# License Audit

Audit date: **2026-08-19**
Audited by: factual-foundation task (this repository's maintainers)

This document reviews the licensing posture of this repository and the
licenses of the external materials it references. It is a factual summary of
public license texts, not legal advice.

## 1. This repository's own licensing

| Scope | License | File |
|---|---|---|
| Code, schemas, scripts, verification tooling | MIT | `LICENSE` |
| Original documentation, prompt examples, storyboards, creative content | CC BY 4.0 | `LICENSE-CONTENT` |
| Third-party attribution and non-redistribution policy | — | `NOTICE` |

The `NOTICE` file already commits this project to **no third-party
redistribution**: the repository stores only links to official sources,
original summaries, and factual capability data with evidence levels and check
dates. This audit confirms that posture is both legally safe and sufficient.

## 2. MiniMax H3 Community License — review and verdict

The MiniMax H3 open-weight release is governed by the **MiniMax H3 Community
License Agreement** (license date **August 2, 2026**), published by MiniMax
(Nanonoble Pte. Ltd.) and hosted at
`https://huggingface.co/MiniMaxAI/MiniMax-H3/blob/main/LICENSE`. The license
file is **not** present in the GitHub repository root (verified: the
`raw.githubusercontent.com/MiniMax-AI/MiniMax-H3/main/LICENSE` URL returns
HTTP 404); the README badge links to the Hugging Face copy. Direct fetches to
huggingface.co failed from this machine on 2026-08-19 (transport error /
HTTP 000); the license text was verified via web-search cache of the official
Hugging Face page.

### Key terms (as published August 2, 2026)

- **Territory**: Applicable Territory is worldwide **excluding** the European
  Union, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Korea and the United States
  (§I.5). Use, reproduction, modification, distribution and display of the
  Works or their Outputs outside the Applicable Territory is not authorized
  (§V.4). MiniMax's own Q&A states the API is globally available while open
  weights are temporarily limited, and that restricted-region organizations
  may apply for a formal license.
- **Grant**: non-exclusive, non-transferable, royalty-free license to use,
  reproduce, distribute, create derivative works (including Model
  Derivatives) and modify the Materials (§II).
- **Distribution conditions** (§III): pass the Agreement to recipients, mark
  modified files, and ship a `NOTICE` text file containing "MiniMax H3 is
  licensed under the MiniMax H3 Community License Agreement, Copyright © 2026
  MiniMax. All Rights Reserved."
- **Commercial terms** (§IV): prior written authorization required above
  USD 20M yearly revenue; "MiniMax H3" must be prominently displayed on the
  UI of commercial products/services using the Works.
- **Use restrictions** (§V): comply with law and the Acceptable Use Policy;
  bind downstream users to at least as protective terms; **may not use the
  Works or their Outputs to improve any other AI model**; may not use the
  Works or Outputs outside the Applicable Territory.
- **IP** (§VI): Licensee owns its derivatives/modifications; Outputs are
  **not** Model Derivatives; no trademark license except for attribution.
- **Warranties** (§VII): AS IS, no warranty of title or noninfringement.

### Verdict for this repository

**What this repository MAY do:**

1. **Reference capability facts.** Facts about H3 (duration 4–15 s, 32 kHz
   stereo audio, FL2VA/Ref2VA modes, 768p local base, 2K via API, etc.) are
   factual information published by MiniMax. Summarizing facts in our own
   words, with source URLs and check dates, is not copying the Works and does
   not trigger the Community License. This is exactly what
   `models/minimax-h3/capability.yaml` and `constraints.yaml` do.
2. **Write our own prompts and prompt compilers.** Original prompt-writing
   guidance, schemas and compilers are our own creative/technical works. They
   are not derived from H3 weights, model code, or MiniMax's Documentation.
   Writing prompts that target H3 is normal use of the model's documented
   interface, not redistribution of the Works.
3. **Link to the official repo, the license, and the API docs.** Linking is
   not redistribution.
4. **Distribute this repo under MIT (code) + CC BY 4.0 (content)** as long as
   it contains no H3 Materials. Our `NOTICE` file already states this.

**What this repository MUST NOT do:**

1. **Copy MiniMax's prompt skill files.** The H3 repo bundles
   `skills/h3-prompt-writing/` (and eight Hub-specific skills). These are
   MiniMax-authored Materials under the Community License. Copying them into
   this repo would be redistribution requiring territory compliance, the
   prescribed NOTICE, flow-down to recipients, and would tangle our MIT/CC BY
   licensing. **We write our own skills instead.**
2. **Copy weights, model code, or any H3 source code.** Same reasoning, plus
   the weights are the core of the Works.
3. **Claim a "complete local open-source H3 2K pipeline."** 2K requires the
   official API (H3-Context-IR + H3-Regenerate-2K are not open-sourced).
4. **Present third-party claims as official** (see §4 below).
5. **Use H3 Works/Outputs to improve another AI model** (§V.3) — not relevant
   to this repo's content, but worth recording so future contributors do not
   add training-data pipelines.

**Territory note:** this repository is authored from a location outside the
Excluded Territories. The repo itself does not distribute H3 Works, so the
territory restriction does not gate this repo's content. If this repo ever
began redistributing H3 Materials, the territory restriction and the
prescribed NOTICE would apply.

## 3. Third-party repositories referenced by this project

| Repo | License | Risk | Action |
|---|---|---|---|
| SamurAIGPT/Seedance-2.5-API | MIT | None for linking | Reference by link only; its "native 4K"/"72 routes"/"30/10/10"/"Spicy" claims are third-party |
| dexhunter/seedance2-skill | MIT | None for linking | Reference by link only |
| songguoxs/seedance-prompt-skill | **No license** | Copying is unauthorized | **Must not copy**; link only |
| ZeroLu/awesome-seedance | MIT | Prompt texts have unclear provenance | Link only; do not copy prompt texts |
| Emily2040/seedance-2.0 | MIT | None for linking | Reference by link only |
| MemeCalculate/moyin-creator | **AGPL-3.0** | **AGPL copyleft** | **Must not copy any code**; linking is fine. AGPL would force this project's derived code to be AGPL, incompatible with our MIT code license |
| liangdabiao/Seedance2-Storyboard-Generator | **No license** | Copying is unauthorized | **Must not copy**; link only |
| YouMind-OpenLab/awesome-seedance-2-prompts | CC BY 4.0 badge / NOASSERTION | Prompt texts are community-collected | Link only; do not copy prompt texts |

### AGPL risk (MemeCalculate/moyin-creator)
AGPL-3.0 is a strong copyleft license: any derivative work distributed or made
available over a network must be licensed under AGPL-3.0. Incorporating any
code from this repo into ours would force our code to AGPL, which conflicts
with the MIT license chosen for this project's code. **Verdict: never copy
code from this repo; reference by link only.**

### No-license risk (songguoxs/seedance-prompt-skill, liangdabiao/Seedance2-Storyboard-Generator)
A repository without a license grants **no** permission to copy, modify or
redistribute its content under copyright law. **Verdict: never copy from these
repos; reference by link only.** (liangdabiao additionally redistributes a
copy of the official Seedance 2.0 manual; that is the repo's own concern and
not endorsed here.)

### CC BY 4.0 / NOASSERTION (YouMind-OpenLab/awesome-seedance-2-prompts)
The README badge claims CC BY 4.0 but the GitHub API reports `NOASSERTION`
(custom license text not auto-detected). Even under CC BY 4.0, the prompt
texts are community-collected with unclear provenance. **Verdict: link only;
do not copy prompt texts.**

## 4. Claims deliberately excluded from official capability files

The following claims appear in third-party wrappers but are **not** in
`models/seedance-2.5/capability.yaml` or `models/minimax-h3/capability.yaml`:

- "native 4K" (Seedance 2.5) — MuAPI wrapper claim; its own README says 4K is
  upscaled from a 720p base render.
- "72 API routes" — MuAPI route matrix, not ByteDance official.
- "30 images / 10 videos / 10 audio" reference limits — MuAPI claim.
- "Spicy / Intl / relaxed moderation" variants — MuAPI claim.
- Seedance 2.5 prices and endpoints — MuAPI claim.
- "complete local open-source H3 2K pipeline" — contradicted by MiniMax's own
  README (H3-Regenerate-2K is not yet open-sourced).
- "official SDK" — no official SDK is claimed by MiniMax; official surfaces
  are the API and the open-source repo.

## 5. Conclusion

- This repository's MIT (code) + CC BY 4.0 (content) split is internally
  consistent and compatible with the no-redistribution policy in `NOTICE`.
- The MiniMax H3 Community License does **not** prevent this repo from
  referencing H3 capability facts, writing original prompts, or linking to
  official sources. It **does** prevent copying MiniMax's skill files, weights
  or code, and prevents claiming a local-only 2K pipeline.
- Third-party repos are reference-by-link only; the AGPL repo and the two
  no-license repos must never be copied from.
- No changes to `LICENSE`, `LICENSE-CONTENT` or `NOTICE` are required by this
  audit.