Copyright © 2026 The Open Reality Initiative · Author: Dr. Šarūnas Grigaliūnas
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The Quantum General Public License (QGPL) is a copyleft license intended for the open sharing of observation outputs (“Results”) and related materials, including datasets, documentation, and (when provided) the code and configurations used to produce or process those Results.
This version adds explicit post-quantum (“quantum-resistant”) requirements for distribution integrity and, when cryptography is used for access or transport, for quantum-resistant (or hybrid) key establishment and signatures. These technical requirements are intended to reduce reliance on public-key cryptosystems that are known to be vulnerable to large-scale quantum attacks.
This License is not a security guarantee. It is a legal permission and set of conditions for exercising rights in the Work.
“License” means this Quantum General Public License (QGPL) version 3.0.
“Licensor” means the copyright holder(s) or other rights holder(s) that are licensing the Work under this License.
“You” (or “Recipient”) means an individual or legal entity exercising permissions granted by this License.
“Work” means any material that the Licensor makes available under this License, including, as applicable:
“Phenomenon” means any system, data, equation, process, or potential state that may be measured, computed, simulated, or otherwise examined.
“Apparatus” means any tool, method, instrument, algorithm, or biological entity used to interact with the Phenomenon. This includes, without limitation, software, computers (classical or quantum), measurement devices, laboratory instruments, and human operators.
“Observation” means an act of measurement, calculation, simulation, inference, or other procedure that produces a definite output.
“Result” (or “Observation Output”) means the specific output produced by an Observation, including values, sequences, measurements, derived quantities, model outputs, and recorded data.
“Modify” means to copy from, adapt, transform, arrange, translate, correct, extend, or otherwise create a work based on the Work, where such action is reserved to the Licensor under applicable copyright and/or database laws.
“Distribute” means to convey, provide, publish, sublicense, transmit, or otherwise make available the Work (or a Modified Work) to another party, including by public download, package repositories, content delivery networks, or physical media.
“Quantum-Vulnerable Public-Key Cryptography” means public-key schemes whose security is based on integer factorization and/or discrete logarithms (including common RSA, finite-field Diffie-Hellman, elliptic-curve Diffie-Hellman, DSA, ECDSA, and EdDSA), and any successor schemes that are comparably vulnerable to large-scale quantum attacks.
“Quantum-Resistant Cryptography” means post-quantum cryptography algorithms that are standardized by NIST as:
and also includes NIST-approved stateful hash-based signature schemes (XMSS, LMS) as specified in NIST SP 800-208, and/or later NIST revisions or replacements.
“Quantum-Safe Distribution Metadata” means, at minimum: (i) a cryptographic hash of the distributed artifact, (ii) a Quantum-Resistant digital signature over that hash (or over the artifact), (iii) the corresponding public key(s), and (iv) an unambiguous identifier of the algorithm(s) and parameter set(s) used.
Subject to the conditions of this License, the Licensor grants You a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to exercise the rights in the Work that are controlled by the Licensor under copyright and related rights (including neighboring rights) to:
Where the Work is subject to sui generis database rights or similar rights, the Licensor grants You a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to extract, reuse, reproduce, and Distribute all or a substantial part of the database contents, and to create and Distribute databases that incorporate all or a substantial part of those contents, subject to this License.
In many jurisdictions, facts, numbers, and other purely factual information are not protected by copyright. To the extent any Result (or portion of a Result) is not protected by copyright, this License is intended to operate as a public permission and covenant not to sue under any rights the Licensor may hold (including database rights, where applicable), to allow the broadest reuse consistent with applicable law.
If You Distribute a Modified Work, You must license the Modified Work, as a whole, under this same License (QGPL v3.0), and include a copy of this License with the Modified Work.
You must ensure that each recipient of the Work or a Modified Work receives the Work under this License and is informed of their rights under this License.
You may not Distribute the Work (or a Modified Work) under any terms that would restrict the rights granted by this License.
You must keep intact all copyright notices, license notices, and attribution statements contained in the Work.
If You Modify the Work, You must add prominent notices stating that You changed the Work and the date of the change.
You may not misrepresent the origin of the Work or any Result. If You Distribute a Result with corrections, filtering, normalization, or other transformations, You must clearly indicate that the distributed Result is modified relative to the original.
You may not use legal terms, contract terms, patents, or technical measures to prevent others from exercising the rights granted by this License.
You may not Distribute the Work in a form that is effectively controlled by digital restrictions management or cryptographic access controls that prevent recipients from exercising rights granted by this License. If You Distribute the Work in an encrypted or access-controlled form for transport or storage, You must also provide a practical means for recipients to obtain an unencumbered copy under this License.
If You Distribute the Work (or a Modified Work), You must provide Quantum-Safe Distribution Metadata for the distributed artifact using at least one Quantum-Resistant signature scheme (as defined in Section 0). The metadata must be made available with the same level of accessibility as the artifact itself.
If You provide the Work to recipients over a network using cryptographic authentication, key agreement, or encrypted transport, You must support Quantum-Resistant key establishment (e.g., ML-KEM) or a hybrid construction that combines Quantum-Resistant key establishment with a classical method. You must not rely solely on Quantum-Vulnerable Public-Key Cryptography for establishing the confidentiality or authenticity of such transport.
If NIST publishes revisions, errata, or replacements for the standards referenced in the definition of Quantum-Resistant Cryptography, You may use the revised or replacement standards to satisfy Sections 5.1 and 5.2.
This License does not grant permission to make false or misleading security claims about the Work. Compliance with Section 5 does not imply that any particular security property is achieved.
Each Licensor grants You a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive, irrevocable (except as stated in Section 7) patent license to make, have made, use, offer to sell, sell, import, and otherwise transfer the Work, where such license applies only to patent claims licensable by the Licensor that would be infringed by exercising rights granted by this License in the unmodified Work.
If You initiate patent litigation (including a cross-claim or counterclaim) alleging that the Work infringes a patent, then any patent licenses granted to You under this License for the Work terminate as of the date such litigation is filed.
Your rights under this License terminate automatically if You fail to comply with its terms.
If You cease all violation of this License, then Your license is reinstated provisionally, unless and until the Licensor explicitly and finally terminates Your rights.
The Work is provided “as is”, without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including but not limited to warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. The entire risk as to the quality, accuracy, security, and performance of the Work is with You.
In no event and under no legal theory, whether in tort (including negligence), contract, or otherwise, shall any Licensor be liable to You for damages, including any direct, indirect, special, incidental, or consequential damages of any character arising as a result of this License or out of the use or inability to use the Work.
Attach the following notice to the Work, Result, dataset, or distribution:
OBSERVATION DATA / WORK NOTICE
This Work (including any included Results) is released under the Quantum General Public
License (QGPL) v3.0 — Quantum-Safe Edition.
You may use, modify, and distribute this Work under the terms of the QGPL v3.0.
Quantum-Safe Distribution Metadata (Section 5) is provided with this distribution.
Contact: Dr. Šarūnas Grigaliūnas <info@qgpl.org>