I am no lawyer, but here are my preliminary thoughts. Should the project have both an open license and a user agreement, or some combination? This project will need a license and/or agreement which contains elements similar to those found on Internet forums, collaborative document sites, legal advice sites, open software development sites and probably several others. Perhaps it would be simpler if certain topics (such as the cat tracking software topic) had their own license and/or agreement.
Here is a starter list of some of the details which might need to be included:
- Something that safeguards the project from those who (knowingly or unknowingly) contribute proprietary or copyrighted information
- Something about plagiarism
- Something about libel
- Something that states this project will not seek to patent anything
- Something giving the project ownership of all contributed digital data (documents, plans, schematics, drawings, photos, source code, etc.)
