Twigum Licensing: Plain-English Summary
This is a summary to help you understand the license. It is not legal advice and it is not the license. LICENSE.md (the Twigum License 2.0) is what actually governs your use of Twigum. If this summary and the license ever disagree, the license wins.
Copyright 2026 Luke Woods. All rights not granted in LICENSE.md are reserved.
Who can use Twigum, and on what terms
| Who | Cost | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Individuals (personal, family, friends, hobby; no commercial purpose) | Free | Nothing; just follow LICENSE.md |
| Churches and other religious organizations (for their religious activities) | Free | Nothing; no application needed |
| Private nonprofits, including private nonprofit schools | Free once approved | Apply by email (see below); you may use it for up to 60 days and 25 users while your application is pending |
| Small businesses (fewer than 100 workers and under $1M revenue, counted across your whole corporate group) | Free, including for paid services you provide with it | Nothing; but you may not sell, resell or sublicense Twigum itself, and your customers need their own license |
| IT consultants setting up Twigum for clients | Free for the consultant | Each client is licensed in its own right; multi-tenant products run by non-small businesses need a commercial agreement |
| Government agencies, public schools, public universities and public libraries | Paid (government rate) | Contact us |
| Military | Paid (50% of the government rate) | Contact us |
| Larger businesses, and any other commercial use not covered above | Paid (commercial agreement) | Contact us |
| Anyone evaluating Twigum | Free 30-day trial, up to 25 users | Once per organization, plus once per Significant Major Version |
Applying as a nonprofit
Email [email protected] with your organization's legal name, country, proof of nonprofit status and roughly how many people will use Twigum. You will get an approval or a decline in writing. Approvals can be revoked as LICENSE.md describes, and a nonprofit may not be used as a front for a business.
Commercial, government and military licenses
CONTACT: [email protected]
These are granted under a separate written commercial license agreement. That agreement template is not published; it is available on request from [email protected].
No competing products
You may not use Twigum's code, non-public materials or modifications to build or offer a chat or messaging product that substitutes for Twigum. Integrations with Twigum, unrelated products that have chat built without Twigum code, and genuinely independent development are fine. LICENSE.md has the exact rule.
Source-available, not "open source"
Twigum's source code is public, but Twigum is source-available, not "open source" as the Open Source Initiative (OSI) defines it, because the license restricts commercial and competing use.
Third-party components
Twigum bundles or depends on third-party components, including (not a complete list) Fluent and Noto emoji, sound effects, Electron/Chromium and other dependencies. Each of those keeps its own license. LICENSE.md covers only Luke Woods' own work in Twigum; see THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.md.
Contributions
Contributions are accepted only if the contributor agrees that Luke Woods may license their contribution under both LICENSE.md and separate commercial terms.
TODO (Luke): this needs a proper contributor agreement (for example, a CLA), reviewed by a lawyer, before outside contributions are accepted.