Open-source licenses

The Machine is built on open-source software. Your server runs it, installed from each project's own package source, so every component arrives with its own license and copyright files, which stay on your server. This page lists them in one place.

The Machine

The assistant service and its OpenClaw plugin are open source under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0-only): github.com/Salesflare/TheMachine. You may use, self-host and change it. If you run a changed version for others, you share your changes.

OpenClaw

Your assistant runs on OpenClaw, installed from npm. The package's own LICENSE and THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md are on your server next to it.

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2026 OpenClaw Foundation

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
SOFTWARE.

Other components on your server

Each is installed unmodified from its own package source. The full license texts are in /usr/share/doc/<package>/copyright on your server, or with the program itself.

  • Ubuntu, operating system: various open-source licenses, mostly GPL
  • Node.js, runs OpenClaw: MIT
  • Python, runs the assistant service: PSF License
  • Caddy, secure web connection to your server: Apache-2.0
  • SQLite, the assistant's database: public domain
  • noVNC (Joel Martin and contributors), the browser view in your account: MPL-2.0; parts BSD-2-Clause
  • websockify (Joel Martin and contributors), connects the browser view: LGPL-3.0
  • TigerVNC (AT&T Laboratories Cambridge, RealVNC Ltd, TightVNC Group and others), the screen of your server's browser: GPL-2.0 or later
  • Tailscale, optional route through your own network: BSD-3-Clause
  • GOST, optional route through your proxy: MIT
  • earlyoom, keeps your server responsive when memory runs low: MIT
  • wacli (Peter Steinberger), links WhatsApp as a device when you add it: MIT

Google Chrome, the browser on your server, is not open source: it is provided by Google under the Google Chrome Terms of Service.

This website

The control plane that runs this website uses Python with the cryptography (Apache-2.0 or BSD-3-Clause) and qrcode (BSD) packages, and Caddy (Apache-2.0).

Questions about a component or its source code? Write to us at the support address below.

The installed wacli binary includes its MIT notice at /usr/local/share/doc/wacli/LICENSE.

Search by meaning

When enabled, search by meaning runs EmbeddingGemma, a Google model converted to GGUF by ggml-org, on llama.cpp (MIT), locally on your server. The model is provided under the Gemma Terms of Use, not the license of The Machine. Its terms, distribution notice and llama.cpp copyright/licence are kept with the model in /opt/machine-embeddings/. The Gemma terms and their prohibited-use policy apply to use of this model; your signal text is not sent to Google for embeddings.

Fonts

The website and dashboard embed Source Serif 4 (headings), copyright Adobe, and Inter (interface text), copyright The Inter Project Authors, both under the SIL Open Font License 1.1. The unmodified fonts travel with their complete copyright and license notices: Source Serif 4 notice and Inter notice. The self-hosted app includes the same notices under brand/fonts/. The font licenses are separate from The Machine's AGPL license and branding rights.