Stefano Zacchiroli <[email protected]> > as recent events have shown, we need to discuss our general stance on > trademarks and the impact that trademark licenses (should) have on the > content of the Debian archive. [...]
Thank you for pushing this important but depressing topic forwards. > Impact analysis [...] > I'm open to suggestions on how we can collect such information for > packages already in the archive. I'd love to know how to do this without hammering servers and probably upsetting people. Also, one data point may be how many packages have trademark licences are in the archive already? [...] > The letter of DFSG > ================== > > A first help in deciding on the above comes from DFSG. According to my > own reading and interpretation of it: > > - the word "license" means "copyright license" I don't think that's correct. I've been corrected in the past: "When creating the DFSG, I recognized, and respected, the right of authors to manage their own brand using trademarks, and to restrict the use of those trademarks in derived works as long as DFSG-compliant use of the software would be possible after a brand substitution. [...]" -- Bruce Perens, in http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2005/08/msg00069.html So it seems like trademarks were considered when writing the DFSG. I think there were also examples from the early days of contracts and maybe design rights making software fail the DFSG, but I don't have links to them. [...] > Proposal > ======== > > We need to decide together what to do about the presence of software > with trademark restrictions in the Debian archive. It would be nice to > reach consensus through simple discussion, but we can of course also > decide to vote on this matter. > > My own proposal, that I submit to your consideration, is as follows: > > - DFSG applies to copyright license; trademark restrictions should not > make a package DFSG non-free (philosophical part) > > - however, trademark restrictions that get in the way of "usual Debian > procedures" should not be accepted in the Debian archive (practical > part) [...] > What do you think? I feel that interpretation is mostly wrong because the DFSG are guidelines for software, not for licences, although the practical outcomes of your proposal would be the same as mine in most cases. I think our freedom to use/study/share/adapt software can be affected by trademark licences as well as copyright licences. If the world agrees another new monopoly right called Betty, then it may be affected by Betty licences too. However, often trademark licences appear to restrict things that are beyond the scope of a trademark - things like honest description of the source of a package - and we should disregard those when deciding whether a trademark licence affects our freedoms. So I would amend your proposal as follows: - DFSG apply to software, not licenses; trademark restrictions may make a package DFSG non-free (philosophical part) - however, trademark restrictions that seek to restrict things which cannot be restricted by trademark law (like honest description or naming of internal components) should be diregarded when evaluating a trademark licence. Requirements to rebrand or seek permission before adding a security patch or making other non-identity changes are not acceptable: probably the package should be rebranded before being accepted into the archive. Other unacceptable restriction types may be spotted by the security team, release team, ftp-masters or maintainers. Does that work as well? Regards, -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/ Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [email protected] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [email protected] Archive: http://lists.debian.org/[email protected]
