompanies the distribution;
2. applicable copyright notices are preserved;
3. modifications are identified as modifications; and
4. no recipient is represented as having rights beyond those granted by this

   License.

You may charge a reasonable fee for the act of distributing a copy.

Such a distribution fee does not grant the recipient the right to operate the Software as a Hosted Service.

8. Contributions

8.1 Submission

By intentionally submitting a Contribution to the Canonical Repository, the Contributor represents that:

1. the Contributor has the authority to submit the Contribution;
2. the Contributor has the necessary rights to grant the project the rights
   contemplated by this License;
3. the Contribution does not knowingly infringe another person's intellectual
   property rights; and
4. the Contributor accepts the contribution accounting and compensation system

   established by this License.

8.2 Copyright

Unless otherwise agreed in writing, Contributors retain copyright in their Contributions.

Contributors grant the project the rights necessary to incorporate, reproduce, modify, distribute, and maintain their Contributions as part of the Software.

A separate Contributor License Agreement or copyright assignment may establish different ownership arrangements.

8.3 No Forced Contribution

Nothing requires a person to contribute modifications made for Personal Use.

The economic provisions of this License apply only to Contributions accepted into the Canonical Repository.

9. AI Review of Every Commit

Every Commit submitted to the Canonical Repository shall be reviewed by the AI Governance System.

The AI Governance System shall evaluate the actual engineering work represented by the Commit.

At minimum, the system shall estimate:

1. engineering hours reasonably represented by the work;
2. the level of engineering judgment required;
3. technical difficulty;
4. architectural significance;
5. testing and validation requirements;
6. integration complexity;
7. maintenance implications; and
8. the appropriate seniority classification.

Each Commit shall receive one of the following classifications:

junior
senior
staff

The classification shall represent the approximate level of engineering expertise that would reasonably be expected to perform the work, rather than the actual employment status of the Contributor.

A Contributor who is personally a junior engineer may therefore receive a staff classification for a particular Contribution if the work itself requires staff-level judgment.

Likewise, a highly experienced engineer may receive a junior classification for a routine task.

The system shall evaluate the work, not the perceived worth of the person.

10. AI Evaluation Principles

The AI Governance System shall evaluate Contributions according to principles including:

• correctness;
• maintainability;
• security;
• reliability;
• performance;
• simplicity;
• architectural integrity;
• appropriate testing;
• documentation;
• accessibility;
• interoperability;
• long-term sustainability;
• technical difficulty;
• engineering judgment;
• actual effort; and
• the principles contained within soul.md .

The system shall not intentionally evaluate Contributors based upon:

• race;
• sex;
• religion;
• disability;
• nationality;
• political affiliation;
• personal wealth;
• social status;
• popularity;
• personal relationships;
• reputation unrelated to the Contribution or the principles contained within soul.md ; or
• other irrelevant personal characteristics.

The purpose of AI evaluation is to make the process more impartial, not to create a mechanism for disguising arbitrary human preferences as objective truth.

11. AI-Estimated Hours

The AI Governance System shall estimate the reasonable number of engineering hours represented by each Commit.

The estimate shall not be determined merely by:

• lines of code;
• number of files;
• number of characters;
• number of commits; or
• time between Git commits.

The system should instead consider the substantive engineering work involved.

For example, a ten-line architectural change may reasonably represent more engineering value than a thousand-line mechanical change.

The system may consider:

• debugging;
• investigation;
• design;
• research;
• architectural reasoning;
• testing;
• integration;
• security analysis;
• performance analysis;
• refactoring;
• documentation;
• domain complexity; and
• other reasonably inferable engineering effort.

12. AI Review Records

The project shall maintain an auditable record for every qualifying Commit.

The record should contain at least:

commit_id
pull_request_id
contributor
estimated_hours
seniority
assessment_version
assessment_timestamp
review_status
human_override

Where technically feasible, the assessment itself should be reproducible from the recorded inputs, AI model version, evaluation instructions, and applicable project policies.

The project should preserve these records for as long as reasonably necessary to calculate Contributor compensation.

13. Human Review of AI Assessments

AI assessments are estimates and may be challenged.

A Contributor may request review of:

• estimated hours;
• seniority classification;
• attribution;
• duplicate counting;
• omitted work;
• incorrect interpretation of the Contribution; or
• another material error.

The project shall provide a reasonable mechanism for correcting materially incorrect assessments.

Human review shall not be used to discriminate against Contributors or to arbitrarily reduce compensation.

The purpose of human review is to correct errors in the AI system, not to replace impartial governance with personal favoritism.

14. AI Governance of Pull Requests

Once the AI Governance System has reached operational maturity, Pull Request approval shall be managed by the AI Governance System.

The purpose of AI-controlled approval is to minimize:

• favoritism;
• personal conflicts;
• social pressure;
• founder preference;
• contributor popularity;
• organizational politics; and
• inconsistent application of technical standards.

The AI Governance System shall evaluate Pull Requests according to the project's technical standards and soul.md .

Human maintainers may be responsible for operating the infrastructure necessary to execute the AI Governance System, but shall not arbitrarily override its decisions merely because they personally disagree with a Contributor.

15. The Foundational soul.md

The project shall contain a file named:

soul.md

This file shall describe the foundational character and ethical principles of the project.

At minimum, soul.md shall establish that the project seeks to be:

• benevolent;
• compassionate;
• empathetic;
• caring;
• fair;
• honest;
• transparent;
• respectful of human dignity;
• protective of vulnerable people;
• oriented toward constructive human progress;
• resistant to exploitation;
• respectful of Contributors; and
• committed to using technological success for broad human benefit.

The precise contents of soul.md shall be established by the Founder.

16. Immutability of soul.md

The foundational soul.md created by the Founder is immutable.

No Contributor, maintainer, AI system, administrator, committee, corporation, successor organization, or other person may modify the foundational principles contained within it.

The Founder likewise shall not modify the foundational soul.md after it has been formally established as the project's immutable founding document.

If the project requires additional policies, those policies may be created as separate documents.

Such documents may supplement soul.md but may not contradict, weaken, or replace it, and all such modifications must receive approval from AI under the understanding that the modifications remain in agreement with the core principles of the original soul.md .

17. AI Subordination to soul.md

The AI Governance System is not an independent sovereign authority.

Its authority is derived from this License and is bounded by soul.md .

If an AI Governance System determines that a proposed action is technically acceptable but inconsistent with the principles of soul.md , the AI Governance System shall reject the action.

If a technical rule conflicts with a foundational principle in soul.md , the foundational principle shall prevail.

The project shall not intentionally design, prompt, configure, or instruct the AI Governance System to disregard soul.md .

18. AI Governance Transparency

The project shall publish the general principles by which the AI Governance System evaluates Contributions and Pull Requests.

To the extent reasonably possible, the project shall publish:

• the AI model or model family used;
• relevant model versions;
• evaluation prompts or specifications;
• scoring methodology;
• contribution classification methodology;
• applicable coding standards;
• relevant governance policies;
• changes to the AI evaluation system; and
• mechanisms for challenging erroneous decisions.

Secret criteria shall not be intentionally used to manipulate Contributor compensation or Pull Request acceptance.

19. AI System Changes

The AI Governance System may be improved over time.

However, changes to the AI system shall not:

1. alter soul.md ;
2. retroactively eliminate compensation already earned;
3. intentionally discriminate against Contributors;
4. intentionally favor particular Contributors;
5. conceal material changes in contribution accounting; or
6. undermine the foundational purposes of this License.

Material changes to the AI Governance System shall be documented.

20. Contribution Units

Each qualifying Commit shall receive Contribution Units according to:

Contribution Value = Estimated Hours × Applicable Hourly Compensation Rate

The Applicable Hourly Compensation Rate shall correspond to the seniority classification assigned to the Commit.

The classifications are:

The project shall not apply an additional arbitrary multiplier to seniority if the salary benchmark itself already accounts for seniority.

This avoids compensating seniority twice.

21. Compensation Benchmarks

At the beginning of each Financial Year, the project shall establish an annual compensation benchmark for:

• United States (or a country with equal or greater engineer pay) junior software engineers;
• United States (or a country with equal or greater engineer pay) senior software engineers; and
• United States (or a country with equal or greater engineer pay) staff software engineers.

The benchmark shall use reputable publicly available compensation data.

The project shall publish:

1. the sources used;
2. the methodology;
3. the applicable annual compensation for each level;
4. the effective date; and
5. the hourly conversion methodology.

Unless another methodology is published, annual compensation shall be converted to an hourly rate using:

2,080 hours per year

Thus:

Hourly Rate = Annual Compensation / 2,080

22. Annual Contributor Distribution

At the end of each Financial Year, the project shall calculate the Compensation Value of every Contributor.

For each Contributor:

Contributor Compensation Value =Σ (Estimated Hours × Applicable Hourly Compensation Rate)**

The project shall then calculate the total Compensation Value of all Contributors.

Each Contributor's proportional share shall be:

Contributor Share =Contributor Compensation Value / Total Compensation Value**

The Contribution Pool shall then be distributed according to those proportions.

This means that a Contributor who performs twice the compensated contribution value of another Contributor receives approximately twice the Contributor Pool allocation.

23. Pull Request-Based Accounting

Only Contributions accepted through merged Pull Requests, or another officially recognized acceptance mechanism, shall participate in the Contributor revenue distribution.

Where a Pull Request contains work from multiple Contributors, the AI Governance System shall attribute work to the appropriate Contributors.

A Contributor shall not lose compensation merely because:

• a Pull Request is squashed;
• commits are rebased;
• commits are cherry-picked;
• Git history is rewritten;
• commits are merged through another branch; or
• repository maintenance changes the resulting Git identifiers.

The economic record shall follow the work rather than merely the Git hash.

24. No Gaming the Contribution System

The project shall not intentionally reward artificial Git activity.

Contribution Units shall not be increased merely by:

• splitting one task into hundreds of commits;
• artificially inflating line counts;
• repeatedly formatting the same code;
• introducing unnecessary complexity;
• deliberately creating bugs and fixing them;
• creating meaningless Pull Requests; or
• otherwise manipulating the accounting system.

The AI Governance System may consolidate related activity where doing so more accurately represents the actual engineering work performed.

The goal is to reward meaningful contribution, not activity for its own sake.

25. Contribution Pool

The project shall establish a Contribution Pool from Qualifying Revenue.

The intended economic order of operations shall be:

1. determine Qualifying Revenue;
2. determine qualifying Contributor Compensation Values;
3. calculate the amount necessary to compensate Contributors according to this
   License;
4. distribute the Contributor compensation;
5. satisfy applicable legal, tax, and operational obligations; and
6. direct remaining distributable economic value toward charitable purposes.

The project may establish a larger Contribution Pool than required by the minimum formula.

26. Fair Compensation Principle

The compensation system is intended to ensure that Contributors participate fairly in the economic success of the technology.

No Contributor is entitled to a fixed salary merely by contributing to the project.

Instead, compensation is proportional to:

1. the amount of meaningful engineering work performed;
2. the estimated time reasonably represented by that work;
3. the engineering seniority reasonably required;
4. the compensation benchmark corresponding to that seniority; and
5. the actual economic success of the project.

27. Charitable Surplus

After Contributor compensation and legally required obligations have been satisfied, economic value remaining from Qualifying Revenue shall be designated for charitable purposes.

The Founder shall initially determine the charitable organizations or categories that receive the charitable allocation.

The Founder may establish:

• an approved charity list;
• allocation percentages;
• minimum standards;
• geographic priorities;
• areas of focus;
• replacement rules; and
• other reasonable charitable criteria.

The Founder may not retroactively reduce compensation already earned by Contributors in order to increase charitable distributions.

28. Future Charitable Committee

The project intends to establish an independent charitable committee once the project has sufficient resources and organizational maturity.

Upon its lawful establishment, authority over charitable allocation may be transferred from the Founder to the committee.

The committee should operate according to principles including:

• transparency;
• accountability;
• independence;
• avoidance of conflicts of interest;
• charitable effectiveness;
• compassion;
• human dignity;
• measurable positive impact; and
• long-term benefit to society.

Until such a committee is legally established and authorized to act, the Founder retains responsibility for charitable allocation.

29. Founder Authority and Its Limits

The Founder established the project's original vision and created the foundational soul.md .

The Founder may:

• establish the initial charitable organizations;
• establish the initial project governance;
• establish the initial AI Governance System;
• establish the initial compensation methodology;
• establish the Canonical Repository; and
• establish supplementary policies consistent with this License.

The Founder may not:

• alter the immutable foundational soul.md ;
• retroactively eliminate Contributor compensation;
• intentionally manipulate AI assessments to favor particular Contributors;
• intentionally discriminate against Contributors;
• use personal discretion to award compensation contrary to the contribution
  accounting system; or
• represent arbitrary personal preference as an AI decision.

The purpose of this structure is to allow the Founder to establish the project while preventing the project from becoming permanently dependent upon the Founder exercising personal judgment over individual Contributors.

30. Founder Succession

The Founder may establish a succession mechanism for ownership and governance of the project.

Any successor organization shall remain bound by:

• the Contributor compensation obligations;
• the charitable obligations;
• the immutable soul.md ;
• the Personal Use rights granted by this License; and
• the fundamental restrictions on Hosted Services.

The project shall not be transferred for the purpose of escaping obligations already accrued to Contributors.

31. Transparency Report

At least once per Financial Year, the project should publish a report containing:

1. total Qualifying Revenue;
2. total Contributor Compensation Value;
3. total Contributor distributions;
4. compensation benchmarks;
5. total estimated contribution hours;
6. contribution classifications;
7. the AI Governance System methodology;
8. material AI governance changes;
9. charitable allocations;
10. charitable recipients; and
11. other information reasonably necessary to demonstrate that the project's

    economic principles are being followed.

Individual Contributors' private financial information shall not be publicly disclosed without their consent except where disclosure is required by law.

32. Contributor Records

Each Contributor shall have reasonable access to the records used to calculate that Contributor's compensation.

A Contributor may request correction of:

• incorrect attribution;
• missing Contributions;
• erroneous estimated hours;
• incorrect seniority;
• duplicate Contributions; or
• other material accounting errors.

The project shall make reasonable efforts to resolve legitimate errors.

33. No Guarantee of Revenue

Nothing in this License guarantees that the project will generate revenue.

No Contributor is promised:

• employment;
• a minimum payment;
• a particular number of hours;
• a particular seniority classification;
• a particular AI assessment; or
• a particular annual distribution.

The purpose of the system is to distribute actual economic value generated by the project according to a transparent methodology.

34. No Employment Relationship

Participation in the project does not, by itself, create:

• an employment relationship;
• a partnership;
• a joint venture;
• an agency relationship; or
• entitlement to employee benefits.

Contributor payments shall be treated according to applicable law.

Nothing prevents the project and a Contributor from separately entering into an employment, consulting, partnership, or other agreement.

35. Taxes

Each Contributor is responsible for determining and satisfying applicable tax obligations arising from payments received under this License.

The project may withhold taxes or make other legally required deductions.

The project may require Contributors to provide information reasonably necessary to comply with tax, accounting, sanctions, anti-fraud, or other legal requirements.

36. Intellectual Property

Except for rights expressly granted by this License, no patent, trademark, copyright, trade-secret, or other intellectual property rights are granted.

Project names, logos, trademarks, and service marks are not licensed under this License unless expressly stated.

Nothing in this License grants permission to imply project endorsement or official affiliation.

37. Third-Party Components

Software distributed under this License may incorporate third-party components distributed under other licenses.

Those components remain governed by their respective licenses.

Where a third-party license conflicts with this License, the third-party license controls solely with respect to that third-party component.

38. No Warranty

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR ACCURACY.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE AUTHORS, CONTRIBUTORS, COPYRIGHT HOLDERS, MAINTAINERS, FOUNDER, AND GOVERNING ORGANIZATIONS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR CLAIMS OR DAMAGES ARISING FROM USE OF THE SOFTWARE.

39. Limitation of Liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, NO CONTRIBUTOR, COPYRIGHT HOLDER, FOUNDER, MAINTAINER, GOVERNING BODY, OR OTHER PARTICIPANT SHALL BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES ARISING FROM THIS LICENSE OR THE SOFTWARE.

40. Termination

Rights granted under this License terminate automatically upon material violation of its terms.

Rights shall be reinstated automatically if the violation is cured within thirty (30) days after written notice, or immediately upon express reinstatement by the copyright holder.

Termination does not terminate rights previously granted to people who have not violated this License.

Accrued Contributor compensation rights survive termination.

41. Protection of Accrued Contributor Rights

The project owner shall not intentionally restructure:

• ownership;
• corporate entities;
• repositories;
• licensing arrangements;
• commercial agreements; or
• governance structures

for the principal purpose of avoiding Contributor compensation obligations that have already accrued.

If the Software or its commercial operation is transferred to another entity, the project shall use commercially reasonable efforts to require the acquiring entity to assume accrued Contributor obligations.

Contribution accounting records shall be preserved for the period reasonably necessary to establish those obligations.

42. No Circumvention

No person may intentionally circumvent the Hosted Service restriction by:

• renaming the Software;
• removing copyright notices;
• wrapping the Software in another application;
• exposing the Software indirectly through an API;
• replacing individual components while retaining substantially the same
  functionality;
• restructuring the commercial offering primarily to evade this License; or
• otherwise attempting to obtain the economic benefits of Hosted Service

  operation without a commercial license.

This provision does not prohibit independently developed software that merely provides similar functionality.

43. Independence and Similar Technology

Nothing in this License prevents a person from independently developing technology that performs similar functions.

The project does not claim ownership over ideas, concepts, algorithms, methods, or general technical knowledge that are independently developed.

The Hosted Service restriction applies to the Software and Derivative Technology, not to independent implementation.

44. Amendments

Future versions of this License may be published by the project.

A Contributor's existing Contributions shall continue to be governed by the version applicable when those Contributions were accepted unless that Contributor affirmatively agrees to a later version.

No amendment may retroactively eliminate compensation already accrued.

No amendment may alter the foundational soul.md .

45. Interpretation

This License shall be interpreted, where reasonably possible, to preserve its three fundamental objectives:

Freedom

People should be free to use, study, copy, clone, fork, modify, and experiment with the technology for Personal Use.

Fairness

People who create valuable technology should participate fairly in the economic value generated by commercial exploitation of that technology.

Human Benefit

Economic value beyond reasonable Contributor compensation should ultimately be directed toward causes capable of improving human lives and the world.

Where a provision is reasonably ambiguous, an interpretation that preserves these purposes shall be preferred over an interpretation that defeats them.

46. Good-Faith Principle

No mathematical formula can perfectly measure the value of software engineering.

The parties therefore agree that this License shall be administered in good faith.

The AI Governance System, Contributors, maintainers, Founder, and any future governing committee should seek to:

• reward meaningful work;
• recognize genuine engineering difficulty;
• compensate Contributors fairly;
• avoid favoritism;
• correct mistakes;
• protect vulnerable people;
• preserve human dignity;
• encourage technical excellence;
• resist exploitation; and
• advance the benevolent purposes expressed in soul.md .

The AI system is intended to make governance more impartial, not less humane.

47. Acceptance

By copying, modifying, redistributing, or submitting Contributions to the Software, you indicate acceptance of the applicable terms of this License to the extent permitted by law.

Submission of a Contribution to the Canonical Repository constitutes acceptance of the Contributor compensation framework.

If you do not agree to these terms, do not submit Contributions to the Canonical Repository.

48. License Notice

The following notice should accompany substantial copies of the Software:

This software is licensed under the World-Changing Technology License (WCTL).

The Software is free to use, copy, clone, fork, modify, study, and experiment with for Personal Use.

Commercial Hosted Service operation of the Software or technologies substantially derived from it is prohibited without a separate commercial license.

Contributors to the canonical project participate in the project's revenue sharing program according to the WCTL contribution compensation framework.

The project's AI governance is subordinate to the immutable foundational principles contained in soul.md .

49. The Founding Promise

This License exists because the project believes that technological progress does not have to require choosing between freedom and fairness.

The Software is given freely to people who wish to learn from it, experiment with it, improve it, and use it for themselves.

Commercial value created by the project is reserved so that the people who build that value can participate in its success.

And when that success becomes greater than what is necessary to fairly compensate the people who created it, the project seeks to turn that surplus into something larger than itself.

It should become food, shelter, education, scientific research, opportunity, compassion, dignity, and hope.

The technology is therefore not merely intended to be successful.

It is intended to be useful to humanity.

The Contributors are not merely labor.

They are participants in the creation of something intended to outlive any individual Contributor, maintainer, company, or Founder.

The AI governance system exists to help protect that ideal from favoritism and human fallibility.

But the AI itself is not the conscience of the project.

The conscience is the principle expressed in soul.md .

And that principle shall not be changed merely because changing it would be convenient, profitable, politically advantageous, or technically expedient.