Barry Warsaw writes: > I think the GFDL would probably be more appropriate: > > http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html#FDL > > I'm not as well versed on this license; what do people think about that?
"Gratuitous license proliferation" about sums it up. The big problem with GFDL is that it means that documentation and code can't be copied between GPL program and GFDL docs without explicit permission of the authors. This problem can be mostly solved by dual licensing the documentation (including all docstrings) GFDL/GPL, of course, but that doesn't stop downstream from reverting to single licensing. And it can't: requiring dual licensing is an additional restriction prohibited by both licenses. Nor does it help with copying code snippets into the documentation as examples, and dual licensing the code is right out: the GFDL is not a free software license according to the FSF. A possible problem is that any downstream derivative can add a cover text or Invariant Section, and effectively fork the documentation (unless we're willing to go nonfree to incorporate their required texts.) If cPanel/Plesk adds nothing else to Mailman documentation, I bet they'll add cover texts! And putting advertisements for their products in cover texts and Invariant Sections is encouraged by the FSF; that's what those provisions are there for. In practice, these don't seem to be real problems; the FSF has regularly looked the other way from massive unpermitted relicensing (eg, Wikipedia) and while cPanel/Plesk might not permit removal of their cover texts, they're not exactly famous for improving Mailman docs. OTOH, the only real advantage to GFDL is that we can borrow from other GFDLed docs. Do we want to do that? _______________________________________________ Mailman-Developers mailing list Mailman-Developers@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-developers Mailman FAQ: http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/faqw-mm.py Searchable Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/mailman-developers%40python.org/ Unsubscribe: http://mail.python.org/mailman/options/mailman-developers/archive%40jab.org Security Policy: http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/faqw-mm.py?req=show&file=faq01.027.htp
