# Purpose Source > A giveware movement with a shared software licence, Purpose Source License 1.0: use by larger organisations helps fund public-benefit causes, while contributors keep their copyright and project teams keep control of their projects. ## Start here - The idea and model: https://purposesource.org/how-it-works - For project owners and contributors: https://purposesource.org/developers - For companies: https://purposesource.org/for/companies - Governance and public evidence: https://purposesource.org/trust - Complete guide and source index: https://purposesource.org/learn ## Current stage The Purpose Source Association was founded in October 2026 as a Swiss association, with its seat in Aargau. Its register entry is pending publication. It does not claim tax-exempt status. Purpose Source License 1.0 (`PurposeSource-1.0`) was published on 2026-10-01 by the Purpose Source Association; counsel has not issued it. Its canonical text is https://purposesource.org/license/PurposeSource-1.0.txt. Its SPDX listing is requested; until it is listed, the identifier is `LicenseRef-PurposeSource-1.0`. Licence credentials are sold through our online reseller Paddle. Checkout opens at launch; no payment is taken before then. The public registry opens with the first registered projects; waivers come with the platform’s claim process. Sample registry artifacts, ledger and certificate examples are labelled and are not evidence of settled purchases, issued production certificates or real disbursements. The current stage and pending publications are at https://purposesource.org/trust/operations. ## The model - Individuals acting for themselves qualify for free use. An organisation qualifies only if its entire consolidated group has **fewer than 100 employees plus contractors AND less than the revenue threshold**, measured for the latest completed tax year. The revenue threshold is one million US dollars (section 5); the figure is not indexed. Acting on behalf of a larger organisation does not create an individual exemption. Non-profit and public-benefit bodies, public educational institutions and public bodies meet the threshold whatever their size; a commercial organisation such a body controls is measured like any other (section 5). - Above the threshold, covered use needs an Entitlement or another recorded permission under the licence. Project covers one registered repository, and the Pass covers all registered repositories. Prices follow the fee schedule (schedule v1, in US dollars a year before tax). Purpose Source License 1.0 has no Donation Entitlement. - A covered version published on or before the paid term’s end remains covered permanently. Non-renewal stops coverage of later versions. Every release independently becomes Apache-2.0 four years after its own publication. - Adoption is one unchanged canonical LICENSE file, with no Association application, account, signature, renewal or ongoing report required. The project must have the rights to apply the terms and retain existing notices. PURPOSE.yml is optional. Project teams can leave at any time for future releases, with no exit fee, minimum term or notice form, while earlier rights and releases remain intact. A registered repository is listed with its badge whether or not anyone claims it; a claim is a separate, optional process that gives its administrators their platform powers. - Contributors keep copyright. The Association does not take rights in the code it registers for others. Purpose Fees do not pay contributors or project owners. - Administrators and contributors may choose among the seven categories or leave their share to the Association, which directs it each month to where it is most needed. The board decides finally. Contributor choices begin in a recording-only trial; activation requires at least a quarter of data and a published fairness and abuse review. Purpose Source is **source-available, not open source or OSI-approved**. Public code, collaboration, forks, modification and retained contributor copyright are familiar features; the size-based coverage condition is the substantive difference. Purpose Fees support charitable and public-benefit recipients through the shared funding model. They are licence fees rather than charitable donations by the buyer. The condition does not require software combined, linked, hosted or shipped with a Purpose Source component to change licence or disclose its source (section 10). Coverage of that component remains a separate question. The licence has no blanket exemption for indirect or transitive use; under section 4, incidental benefit and merely passing the software on do not count as use for an organisation. Package channels set their own acceptance rules; there is no blanket package-registry or library exclusion. ## Repository catalogue and registration https://purposesource.org/registry lists the repositories in the registry's published records, and nothing else. Sample registration records are excluded from it. It is not a complete inventory of every project using Purpose Source. Every listed repository is shown with the same details, and the directory shows no claim status. Project and Pass retain their registered-repository scopes, and the coverage API reports `repo_not_registered` for a repository with no published record unless the organisation holds a Pass inside its term, which it answers `yes-via-pass` (cov-v2). The registry artifacts and signed coverage records remain authoritative for those contracts. See https://purposesource.org/registry/about. ## Where the money goes 100% of net Purpose Fees go to the listed charities within 30 days of each payout, after published, capped costs: running costs at most 15% of a year's net fees, and the reserve at most 5% of each payout until it holds six months of costs, so at least 80% every year. Listed supporters lower the costs, never what is passed on. No cap is ever raised for a purchase already made. Every cost and transfer is published monthly. The running-cost and reserve percentages use the fee base the statutes use, net Purpose Fee proceeds: after the payment provider’s fee, without the taxes charged at purchase, and after refunds and chargebacks. Full use of both caps leaves at least 80% of that base for recipients, not 80% of the buyer’s gross payment. The operations reserve starts at zero, so the 5% retention can apply to every payout until the reserve reaches its published target. Listed supporters reduce the costs charged to fees, never what is passed on. Running costs and reserve movements remain published; no distributable private profit is permitted. Recipients must be on the board’s published list and meet the statutory standard. The seven areas are health, education, poverty relief, humanitarian aid, environment, animal welfare and research. The first list is pending; no particular charity or completed outcome is asserted. Transfers go directly to listed recipients. Each payout’s allocation is locked before its transfer, and the transfers are normally initiated on the 25th of the month the payout is credited, within thirty days of its credit. The full method is at https://purposesource.org/trust/money. ## Sources and interpretation The canonical licence controls licence rights. The statutes control the Association. Published schedules, signed records and accepted platform terms control their respective subjects. Marketing summaries do not amend these instruments. An Impact Share is attribution, not money, equity or a claim to payment. An Entitlement records coverage; responsibility for project code remains with its licensors and stewards, under the applicable terms. The Association separately develops Rendlio Sheets. Purpose Fee funds and the accounts of that activity remain separate; any Association-owned registered project follows the same rules as others. ## Canonical URLs - Licence versions: https://purposesource.org/license - Canonical text: https://purposesource.org/license/PurposeSource-1.0 - Byte-exact text: https://purposesource.org/license/{versionId}.txt - Licence metadata: https://purposesource.org/license/{versionId}.json - Plain-English companion to 1.0 (non-operative; the licence text governs): https://purposesource.org/license/PurposeSource-1.0/annotated - Statutes: https://purposesource.org/constitution - Fee schedule: https://purposesource.org/pricing - Fee schedule, current version: https://purposesource.org/pricing/schedule - Fee schedule, one version, permanent: https://purposesource.org/pricing/schedule/v{n} - Fee schedule as JSON: https://purposesource.org/schedule/v{n}.json (current: /schedule.json) - Honest comparison: https://purposesource.org/compare - Repository catalogue: https://purposesource.org/registry - The repository directory and registration records: https://purposesource.org/registry/about - Coverage semantics: https://purposesource.org/coverage - Certificate verification: https://purposesource.org/verify - Trust Center: https://purposesource.org/trust - Where the money goes: https://purposesource.org/trust/money - Causes, the seven categories and the Recipient Standard: https://purposesource.org/causes - What we can never do: https://purposesource.org/trust/never - If the activity stops (the wind-down): https://purposesource.org/trust/wind-down - Privacy notice: https://purposesource.org/legal/privacy - Terms of use: https://purposesource.org/legal/terms - Imprint: https://purposesource.org/legal/imprint - Refund policy: https://purposesource.org/legal/refunds - Entitlement terms: https://purposesource.org/legal/entitlement-terms - Legal documents, one version, permanent: https://purposesource.org/legal/{document}/v{n} - Manifesto: https://purposesource.org/manifesto ## Documentation, in sidebar order - Adoption guide: https://purposesource.org/docs/adoption - Leaving (quit): https://purposesource.org/docs/quit - PURPOSE.yml reference: https://purposesource.org/docs/purpose-yml - Contributors: https://purposesource.org/docs/contributors - Companies: buying and complying: https://purposesource.org/docs/companies - OSPO and legal pack: https://purposesource.org/docs/ospo-legal-pack - Waivers: https://purposesource.org/docs/waivers - Verify a certificate offline: https://purposesource.org/docs/verify - Public API reference: https://purposesource.org/docs/api ## Machine endpoints (edge API) - https://api.purposesource.org/badge/{node_id}.json - https://api.purposesource.org/v1/verify/{certId} - https://api.purposesource.org/jwks.json - https://api.purposesource.org/stats.json - https://api.purposesource.org/v1/meta - POST https://api.purposesource.org/v1/forms/{contact|abuse|dsar} - artifact passthrough: /v1/registry/*, /v1/waivers/*, /v1/entitlements/{co}.jws, /v1/ledger/*, /ct/* Certificates are verified at https://purposesource.org/verify and nowhere else. Full text: https://purposesource.org/llms-full.txt