Re: Debian-approved creative/content license?
On 3/13/07, Marco d'Itri [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Actually I understand that the ftpmasters have approved content licensed under CC 3.0 I assume you mean that CC-licensed content has been accepted into main. Could you please give some examples of packages where this is the case? Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Java in Debian advice result
On 2/28/07, John Goerzen [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: to summarize the situation here. SPI's attorney has asked that his messages not be posted to public mailing lists for reasons of attorney-client privilege. Please could you elaborate on whom this secrecy is intended to protect, and in what way? I thought attorney-client privilege was a mechanism intended to protect sensitive information disclosed by the client to the attorney (facilitating honest and open communication without the client having to worry about information being leaked to enemies, competitors or the authorities). Assuming this is the case, it seems a bit strange that the request for secrecy should be coming from the *attorney*'s side... I could well be talking bollocks here, and I apologise in advance if that's the case, but I have to say that that's the inference I got. Clarification welcome. Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Java in Debian advice result
On 3/5/07, Roberto C. Sanchez [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, Mar 05, 2007 at 10:23:40AM -0800, Sean Kellogg wrote: So, from the lawyer's perspective, it is a matter of client-attorney privilege. SPI now has to make the decision that full disclosure to the public via d-l is worth the potential risk of losing that protection. My guess would be the lawyer has done the research on how one could bring suit against Debian/SPI/3rd party and disclosure would be like handing a roadmap to the enemy. You generally want to make the cost of bringing suit against you as high as possible to warred off long-shot litigation. OK. Makes perfect sense to me. And me. Ta muchly for the explanation. Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Free art license, CC and DFSG
On 3/5/07, Francesco Poli [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: As far as CC-v3.0 are concerned, my personal opinion should be clear from the message[2] that you yourself cite: I don't think that any CC-v3.0 license meets the DFSG. Other people disagree with me, though. You didn't find any final answer because the thread didn't reach a clear consensus (and possibily is not even over, just in pause for a while...). The final answer on this sort of issue isn't arrived at through discussion on -legal at all. To quote an ftp-master: the way Debian makes the actual call on whether a license is suitable for distribution [...] isn't based on who shouts the loudest on a mailing list, it's on the views of the archive maintainers. [1] In his role as DPL, that same ftp-master (or archive maintainer, if you prefer) has endorsed [2] the Debian Creative Commons Workgroup which opined [3] that the CCPL 3.0 is suitable for Debian main. The Workgroup's conclusion appears to hinge on whether one chooses to interpret the GFDL GR [4] as a precedent rather than an exemption, but I suspect that in the absence of another GR, it's the ftp-masters that'll be getting to choose. Similarly, while MJ Ray argues [5] that packages under the Open Font License making their way into main is proof of incompetence and/or oversight on the ftp-masters' part, is it not possible that they simply disagree with debian-legal's analysis and decided to let the packages in on that basis, just as they did in the case of Sun's Java licensing? As ever, the above is only my personal opinion and I'm perfectly happy to be proven wrong when presented with appropriate evidence. Feel free to smash my thought experiment to bits as best as you are able. :-) [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2006/06/msg00129.html [2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2006/08/msg00015.html [3] http://evan.prodromou.name/Debian_Creative_Commons_Workgroup_report [4] http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_001 [5] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2007/03/msg1.html Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rejected Package - Licence question
On 7/10/06, Frank Küster [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If you fail, well, I fear there is currently no license for documentation that has been approved by -legal. Actually, the MIT license[1] covers documentation: --- Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the Software) --- [1] http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: MPL license
On 4/1/06, Anthony DeRobertis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [Snapshot.debian.net does not help because Debian made legally responsible for ensuring the code remains available by the MPL, and as we know all to well snapshot.d.n is not invincible.] True enough. However, once snapshot.debian.net has moved to Debian's promised multi-server, multi-terabyte storage cluster with 2Gbits uplink [1, 2] it might be considered sufficiently robust... [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2005/12/msg00112.html [2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2006/03/msg00245.html -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Results for Debian's Position on the GFDL
On 3/16/06, Anthony DeRobertis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: One thing that springs to mind is to start doing summaries of traffic on Debian-legal (again). Its has been tried before, but turns out to be too much work for every victim^Wvolunteer so far. Way back in February last year, MJ Ray and I were tossing around the idea of resurrecting the summaries in a new fleshed-out form [0]. Unfortunately, real life goings-on drew me away, the discussion petered out without reaching a conclusion, and somehow I never managed to get back to it. But I'm game for another attempt - I'll give summarizing this coming week's (20th - 26th) traffic a go. As that rather ancient prototype document says at the very top, feedback is most welcome as to how it might be improved. MJ's already kindly pointed out the risks of editorializing (which I shall do my utmost to avoid) and the fact that one shouldn't summarize threads that are still active (I'll follow the 3 day rule [1] from now on). [0] http://www.dur.ac.uk/andrew.saunders/14th-20th_Feb.html [1] http://kt.earth.li/summaryfaq.html#3day Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Licenses for DebConf6
On 11/14/05, Henning Makholm [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I case you hadn't noticed, there was a major _difference_ in opionons about how software was to be interpreted. The editorial clarification in 2004-003 removed the confusion by avoiding the ambiguous word software Unfortunately not. :-( The GR's author explained[1] that both the DFSG and the SC required clarifying, but that in the interests of simplicity the necessary changes would be dealt with in separate GRs. Thus, 2004-003 clarified only the SC. Until his follow-up GR amending the DFSG is proposed and passed, the ambiguity will remain. [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/07/msg00435.html -- Andrew Saunders
Re: GPL+OpenSSL issue -- good suggestion?
On 8/30/05, Pascal Giard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'd be inclined to accept this and go with the upstream author's will; enable SSL and add information in the copyright file. He's not the only upstream author of the code, so his statement is not sufficient. The package also includes some of Google's artwork (gmail.png). Google's usage guidelines[1] forbid any and all modifications to their logos (About Our Logos - One of the conditions for all uses is that you can't mess around with our logo. Only we get to do that.) and any use of their Brand Features requires an explicit permission statement from them. It looks like we mightn't have permission to distribute this file even from non-free, let alone a suitably permissive license to allow it to stay in main. Fortunately, it's just an image of the letter G so it shouldn't be too hard to whip up a replacement. [1] http://www.google.com/permissions/guidelines.html -- Andrew Saunders
Re: zsnes belonging to main instead of contrib
On 8/7/05, Philipp Kern [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In the case of zsnes its practical function is to emulate a SNES console, with all its hardware. It supports this completely without any non-free data. It's only that most data for practical use is non-free. Take Wine. It emulates the Windows API quite well to run Windows application. Now one could argue that most of them are non-free if you look at them from a DFSG point of view. And the calculator etc. they ship with Wine is also a set of dummy data which could calculate some very basic equations but which primarily demonstrate that it runs without crashing. (This is only from my limited knowledge back in the old days when I occasionally used it.) FWIW, this comparison to Wine has been made before[1] and it failed to convince the ftpmasters. [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/07/msg00178.html Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: RFS: tvbrowser -- TV-Browser is a java-based TV guide
On 8/5/05, Bastian Venthur [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I package the client -- I did not even note, that upstream also provides a server, but as far as I (now) understand, the server is a tool to provide the data, so users of tvbrowser can use them. If this is correct, I provide only the server. As already mentioned, the data which is required for the program to serve its purpose is non-free: --- All tv data provided by TV-Browser are protected by copyright laws and may only be used within TV-Browser. Every other manner of using, reproducing or redistributing of the tv data is illegal and my be prosecuted on civil or criminal law. On downloading the tv data you declare your agreement to these terms. If you have any questions concerning these terms please contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- So even if you managed to build it entirely with free tools at some later date, this issue alone would relegate it to contrib until suitably free data is available - or at least, that's been the current practice for e.g. emulators such as zsnes which require non-free roms. But having had a quick peek inside the orig.tar.gz, it looks like there's stuff in there that renders it completely undistributable, even from non-free. Everything under win/include/ contains: * Copyright 1997-1999 by Sun Microsystems, Inc., * 901 San Antonio Road, Palo Alto, California, 94303, U.S.A. * All rights reserved. * * This software is the confidential and proprietary information * of Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Confidential Information). You * shall not disclose such Confidential Information and shall use * it only in accordance with the terms of the license agreement * you entered into with Sun. And all instances of Search16.gif, About16.gif, WebComponent16.gif, Edit16.gif, Information24.gif, TipOfTheDay24.gif, Host16.gif, Refresh16.gif, Help16.gif, Find16.gif, Stop24.gif, listview24.gif, Import24.gif, Stop16.gif, Refresh24.gif, Properties16.gif, New16.gif, Export16.gif, listview16.gif, Bookmarks24.gif, New24.gif, Import16.gif, PrintPreview16.gif, details16.gif, Back24.gif, Print16.gif, Bookmarks16.gif, Forward24.gif, PageSetup16.gif, Open16.gif, Down24.gif, Delete16.gif, Down16.gif, down16.gif, Preferences24.gif, Print24.gif, Up24.gif, Delete24.gif, Up16.gif, up16.gif, Preferences16.gif, Save16.gif, Jar16.gif, Information16.gif, Find24.gif, TipOfTheDay16.gif and Edit24.gif contain the string Copyright 2000 by Sun Microsystems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. CCed the author to make him aware of the situation. Any further discussion with regards to the licensing should probably take place on -legal rather than -mentors. Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: RFS: tvbrowser -- TV-Browser is a java-based TV guide
On 8/6/05, Bastian Venthur [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: 2) The gifs are free! Unfortunately not. :-( Try actually downloading the graphics from that site using the link provided, and you're forced to accept the following license agreement: --- SUN IS WILLING TO MAKE THE ACCOMPANYING SOFTWARE GRAPHICS ARTWORK AVAILABLE TO YOU ONLY UPON THE CONDITION THAT YOU ACCEPT ALL OF THE TERMS CONTAINED IN THIS LICENSE. PLEASE READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THIS LICENSE CAREFULLY. BY CLICKING ACCEPT AND DOWNLOADING THE SOFTWARE GRAPHICS ARTWORK, YOU ARE AGREEING TO THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO ALL OF THESE TERMS, SELECT THE DO NOT ACCEPT BUTTON AT THE END OF THIS LICENSE. Copyright 2000 by Sun Microsystems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Sun grants you (Licensee) a non-exclusive, royalty free, license to use, and redistribute this software graphics artwork, as individual graphics or as a collection, as part of software code or programs that you develop, provided that i) this copyright notice and license accompany the software graphics artwork; and ii) you do not utilize the software graphics artwork in a manner which is disparaging to Sun. Unless enforcement is prohibited by applicable law, you may not modify the graphics, and must use them true to color and unmodified in every way. This software graphics artwork is provided AS IS, without a warranty of any kind. ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS, REPRESENTATIONS AND WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT, ARE HEREBY EXCLUDED. SUN AND ITS LICENSORS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES SUFFERED BY LICENSEE AS A RESULT OF USING, MODIFYING OR DISTRIBUTING THE SOFTWARE GRAPHICS ARTWORK. IN NO EVENT WILL SUN OR ITS LICENSORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY LOST REVENUE, PROFIT OR DATA, OR FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED AND REGARDLESS OF THE THEORY OF LIABILITY, ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE SOFTWARE GRAPHICS ARTWORK, EVEN IF SUN HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. If any of the above provisions are held to be in violation of applicable law, void, or unenforceable in any jurisdiction, then such provisions are waived to the extent necessary for this Disclaimer to be otherwise enforceable in such jurisdiction. --- This license is obviously non-free as it expressly prohibits creating or distributing modified versions. I also suspect that the prohibition on using the graphics in a manner which is disparaging to Sun fails DFSG #6. But hey, it's still an improvement - beforehand, we didn't even have permission to distribute the graphics *at all*. Now at least they're suitable for non-free. Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: RFS: tvbrowser -- TV-Browser is a java-based TV guide
On 8/6/05, Bastian Venthur [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Fine, for me that's a good start. I'd like to package tvbrowser as non-free at the first run and in the meantime try to convince upstream to substitute this non-free-images with free ones in the next version. If they don't want to do so, than I'd do this by myself in order to push tvbrowser from non-free to contrib. Would this be OK? Sounds good. In the meantime I've found something about the copyrighted files from sun. Actually these files are part of the official j2sdk! The contens of win/include seems to be just a copy of my /usr/lib/j2sdk1.5-sun/include. But I have no idea how to treat this information. Does this mean, that these files can be treated like our gifs, or do they block a distribution into debian? In order to distribute any part of Sun's j2sdk you have to agree that (iii) you do not distribute additional software intended to replace any component(s) of the Software. Since Debian distributes and encourages free replacements such as Kaffe, GCJ and SableVM, no part of j2sdk can be distributed by the Project at all, even from non-free. If these files are showstoppers, then I'll just remove the win-dir (we obviously don't need it anyway). Yep, that's what you'll need to do. Kind regards and thanks for your help No worries. :-) Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Re: RFS: tvbrowser -- TV-Browser is a java-based TV guide
On 8/7/05, Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Last I checked you can't distribute parts of Sun's java anyway, only the *precise* installer files provided by Sun. You're quite right, thanks for the correction. Just to clarify, for anyone else who might be reading: the agreement[1] requires you to promise that (i) you distribute the Software complete and unmodified and only bundled as part of, and for the sole purpose of running, your Programs. [1] http://java.com/en/download/license.jsp Cheers, -- Andrew Saunders
Illegal code distribution from http://people.debian.org/~cowboy/debian/x3270/
On Mon, 11 April 2005, Richard A Nelson wrote: It seem to me the the situation can be cleared by sending few emails and instead the pacage was removed. You've only read about the most recent issue... This has been battled for *many* years and the DFSG crew is growing more vigilant - at the expense of the pragmatists amongs us :( The need for a suitable permission statement from the rights holder(s) for Debian to distribute any given copyrighted work is a legal requirement, and has nothing at all to do with the DFSG. I still need and use x3270, in fact I've just put the newest version up at: http://people.debian.org/~cowboy/debian/x3270/dists/unstable/ As stated in the follow-ups to the bug report, the package was removed from the FTP archive in order to reduce the Project's potential liability for copyright infringement. Now, thanks to you, the Project is *still* hosting and distributing copyrighted code from within its infrastructure without the permissions required to legally do so. I'm assuming that the only reason DSA haven't already moved to enforce the Machine Usage Policy[1] is that they're not yet aware of this most blatant and deliberate breach on your part. CC to -admin added in order to bring it to their attention. [1] http://www.debian.org/devel/dmup
Re: Linux and GPLv2
On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 00:38:21 +1100, Matthew Palmer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'm too tired to dig up the exact reference, but in a large heated discussion between Hans Reiser and many other people on d-devel last year (or maybe the year before) about removing or obscuring credits in mkreiserfs, Hans Reiser stated that he had information from RMS that there would be some sort of invariant section-like clause in GPLv3. FWIW, RMS later posted to the list[1] stating that Hans was mistaken: Reiser's statement was inaccurate. For GPL version 3 we are considering requirements for preserving certain limited author information in the source code, and making explicit that other GPL-compatible licenses that are present on parts of the code cannot be removed from the source, but nothing beyond that. [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/06/msg00173.html -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Use of the Debian name for websites
On Thu, 10 Feb 2005 21:43:49 -0500, Glenn Maynard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This isn't avoiding it at all; the DFSG was not renamed to the Debian Free Stuff Guidelines. It merely makes it clear that documentation is included in software, at least as far as the SC is concerned. I don't think the GR's numerous removals or substitutions of the word software support this argument. You can change your vocabulary if you want, but I certainly don't like the idea of giving way to the people trying to change the language to suit their claims that freedom isn't important for documentation. Good for you, but how is this relevant to what I wrote? I claimed no such thing, and my own change of vocabulary is idential to that which has already been approved in the portions I quoted from the GR. -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Use of the Debian name for websites
On Thu, 10 Feb 2005 13:04:08 -0600, Josh King [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The goal/intent of the site is to provide new user friendly forums This part sounds like unnecessary duplication of effort. There are already a great many such forums in existence, not least http://forums.debian.net. What would be gained by creating yet another? We plan to post a disclaimer stating that we are not endorsed nor affiliated with Debian or SPI. All content on the site will be licensed under the applicable Debian or GNU accepted licenses, meaning all original content of any kind generated or developed by or for the site will be free as in beer and freedom. Sadly, in practice this means that there'd be no guarantee as to the DFSG-freeness of the content at all, in light of the disagreements between Debian and the FSF over what constitutes a Free license (the GNU Free Documentation License being one prominent example[1]). [1] http://people.debian.org/~srivasta/Position_Statement.html -- Andrew Saunders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Bits from debian-legal between 2004-08-09 and 2004-08-15
This summary covers 9 August to 15 August 2004. http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/maillist.html#00214 7 most active threads with over 4 posts: Netatalk and OpenSSL licensing, over 20 posts, last post 12 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00181 Web application licenses, around 20 posts, last post 14 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00011 NEW ocaml licence proposal by upstream, will be part of the3.08.1 release going into sarge., over 30 posts, last post 14 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00228 GPL-licensed packages with depend-chain to OpenSSL, over 10 posts, last post 11 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00279 Clarification of redistribution, under 10 posts, last post 11 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00252 Nmap license, under 10 posts, last post 10 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00214 Free open DRM software, under 10 posts, last post 11 Aug http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/threads.html#00218 Bits author picks: Sleepycat relicense documentation under the same DFSG terms as their code, thank -legal participants for their input http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/msg00252.html Should http://www.debian.co.jp sign a trademark use agreement? http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/msg00251.html Bugs in -legal's current approach to license summaries http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/msg00177.html Please inform [EMAIL PROTECTED] and [EMAIL PROTECTED] of errors or improvements. -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Clarification of redistribution
On Wed, 11 Aug 2004 07:57:25 -0400, Joe Moore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I hope this sort of success is mentioned in the debian-legal summary of threads for this week. Don't worry, it will be. :-) -- Andrew Saunders
Re: the meaning of 'the same terms in DFSG 3, and why the QPL fails it (was: An old question of EGE's)
On Mon, 2 Aug 2004 13:08:39 -0500, Branden Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, Jul 26, 2004 at 10:41:24AM +0100, Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS wrote: Branden Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED]: DFSG 3 was intended to forbid licensors from placing themselves in a specially advantaged position. If not, why doesn't DSFG 3 simply say: The license must allow modifications and derived works. ...hmm? Perhaps DFSG 3 is looking at it from the point of view of the receiver of the modified work rather than the modifer: A creates a QPL work, B modifies it and gives the modified version to C. Then C gets the modified work under the same licence as the original work was distributed. However, if you really want to know how DFSG 3 was intended then you must talk to the people who wrote it. To be honest, I'm less interested in that than in what it is we think it means today. You don't seem to be very consistent on this point. You yourself used Bruce's clarification that he intended the DFSG to be applied to everything on the Debian CDs to back up your own interpretation[1] and suggested seeking his counsel regarding the meaning of the (now defunct) We won't object to commercial software that is intended to run on Debian systems clause[2]. What brought about this change of heart? [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2003/08/msg00017.html [2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2000/06/msg00299.html -- Andrew Saunders
Re: ocaml QPL : Clause 3b in question now.
On Thu, 22 Jul 2004 21:56:06 +0200, Sven Luther [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And i can't take you seriously as long as people like Brian are allowed to participate in this discussion which such low-quality contributions. What's this part all about? If his posts really bother you that much and you don't want to read what he writes, add him to your killfile. The only reason I could see you wanting to ban him from the list altogether is if you're afraid that others won't agree that his contributions are of such low quality after all, and thus you want to gag him instead of attempting to rebut his arguments. -- Andrew Saunders Apart from the fact that he clearly has made a lot of valuable contributions to this list in the past, I think advocating banning him from posting is an extreme overreaction. Friendly, Please try harder. And you, do you try to be reasonable ? you only defend Brian because he is a long timer here, and one of your crow of time-loser who discuss things in round without even bothering to provide serious advice. What do i gain to participate here, only hours of lost time. I feel like i will provide my analysis in the debian copyright file of the ocaml package, and discuss this directly with the ftp-masters, or the RM. There is absolutely no credibility left here as long as such bullshit is allowed. And yes, if i sound pissed, i am. It is now almost one week since this bullshit started, and we haven't advanced one bit, and you are all so imbued with your righteouness that you don't even bother reading the licence you are criticing, nor the comment that don't agree with you. Friendly, still, Sven Luther Regards, Walter Landry [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: ocaml QPL : Clause 3b in question now.
On Thu, 22 Jul 2004 21:32:15 +0100, Andrew Saunders [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [Extraordinarily poorly formatted post] Bugger, bugger, bugger. Sorry about the atrocious layout. I'm sure it's pretty obvious, but just in case not: everything after the first paragraph shouldn't have been there. -- Andrew Saunders
Re: dpANSI
On 22 Jun 2004 11:56:33 -0400 Camm Maguire [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Adam Warner [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I am personally prepared to rely upon the Common Lisp community understanding that they are public domain documents. Whether the Debian project is similarly prepared to accept the uncertainty is their decision. It would be nice for those in the know/responsible for Debian's legal understanding to put forth a consensus on this. Reading Kent Pitman's statement didn't exactly instil me with confidence: Kent M Pitman ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Documents do exist (but are not on display publicly) This raises the question: why not? that would show that the legal intent was to have placed them into the public domain, even though we botched the final execution of that. So, this stuff definitely *isn't* in the public domain, then. A good intellectual property lawyer would tell you that this means the legal status is messy Whoo, a lawyerbomb. those who paid for its creation could (hypothetically) have grounds to make a claim that it was encumbered in some way, that is, to assert that they have some right of ownership. But since all of those parties at one time or another signed into this system of contracts identifying that the intent was to make a public domain document, I don't personally think they would succeed. It would be nice to know who all the parties in question are. Also: 1) The papers that detail the contract aren't on public display. 2) They might not even be in the possession of the prosecuting party, making obtaining access to them via some disclosure process difficult. 3) I'm not sure how much intent would be worth, and indeed 4) Surely a contract is only binding between the signatories? I fail to see how it could realistically be used as proof of any obligation to third parties. IANAL, but this sounds highly dodgy to me. -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Tracking down Rockfall's copyright holder.
On Sat, 19 Jun 2004 19:30:48 -0500 J.B. Nicholson-Owens [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If anyone reading this post knows Paul Lay or Harvey Kong Tin (Rockfall's co-authors), please feel free to have them e-mail me. If you haven't already come across it, http://members.tripod.com/~plain2/ looks like Harvey Kong Tin's homepage. Whilst it hasn't been updated for a couple of years now, you might want to try contacting him at [EMAIL PROTECTED], the email address listed there. Browsing past versions of the page courtesy of archive.org, I see that he also used to have his ICQ number, #39435522, up on there, and that his email address was formerly [EMAIL PROTECTED] You might want to give both of those a go as well. I'm sure I stumbled across Paul Lay's contact information once, but for the life of me I can't seem to find it again now. Ah well, not to worry. According to http://www.darkmazda.com/archives/052003.html, [EMAIL PROTECTED] had an email exchange with the guy just over a year ago. With any luck, you'll be able to get Paul Lay's email address from him. As far as co-authorship is concerned, most of the credit attributions I've seen list Harvey Kong Tin as being responsible for the graphical side of things and Paul Lay for the actual code. Finally, I understand that the authors of the program may not be the copyright holder8s (work for hire clause, for instance), but one must start somewhere. Quite so. Best of luck, and please be sure to let us know how you get on! :-) -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Bug#248782: abuse-sfx: violation of license terms
On Thu, 13 May 2004 11:13:03 +0200 Sam Hocevar [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am adopting the Abuse packages, but I first wqnt to get rid of abuse-sfx by providing DFSG-free replacements for all sounds. I just noticed that the abuse-lib package's copyright file tells us who owns the right to the original sounds: http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/main/a/abuse-lib/abuse-lib_2.00-14/copyright Apparently they're the property of one Bobby Prince, who can be reached via http://www.bpmusic.com. Perhaps you could persuade him to release them under DFSG-Free terms? -- Andrew Saunders
Bug#248853: 3270: 5250 emulation code, all rights reserved
On Thu, 13 May 2004 10:35:27 -0400 (EDT) Richard A Nelson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Thu, 13 May 2004, Andrew Saunders wrote: Package: 3270 Version: all Severity: serious Justification: Policy 2.3 See the license terms here: http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/non-free/3/3270/3270_3.3.2p1-1/copyright ^-- - The copyright holder of the 5250 emulation code appears to have granted no permissions whatsoever; there is just the bare copyright declaration on its own. Since copyright law works on the basis that pretty much all rights are reserved (barring fair use etc) unless expressly stated otherwise, the 5250 emulation code and all code that could be considered to have been derived from it are most definitely not legally distributable by Debian. Similarly, the portions of code copyrighted by Georgia Tech Research Corporation are not distributable either, since the only right explicitly granted is that to public use (whatever that means). IMO, the 3270 packages should be removed from the archive immediately. Sigh... did you not notice from which pool this came ? Even Non-Free packages must as a minimum be legally distributable by the Project to qualify for inclusion in the archive. I'm surprised you could be a DD and yet not know this. I'm all for constructive criticism; something I can take to upstream - and he has done some work to improve the situation based upon earlier conversations. However, knee-jerk responces (like this) will be simply routed to /dev/null. If you disagree with my analysis of the situation, how about providing a coherent rebuttal as opposed to just dismissing my concerns out of hand? If you wish to be helpful, I'll be happy to blast the copyright info to debian-legal for further critique. If you wish to just blather, consider this a *plonk*. Appropriate X-Debbugs-CC header added. Let's see what the -legal eagles think. -- Andrew Saunders
Bug#248782: abuse-sfx: violation of license terms
Package: abuse-sfx Version: 2.00-8 Severity: serious Justification: Policy 2.3 To view the license terms, see the copyright file: http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/non-free/a/abuse-sfx/abuse-sfx_2.00-8/copyright First off, the license only grants the right to *use* the software: For purposes of this section, use means loading the Software into RAM, as well as installation on a hard disk or other storage device. After granting this right, it then proceeds to list many things that one is *not* allowed to do: You may not: modify, translate, disassemble, decompile, reverse engineer, or create derivative works based upon the Software. You agree that the Software will not be shipped, transferred or exported into any country in violation of the U.S. Export Administration Act and that you will not utilize, in any other manner, the Software in violation of any applicable law. Nowhere does it grant permission to distribute the software. I'd say it's strongly implied by the second sentence (why would they bother specifying that distributing to T7 countries is prohibited if distribution isn't permitted at all in the first place) but, according to Policy 2.3, no distribution or modification of a work is allowed without an explicit notice saying so. An even greater worry is a clause that appears to make the Project responsible for enforcing compliance with the license terms: You agree to use your best efforts to see that any user of the Software licensed hereunder complies with this Agreement. First of all, does the Project really agree to that? If not: If you fail to comply with any terms of this Agreement, YOUR LICENSE IS AUTOMATICALLY TERMINATED. And if OTOH we *do* agree to that ridiculous condition, we are already in violation of this policeman clause due to our own policy regarding the US Export Administration Act. AIUI, the resolution of the crypto-in-main issue involved implementing reverse IP lookups on the main archive[1] and having no official mirrors in the T7 countries[2], thus showing a good-faith attempt to prevent exporting software to these so-called terrorist states. Re-exportation, e.g. via a mirror not implementing similar restrictions, would pose no legal threat to Debian proper since we would no longer be the ones doing the exporting. Unfortunately, this license would have us go even further. The Project would have to actively pressure all the mirror admins to implement similar restrictions, since the current stance of leaving the decision entirely up to them would IMO be highly unlikely to count as best efforts on our part to bring them into compliance. Needless to say, I think it'd be far easier (and more moral) just to drop this package, together with anything else that has a similarly odious clause. Thoughts, comments, critiques? I very much doubt that we can continue to distribute this in light of the above, but I'd be interested to hear what others think. [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/02/msg00181.html [2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/02/msg00176.html -- Andrew Saunders
Re: Quake WADs (was: Packaging Linuxant's driverloader?)
Joey Hess wrote: There is a project on sourceforge that has produced a usable set of quake WADs. I tried it, it works without needing the shareware WADs, and the license is free. I forget the name of the project. http://openquartz.sourceforge.net/ -- Andrew Saunders
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
On Mon, 22 Sep 2003 10:58:27 -0400 Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If the whole doc was DFSG free, I believe no Debian maintainer would remove the political statements one could find in it. Two people have just said they would remove any essay that cannot be modified. Yes, because any such essay would not be DFSG free, and DFSG free-ness is a prerequisite for inclusion of software[1] in main. For the political statements to remain, they would have to be both removable *and* modifiable. [2] Which part of If the whole doc was DFSG free did you fail to understand? [1] As in that which is not hardware, not just the programs therein. [2] Okay, if they were fully modifiable, then removable kind of goes without saying. The former is really just a subset of the latter, I accept.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Mon, 22 Sep 2003 10:58:01 -0400 Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If, OTOH, your only goal is to persuade Debian to accept the GFDL with invariant sections as free enough for inclusion in our distribution, I don't see that such a discussion could ever bear fruit without a concrete proposal spelling out the alternative guidelines that should apply to documentation. I don't plan to discuss even small GFDL changes here. I think people will present a proposal for guidelines for free documentation for Debian. As has been pointed out before, such a proposal doesn't belong here. The function of -legal is to interpret the DFSG and vet the free-ness of software[1] licenses in accordance with said interpretation. It is *not* its role to decide which parts of Debian the DFSG should adhere to (or not). Such a proposal should be brought up on -project if and when anyone gets around to actually writing it. Of course (IMHO) they'd be wasting their time. Said proposal would have a near-zero chance of passing unless accompanied with a convincing rationale for why a different measure of freedom is necessary, and I sincerely doubt that We must have invariant sections to make sure that everyone receives a copy of the GNU Manifesto together with the manual[1] will pass muster in this regard. [1] Ok, so the Freedom of modifiability has been slain on the altar of getting the word out. Presumably the next iteration of the license will have a clause forcing every recipient of the software to *read* the Manifesto, too?[2] [2] Okay, this was just an extreme example. However: since I personally believe that, Invariant sections or no, the term Open Source will *still* be more widespread, or at least be seen as synonymous with Free Software (as the increasingly popular FOSS [Free/Open Source Software] concatenation shows) presumably some even more drastic concessions will have to be made in the name of increasing mindshare?
