## 🚨Missing License
Hi, I'd like to report a missing license in microsoft/trocr-base-printed. From what I can see, this model is widely used and has become a foundational piece in a lot of downstream models. Given its popularity and the large number of derivative works built on top of it, the absence of an explicit license is becoming a growing concern.
As far as I can tell, the model card and repository don’t currently include any license information — which means, legally speaking, no one has formal permission to use, modify, or redistribute it, even if it’s widely done in practice.
⚠️ Without a license attached:
• By default, users technically don’t have legal permission to use, modify, distribute, or even deploy the model
• This also technically blocks any downstream reuse, even for research or open-source work
• Other teams might want to build on this model but may hesitate or be unable to because the usage rights are unclear
• This can unintentionally limit the model’s impact, even if your intention was to make it openly available!
🔹 Suggestion:
It might be helpful to:
1. Maybe we can just add an explicit license to the repo or model card
2. Optionally，It’s a good idea to clarify whether the model weights are under different terms than the code
Really appreciate this model has been a huge contribution to the community! Just hoping to help make things clearer and safer for everyone relying on it.
Let me know if I missed anything — happy to help however I can!
Thanks for your attention!
Would love to hear your view on this!
Hi - This model is part of the Microsoft Unilm project and is MIT licensed. As found here:
Hi, thanks for the clarification!
I understand that the model is covered under the MIT license via the Unilm project. However, since it is released as a standalone model on Hugging Face, the license is not directly visible to users from the model page.
For clarity and to avoid confusion in downstream use, it would be helpful to explicitly specify the license in the model card or the Hugging Face license field.
Thanks again for your response!