Question 1:

Which of the following software licenses provides the least restrictions on re-use other than recognizing the original author?

1. CC-BY (Creative commons with attribution)
2. GPL-3 (Gnu Public License v. 3)
3. MIT, BSD or MIT/BSD compatible licenses
4. A README file with the author's name(s) with the statement "derived works must acknowledge the original author"

Question 2:

List one new method or tool that you can adopt to make your science more open, and describe how it could make you own research more effective (three sentences max).

Update: (Answers)

Q1: the answer is 3) MIT, BSD or MIT/BSD compatible licenses

• 1 is not correct; the goal was to test that the student understood that software is a special type of product that requires software-specific licensing. The creative commons faq states that CC licenses are not compatible with open source licenses and do not specifically address issues related to sharing and reusing source code e.g. patents.
• 2 is not correct. This tests that the student understands the restrictions that GPL puts on the code that they use and create. GPL-3 places specific conditions on the reuse of code; specifically, any derivative works be released with a GPL-3 compatible license. As a result, many companies have restrictions on the use of GPL licensed software (although dual licensing can solve this to some extent, it doesn't change the answer). This is why, for example, Windows can not be shipped with a bash shell and OSX repositories (like macports or homebrew) are not supported by Apple, unlike Ubuntu (apt) and RedHat (yum) repositories.
• 4 tested that students understand that in the legal domain it is insufficient to simply state intent; the content of OS licenses are written by and for lawyers!

Q2: There were many acceptable answers, but some students answered the first part (what methods could you use) but I was hoping for more specific answers to the second part (how it could make your own research more effective). Of course, the students here took the question without the benefit of hearing my erudite but presently unrealized lecture on open science.