Jean Hollis Weber wrote:
Chris Bonde wrote,
... I am a little disturbed that anyone can take what 'authors',
'documentors' have done and sell it for a profit. That is a profit
without something being given to OOo. That is, if I were to write
something good for OOo and it be published, great. (hey, ma, look at
me!). But if someone else where allowed to take the same, put a
different ribbon on it and collect some funds, I would be, at the
least, very perturbed.
That's just the way it is, Chris, in the open source world. There is
nothing unusual in the license arrangements for documents produced by
OOoAuthors. Indeed, people can sell OpenOffice.org, the program, and
make a profit if they want to, and many people do. (Some of those people
contribute money or work back to the OOo community, but others don't.)
Jean
In addition to Jean's comments, I'll add that this is completely standard
right across the open source world, with Linux etc. Not only do people
resell
the work of others; they incorporate other people's work into their
products (keeping in line with the licenses) and then sell the result.
That's the way it works.
Of course, if you see someone else selling your work, there's nothing to
stop you selling it at a lower price; or even bringing out a newer
version with a more restrictive license if you don't like it.
This is the trade off for getting the benefits of the open source
development model. Not everyone likes it, but OOo Authors is doing
nothing out of the ordinary.
Iain.
--
Iain Roberts
www.axiomtech.co.uk
