Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Ian Jackson]

Francesco Poli writes ("Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license"):
> On Thu, 01 Sep 2016 16:38:06 -0700 (PDT) Walter Landry wrote:
> > It is not like it is hard to add the attribution
> > required by the license.
> 
> Well, in my own personal opinion, CC-by-v3.0 requirements on
> attribution are not so easy and practical to comply with [1].
> This is one of the reasons why I believe that this license fails to
> meet the DFSG.

You have forgotten to add the usual rider, that you should add when
you are putting forward an opinion which is contrary to Debian's
established policy.

Ian.

-- 
Ian Jackson <ijack...@chiark.greenend.org.uk>   These opinions are my own.

If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is
a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Francesco Poli]

On Thu, 01 Sep 2016 16:38:06 -0700 (PDT) Walter Landry wrote:

[...]
> It is not like it is hard to add the attribution
> required by the license.

Well, in my own personal opinion, CC-by-v3.0 requirements on
attribution are not so easy and practical to comply with [1].
This is one of the reasons why I believe that this license fails to
meet the DFSG.
And not much has improved in CC-by-v4.0 unfortunately, despite my
repeated attempts to persuade the license drafters [2][3][4].

[1] https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2007/07/msg00124.html
[2] http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/cc-licenses/2012-April/006729.html
[3] http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/cc-licenses/2012-August/007118.html
[4] http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/cc-licenses/2013-February/007327.html



-- 
 http://www.inventati.org/frx/
 There's not a second to spare! To the laboratory!
. Francesco Poli .
 GnuPG key fpr == CA01 1147 9CD2 EFDF FB82  3925 3E1C 27E1 1F69 BFFE


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Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Francesco Poli]

On Fri, 2 Sep 2016 00:15:11 +0100 Ian Jackson wrote:

[...]
> Making a modified version of a scientific paper like this
> one is neither useful, nor, unless especial care is taken, ethical.

I respectfully, but strongly, disagree.

DFSG-free scientific papers (distributed while making source available)
may be of great value to the scientific community and to the general
public.
There are countless kinds of modification/partial-reuse/mixing that
would serve the best interest of scientific progress and/or scientific
education. And even scenarios where (part of) a DFSG-free scientific
paper could be turned into something completely different from a
paper...

As a Free Software supporter, I am convinced that none of these
activities should be considered unethical, as long as no
misrepresentation is going on (that is to say: as long as the derived
work is clearly described as such, proper credit is given to the
authors of the original paper, and the derived work is not passed off
as the original paper).

[...]
> But Debian has taken the view that even documents like this one must
> be fully free,
[...]

Thank goodness Debian has taken such view!


My personal opinion on the case at hand follows.

The Debian FTP Masters apparently consider works licensed under the
terms of CC Attribution v3.0 as acceptable for the main archive.
I personally disagree with them [1][2], but that's another story...

[1] https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2010/01/msg00084.html
[2] https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2007/07/msg00124.html

The paper PDF is apparently generated from LaTeX code (which, along
with the source for the images, is the source form, unless it is in its
turn generated from some other format), but the source is not made
available.
Shipping a source-less PDF document in the (source and/or binary)
Debian package would make the package unfit for the main archive.

The PDF file should be shipped in the binary package, while shipping
the corresponding source in the source package. The PDF file should be
preferably regenerated at package build time.
Otherwise, if the authors of the paper cannot be persuaded to provide
the source, then the PDF file should be dropped from both the source
package and the binary package.


I hope this clarifies my own take on the subject.
Bye.

-- 
 http://www.inventati.org/frx/
 There's not a second to spare! To the laboratory!
. Francesco Poli .
 GnuPG key fpr == CA01 1147 9CD2 EFDF FB82  3925 3E1C 27E1 1F69 BFFE


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Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Rafael Laboissière]

* Charles Plessy  [2016-09-02 09:22]:


[snip]

So my personal point of view is that shipping the PDF in the source package is 
harmless, shipping it in a binary package is close to useless, and we should 
let the package maintainer chose the solution that he finds most suitable.


Thanks for your reply.

I understand your arguments, but I am not sure I agree with your 
suggestion.  Debian excels for having policies.  Policies may not be 
perfect, but should be followed or, if they are not appropriate, be 
changed.  I do not know whether it is productive to let the decision 
about debatable matters at the discretion of the package maintainer.


Best,

Rafael

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Ben Finney]

Rafael Laboissière  writes:

> I will strip the PDF file from the tarball, add a link to it in
> README.Debian, and also contact the upstream authors for making the
> source files available.

Thank you, that's a good course.

-- 
 \“We have to go forth and crush every world view that doesn't |
  `\believe in tolerance and free speech.” —David Brin |
_o__)  |
Ben Finney 

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Rafael Laboissière]

Thanks to Paul, Ian and Walter for the replies.

I will strip the PDF file from the tarball, add a link to it in 
README.Debian, and also contact the upstream authors for making the 
source files available.


Best,

Rafael

* Paul Wise  [2016-09-02 08:39]:


On Fri, Sep 2, 2016 at 4:44 AM, Rafael Laboissière wrote:


[Please, Cc to me, since I am not subscribed to debian-legal.]


Done.

I am considering to package Divand [1], an add-on package for Octave. The 
current upstream tarball [2] contains a PDF file [3] with the following 
copyright and licensing conditions: "© Author(s) 2014. CC Attribution 3.0 
License."


Would it be okay to include this file in the Debian package?


You can find answers to this question in the FTP-master reject FAQ:

https://ftp-master.debian.org/REJECT-FAQ.html


Source missing:

Your package contains files that need source but do not have it. 
These include PDF and PS files in the documentation, or auto-generated files.


Generated files 
Your package contains generated files (such as compressed .js libraries) without 
corresponding original form. They're not considered as the preferred form of 
modification, so you will either have to provide corresponding original form, 
or remove them from your tarball, eventually depending on an already 
available packages to provide missing features.


Based on the other replies you got, the PDF is clearly a generated, 
sourceless file that the ftp-masters would reject having in Debian.


Personally, I would suggest talking to the author of the paper to 
provide their sources and other data publicly.


--
bye,
pabs

https://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Ben Finney]

Walter Landry  writes:

> Ian Jackson  wrote:
> > My personal view is that there would be no problem shipping the PDF,
> > even though Debian's users would have no practical ability to modify
> > this PDF. Making a modified version of a scientific paper like this
> > one is neither useful, nor, unless especial care is taken, ethical.
>
> As someone who reads and writes papers, this is not true. Reusing
> figures for talks and other papers is immensely useful. Copying the
> LaTeX for an equation can also be quite helpful. This paper has both
> of these elements. It is not like it is hard to add the attribution
> required by the license.

In addition to those important use cases of partial re-use, there are
more.

For example, re-rendering the source document (without significant
modification) to a different format is highly valuable, and is thwarted
when the source document is not made available to recipients.

All of these are useful, and ethically sound, uses that require equal
access to the source document.

-- 
 \ “I cannot conceive that anybody will require multiplications at |
  `\   the rate of 40,000 or even 4,000 per hour …” —F. H. Wales, 1936 |
_o__)  |
Ben Finney

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Paul Wise]

On Fri, Sep 2, 2016 at 4:44 AM, Rafael Laboissière wrote:

> [Please, Cc to me, since I am not subscribed to debian-legal.]

Done.

> I am considering to package Divand [1], an add-on package for Octave. The
> current upstream tarball [2] contains a PDF file [3] with the following
> copyright and licensing conditions: "© Author(s) 2014. CC Attribution 3.0
> License."
>
> Would it be okay to include this file in the Debian package?

You can find answers to this question in the FTP-master reject FAQ:

https://ftp-master.debian.org/REJECT-FAQ.html

> Source missing:
>
> Your package contains files that need source but do not have it.
> These include PDF and PS files in the documentation, or auto-generated files.
>
> Generated files
> Your package contains generated files (such as compressed .js libraries) 
> without
> corresponding original form. They're not considered as the preferred form of
> modification, so you will either have to provide corresponding original form,
> or remove them from your tarball, eventually depending on an already
> available packages to provide missing features.

Based on the other replies you got, the PDF is clearly a generated,
sourceless file that the ftp-masters would reject having in Debian.

Personally, I would suggest talking to the author of the paper to
provide their sources and other data publicly.

-- 
bye,
pabs

https://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Charles Plessy]

Le Thu, Sep 01, 2016 at 04:38:06PM -0700, Walter Landry a écrit :
> Ian Jackson  wrote:
> > My personal view is that there would be no problem shipping the PDF,
> > even though Debian's users would have no practical ability to modify
> > this PDF.  Making a modified version of a scientific paper like this
> > one is neither useful, nor, unless especial care is taken, ethical.
> 
> As someone who reads and writes papers, this is not true.  Reusing
> figures for talks and other papers is immensely useful.  Copying the
> LaTeX for an equation can also be quite helpful.  This paper has both
> of these elements.  It is not like it is hard to add the attribution
> required by the license.

Hi all

definitely, when the source is LaTeX, it is tempting to ask the authors or the
publisher if they can provide it.  Indeed, the document discussed here was
produced from a latex source.

pdfinfo gmd-7-225-2014.pdf 
Title:  
Subject:
Keywords:   
Author: 
Creator:copernicus.cls
Producer:   pdfeTeX-1.303
CreationDate:   Wed Jan 29 10:06:49 2014
Tagged: no
UserProperties: no
Suspects:   no
Form:   none
JavaScript: no
Pages:  17
Encrypted:  no
Page size:  595.276 x 785.197 pts
Page rot:   0
File size:  1329711 bytes
Optimized:  no
PDF version:1.4

But let's also consider the extra work demanded to the authors and package
maintainers.  In some case, perhaps quite frequently, the final action taken
will be that the package maintainer will remove the PDF from the package,
because the author and the publisher will favour the solution that is zero work
to them.  But I would also argue, it is zero gain for the user.  These PDFs are
available on line, so deleting them puts no pressure on the ecosystem to force
the authors to request that the publisher share their build system and then
integrate them in their sofware package.

So my personal point of view is that shipping the PDF in the source package is
harmless, shipping it in a binary package is close to useless, and we should
let the package maintainer chose the solution that he finds most suitable.

Have a nice day,

Charles

-- 
Charles Plessy
Debian Med packaging team,
http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-med
Tsurumi, Kanagawa, Japan

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Walter Landry]

Ian Jackson  wrote:
> My personal view is that there would be no problem shipping the PDF,
> even though Debian's users would have no practical ability to modify
> this PDF.  Making a modified version of a scientific paper like this
> one is neither useful, nor, unless especial care is taken, ethical.

As someone who reads and writes papers, this is not true.  Reusing
figures for talks and other papers is immensely useful.  Copying the
LaTeX for an equation can also be quite helpful.  This paper has both
of these elements.  It is not like it is hard to add the attribution
required by the license.

Cheers,
Walter Landry

Re: Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license

[Ian Jackson]

Rafael Laboissière writes ("Inclusion of PDF with CC Attr 3.0 license"):
> [Please, Cc to me, since I am not subscribed to debian-legal.]
> 
> I am considering to package Divand [1], an add-on package for Octave. The 
> current upstream tarball [2] contains a PDF file [3] with the following 
> copyright and licensing conditions: "© Author(s) 2014. CC Attribution 3.0 
> License."
> 
> Would it be okay to include this file in the Debian package?

AFAICT this PDF is a scientific paper.  The source code (typesetter
input file or whatever) is not provided, and while modifying it would
be permitted by the CC-BY copyright licence, it would be awkward using
just the PDF.

My personal view is that there would be no problem shipping the PDF,
even though Debian's users would have no practical ability to modify
this PDF.  Making a modified version of a scientific paper like this
one is neither useful, nor, unless especial care is taken, ethical.
Our users would be better served by getting a copy of the paper than
by having you remove it.

But Debian has taken the view that even documents like this one must
be fully free, and even removed from the source package.  So you will
need to strip it out of the source package and make a "dfsg" orig
tarball.

Sorry.  I think this is daft.  Debian does at least permit you to
include a link to somewhere else the paper may be found.

Regards,
Ian.

-- 
Ian Jackson    These opinions are my own.

If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is
a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.