Python license documentation file has a stale link to Zope Corporation

[partev]

Python license file https://docs.python.org/3.14/license.html refers to "Digital Creations (now Zope Corporation; see https://www.zope.org/)". However, Zope Corporations' current website is https://zope.dev and not zope.org. Currently zope.org redirects to zope.dev but at some point in the future this redirection may stop working and it is probably better to link to the new URL which is https://zope.dev

Linked PRs

• gh-126022: Docs: fix URL redirect for Zope Corporation #126011
• gh-126022: make license.rst consistent with LICENSE #128516
• [3.13] gh-126022: make license.rst consistent with LICENSE (GH-128516) #129290
• [3.12] gh-126022: make license.rst consistent with LICENSE (GH-128516) #129291
• gh-126022: make license.rst consistent with LICENSE: fix underline #129292
• gh-126022: Remove zope.org from the permitted linkcheck redirects #129308
• [3.13] gh-126022: Remove zope.org from the permitted linkcheck redirects (GH-129308) #129317
• [3.12] gh-126022: Remove zope.org from the permitted linkcheck redirects (GH-129308) #129318
• gh-126022: Replace TeX quotation marks with " in Doc/license.rst #129535
• [3.13] gh-126022: Replace TeX quotation marks with " in Doc/license.rst (GH-129535) #129551
• [3.12] gh-126022: Replace TeX quotation marks with " in Doc/license.rst (GH-129535) #129554

[terryjreedy]

I verified redirection and destination. @serhiy-storchaka commented on the PR "This is a legal document. It cannot be changed without consulting lawyers. Please open an issue for further discussion." @ambv How continue?

[serhiy-storchaka]

For context, the dead link www.zope.com for the Zope Corporation was discussed in bpo-25910/gh-70098. It was proposed to change it to www.zope.org, but it was a link for the Zope Foundation, which is a different entity. Alternative proposition was to remove the link. In result, it was left unchanged. The license file was also excluded in several other rounds of link updates.

Then it was changed to www.zope.org in #16880. I wonder if it was a correct change.

cc @orsenthil, @gvanrossum, @jimfulton, @aeros, @terryjreedy

[gvanrossum]

I'd recommend to link to the wayback machine, e.g. http://web.archive.org/web/20130102003549/http://www.zope.com/ (that's the last year it was functioning IIUC -- the last snapshot from 2023 already looks very different, more sales-oriented.

Should this also be changed in other copies of the license?

[jimfulton]

Thanks Guido, I'm not sure what would be best. Zope Corp is long gone. The Plone Foundation took over the Zope IP. I'm CCing Martijn Peters, who may have a suggestion. 😁 Jim

…

On Sun, Oct 27, 2024 at 9:51 AM Guido van Rossum ***@***.***> wrote: I'd recommend to link to the wayback machine, e.g. http://web.archive.org/web/20130102003549/http://www.zope.com/ (that's the last year it was functioning IIUC -- the last snapshot from 2023 already looks very different, more sales-oriented. Should this also be changed in other copies of the license? — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#126022 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AAF4U56JR4TWVGDOTO2SPQDZ5UDV3AVCNFSM6AAAAABQVJ4CR6VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZDINBQGA3TINBXHA> . You are receiving this because you were mentioned.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[serhiy-storchaka]

Strictly speaking, this is not in in the license text, but in a historical reference. This is why we have some freedom of changing it.

I have not found mention of the Zope Corporation on https://zope.dev/, so this is a wrong link. BTW, the link https://foundation.zope.dev/ in Wikipedia is not working.

The only other references to zope.com are in email addresses of some authors:

Doc/extending/newtypes_tutorial.rst:11:.. sectionauthor:: Jim Fulton <jim@zope.com>
Doc/library/datetime.rst:7:.. moduleauthor:: Tim Peters <tim@zope.com>
Doc/library/datetime.rst:8:.. sectionauthor:: Tim Peters <tim@zope.com>
Doc/library/configparser.rst:7:.. moduleauthor:: Ken Manheimer <klm@zope.com>

Doc/conf.py should be updated after changing the link in Doc/license.rst.

[picnixz]

On Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zope) it says

The Zope Corporation was formed in 1995 in Fredericksburg, Virginia under the name Digital Creations

So this appears that this the correct entry. The website on Wikipedia is https://zope.readthedocs.io/en/latest/. And it appears to be the successor of the Digital Creations mentioned in Python: https://github.com/zopefoundation/Zope/blob/072af95e25954837f2dc39ebeddf290042682144/docs/zopebook/IntroducingZope.rst#L8

(I don't know if I'm wrong or not here).

---

To summarize, the correct link should be zope.readthedocs.io but there is a mention of zope.dev in https://zope.readthedocs.io/en/latest/news.html:

The Zope release schedule on www.zope.dev explains which versions are supported and for how long.

[partev]

another option is to remove the URL link altogether.

there are other obsolete sentences, e.g. "Zope Corporation is a sponsoring member of the PSF." is probably also obsolete and should be written in past tense?

should the whole paragraph be updated?

[gvanrossum]

I would take Jim Fulton's guidance here. He created the Zope software system, he was at Zope.com from (close to) its beginnings as Digital Creations till (almost?) the end (2013 IIRC).

But regardless, it is my position that the Doc/license.rst file is simply a marked-up copy of the LICENSE file in the project root. That file was updated to remove the zope.com link seven years ago: 8474d87. We should use the exact same words here to be faithful. If you really want to plant link on "Zope Corporation", IMO a wayback machine link (from before the sale of the company) is the best.

PS. Be careful to distinguish the several different uses: Zope.com was the company; Zope is the software (actively being maintained at https://github.com/zopefoundation/Zope); Zope.org was the Zope foundation (what the PSF is for Python), now subsumed by the Plone foundation (Plone was one of the the most successful Zope applications/frameworks). The software lives under the zopefoundation org on GitHub.

[ambv]

Let's wait a bit for Martijn's suggestion and apply it across the board. Otherwise, removing the stale URL seems like the best course of action.

[mpeeters]

First of all, I am the Martin Peeters mentioned by @jimfulton there was just a typo in my name.

Zope Corporation's intellectual property was transferred to the Zope Foundation, and then to the Plone Foundation. As the president of the Plone Foundation, I brought that subject to today's board meeting, and we believe that the correct URL should be zope.dev.