license
Enable an agent to recognise a license document, assess the permission it records, and determine whether a proposed activity falls within its evidenced scope and conditions.
Bundle → Layer → Finding → Questions Filled
7 bundles · 13 layers · 19 findings · 32 questions
License document and operative text Identify the artifact that records permission and establish which text governs the assessment.
Document identity and authenticity
Identify the document and evidence connecting it to its claimed issuer.
Authoritative license record
Record the identifier, issuing channel, artifact provenance, and available authentication evidence without assuming appearance proves authenticity.
- Which document or registry record is authoritative for this license, and how is it identified? provenance
- What evidence connects this copy or digital representation to the claimed issuer? provenance
Operative text and version
Determine the relevant version and the terms included by reference.
Complete permission text
Connect the license to applicable schedules, standard terms, amendments, and language versions while preserving unresolved precedence issues.
- Which version, schedules, referenced terms, and amendments apply to the activity and date being assessed? boundary
- What evidence establishes precedence when the license, incorporated terms, translations, or registry entries differ? provenance
Authority and permission holder Establish who grants permission, on what basis, and who can rely on it.
Issuer authority
Connect the issuer to a public power, controlled right, or delegated authority relevant to the grant.
Authority to grant
Record the claimed authority and supporting evidence separately, including limits on delegated issuance.
- What legal power, controlled right, or delegation is stated as the basis for issuing this license? definition
- Which evidence supports that authority for the particular subject, activity, and issuance date? provenance
Holder and covered actors
Determine the recipient of permission and any additional actors covered through that recipient.
Actor eligibility
Distinguish named holders, eligible recipient classes, and persons acting through a holder without assuming shared coverage.
- Is permission granted to a named party, a defined recipient class, or another explicitly described holder? definition
- Under what terms, if any, may employees, contractors, affiliates, or agents exercise this permission? boundary
Permission scope and limits Describe the activities and subjects covered and the boundaries of that coverage.
Authorized acts and subjects
Connect the permission to specific actions and identifiable licensed subjects.
Grant and exclusions
Record permitted acts, covered subjects, and express exclusions separately from assumptions about usual use.
- Which acts are permitted, and which works, assets, premises, products, or activities do they concern? definition
- Which uses, subject versions, or purposes are expressly excluded or left unresolved? boundary
Territory, capacity, and reserved rights
Capture geographic, quantitative, and exclusivity limits without conflating them.
Limits on exercise
Record territorial coverage, measurable allowances, and any exclusivity or retained-rights provisions.
- Where may permission be exercised, and what separate evidence addresses recognition in another jurisdiction? boundary
- What limits apply to users, seats, copies, installations, output, or other quantities, and how are they counted? measurement
- What exclusivity, retained rights, or competing grants are expressly addressed? boundary
Conditions and obligations Identify prerequisites and continuing requirements associated with exercising permission.
Effectiveness prerequisites
Identify events or requirements that must occur before the grant can be relied upon.
Permission activation
Record any stated acceptance, payment, registration, qualification, or other prerequisites and evidence of their completion.
- What stated events or requirements make this permission effective for the proposed holder? definition
- What evidence establishes completion of each applicable prerequisite? provenance
Continuing duties and consequences
Connect ongoing requirements to relevant uses and documented consequences of noncompliance.
Use-specific compliance
Record applicable duties such as attribution, reporting, renewal payments, or maintenance of qualifications without assuming every breach ends permission.
- Which continuing duties apply to the proposed use, and what actions would satisfy them? action
- What text or authoritative determination establishes the consequences of failure, including any notice or cure provisions? provenance
Duration, status, and change Track when permission applies and the events that alter its documented state.
Temporal applicability and status
Assess effective dates and status using evidence appropriate to the assessment time.
Permission at assessment time
Distinguish issuance, commencement, expiry, and subsequent status changes, retaining evidence timestamps and uncertainty.
- What dates or triggering events determine commencement and expiry, with what temporal precision? measurement
- Which authoritative evidence supports the permission's status at the time being assessed, and when was that evidence checked? provenance
Renewal, amendment, and ending
Capture procedures and events that continue, modify, suspend, or end permission.
Status-changing events
Link changes to their effective times, authority, notices, and any expressly surviving permissions or duties.
- What procedures and deadlines govern renewal, amendment, suspension, revocation, or termination? action
- Which recorded events changed this permission, and what rights or obligations are stated to survive those changes? boundary
Onward permission and action assessment Assess proposed reliance on the license, including attempts to pass permission to another party.
Transfer and sublicensing
Identify express terms governing changes of holder and grants to additional recipients.
Onward grant authority
Assess assignment, transfer, and sublicensing separately, including required consent and limits inherited by recipients.
- What terms separately address transfer of the license and authority to sublicense? boundary
- What consent, notice, eligibility checks, or other steps are required for the proposed onward permission? action
Proposed use assessment
Apply the recorded grant to a concrete proposed action while exposing evidence gaps.
Evidenced applicability decision
Compare the proposed actor, act, subject, place, time, and conditions with the license; record supported conclusions and unresolved dependencies.
- Does the proposed action match the evidenced holder, grant scope, temporal status, and applicable conditions? action
- What missing evidence, conflicting terms, or additional permissions prevent a settled assessment? boundary
Evidence and external alignment What the world already says about this thing, gathered so the model can be checked against it.
Reported evidence
Findings from the breadth pass, kept separate from the structural claims.
Check these first
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these check these first hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Kinds and varieties
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these kinds and varieties hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Identifiers and schemes
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these identifiers and schemes hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Real-world use
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these real-world use hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Failure modes and hazards
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these failure modes and hazards hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Regional variation
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these regional variation hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Neighbouring kinds and how to tell them apart
Recalled without web access and unsourced; every item is a lead to verify.
- Which of these neighbouring kinds and how to tell them apart hold for the sense of license this model covers, and on what evidence? provenance
Classifiers Filled
- Family
- Thing Registry
- Category
- Information and virtual systems
- Entry kind
- noun.communication
- Plane
- INF
- Domain
- INF.MED
- Tags
- document
- Facets: substance
- information
- Facets: origin
- conceptual
- Facets: agency
- inert
- Facets: mobility
- not-applicable
- Facets: scale
- not-applicable
- Facets: affordances
- readable
- Other names and narrower kinds
- licence, permit, building permit, driver's license, driver's licence, driving license, driving licence, fishing license, fishing licence, fishing permit, hunting license, hunting licence
What it is Filled
A license is a legal document that records permission granted by a competent authority or rights holder to an identified person or entity to undertake a specified activity or use specified rights, subject to applicable limits and conditions.
In scope
- Identification of the license document, its authoritative version, and any incorporated terms
- Identification of the issuer, permission holder, and evidence of the issuer's authority
- Specification of authorized activities, covered subjects, exclusions, and territorial limits
- Conditions, obligations, restrictions, and evidence relevant to exercising permission
- Effective dates, expiry, renewal, suspension, revocation, and amendment records
- Relationships between the license and associated grants, agreements, credentials, and registry records
Out of scope
- The underlying legal authorization as a separate institutional relationship
- The complete model of the licensed asset, work, premises, product, or activity
- The issuer's organization and the holder's full identity or professional profile
- Applications, examinations, inspections, and licensing proceedings except where their outcomes affect the license
- Entire contracts, statutes, or regulatory frameworks beyond provisions needed to interpret the license
- Enforcement cases and judicial determinations beyond their documented effects on permission
Why it exists Filled
Enable an agent to recognise a license document, assess the permission it records, and determine whether a proposed activity falls within its evidenced scope and conditions.
Distinguishing features Filled
- Its operative content records permission to undertake an identified activity; a document that only establishes identity or qualifications does not satisfy this test.
- It identifies, or provides a way to determine, the permission holder and an issuer claiming authority over the relevant activity or subject.
- Its permission has a determinable scope and applicability; possession of a document bearing the word 'license' is insufficient.
- It can record permission without transferring ownership of the licensed subject; any ownership transfer must be established separately.
- A permit, certificate, agreement, or registry extract may serve as a license depending on its operative function; document titles alone do not establish the boundary.
What robots and AI may and may not do Filled
Must not
- Forge, alter or reuse a licence, or present an expired one as current.
- Act under a licence it does not hold or that does not cover the activity.
- Disclose licence documents containing personal data beyond those entitled to see them.
- Advise that an activity is permitted without reading the licence conditions.
Only with a human decision
- Applying for, surrendering or transferring a licence.
- Deciding that an activity is covered by an existing licence.
May
- Read a licence and report who it covers, what it permits and its conditions and dates.
- Track renewal dates and conditions for the holder.
- Check a licence number against the issuer's public register where one exists.
Moral aspects Filled
- Licences protect the public from unqualified or unsafe activity.
- Licence records hold personal data such as addresses and medical conditions.
Who is affected
- The licence holder
- People the licence protects
- The issuing authority
Owners Filled
Steward
The named holder; the issuing authority holds the authoritative record.
Master systems
- Issuing authorities' licence registers
Links to other meta-models Filled
parent
- oewn-06491336-n - registry parent class
What else AI and robots need to interact with it Filled
Identity and identifiers required Filled
- Vercy registry: vr.tr.license
- Open English WordNet: oewn-06561652-n
Direct properties not applicable Not applicable
- License identifier: Issuer-assigned identifier and namespace; absent; unknown
- Permission basis: Public-authority permission; rights-holder permission; combined basis; unresolved
- Issuer and authority basis: Links to issuing party, relevant authority or rights, and any delegation evidence
- Permission holder: Named party; defined class of eligible recipients; bearer where supported; unresolved
- Licensed subject and activities: Links to covered subjects and descriptions of permitted acts and exclusions
- Territorial and jurisdictional applicability: Express territories, governing jurisdiction, recognition limitations, or unspecified
- Effective interval: Recorded start and end dates or timestamps, precision and time zone where relevant; conditional; unspecified
- Documented permission status: Pending effectiveness; effective; suspended; expired; revoked; terminated; disputed; unknown, each with evidence and an as-of time
- Conditions and compliance assessment: For each relevant condition: satisfied; unsatisfied; not applicable; disputed; unknown
- Transfer and sublicensing terms: Expressly allowed; allowed subject to conditions; expressly prohibited; silent; unresolved, assessed separately for transfer and sublicensing
Plane INF: no invented physical properties.
Recognition optional Filled
- A document or card naming the holder, the permitted activity, conditions and validity dates.
- Authenticity is checked against the issuer's register, not by appearance.
Capabilities and actions required Filled
- Retrieve the authoritative license text and identify missing incorporated terms or amendments.
- Compare a proposed actor, activity, subject, location, and time against the recorded permission.
- Identify obligations and evidence that must be checked before exercising permission.
- Check authoritative status records and flag stale, conflicting, or incomplete evidence.
- Identify documented renewal, amendment, transfer, or sublicensing procedures.
- Produce an evidence-linked applicability assessment that exposes unresolved interpretation questions.
Hazards and failure modes required Filled
- Expired or misread licences lead to unlawful operation and loss of insurance.
- Forged licences put unqualified people in safety-critical roles.
Standards and interfaces required Filled
- ISO/IEC 18013-1, issued by the International Organization for Standardization and the International Electrotechnical Commission, specifies physical characteristics and basic data requirements for driving licences within its scope.
Context of use required Filled
- License documents are encountered in regulated activities and in permissions to use intellectual property or other controlled resources.
- They provide evidence of who grants permission, who receives it and which activities or rights it covers.
- They are consulted when checking conditions, restrictions, validity periods and whether a proposed activity is within the recorded permission.
Sources Filled
- Open English WordNet 2024, synset oewn-06561652-n - sense and gloss of the concept
- Wiktionary: license - word senses and usage
Open questions
- Does the registry's phrase 'official permission' include private rights-holder licenses, such as software and content licenses, or only permissions issued under public authority?
- Where does the registry place the boundary between a license document and the underlying authorization, particularly when permission is recorded only in a live register?
- Which neighboring registry entries cover permits, certificates, credentials, and licensing agreements, and how should functional overlap be represented without duplicate models?
- Which license families require specialized treatment of acceptance, breach, cure, revocation, and surviving rights beyond this shared structure?
- What evidence and freshness standards should govern status assessments when the document, issuer register, and subsequent notices conflict?
Machine files
Provenance
thing registry research (pass 2) · unreviewed
Built from: models/things/publications/thing-license/spec.json