Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
On Wed, Mar 29, 2006 at 12:55:33AM -0500, Nathanael Nerode wrote: [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If so, I expect it will be more efficient if we can approach the FSF for a blanket license change. No; from what we can tell, RMS is personally blocking even the simplest and most obvious license changes, and nobody with authority in the FSF will go up against him, although a very large number of GNU developers disagree with him. Get the individual developers to relicense/dual-license under the GPL. They ain't willing to do so: they told me to ask FSF :-( -Steve -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If so, I expect it will be more efficient if we can approach the FSF for a blanket license change. No; from what we can tell, RMS is personally blocking even the simplest and most obvious license changes, and nobody with authority in the FSF will go up against him, although a very large number of GNU developers disagree with him. Get the individual developers to relicense/dual-license under the GPL. Under the texts of all the FSF copyright assignment forms, they have the right to license their own work under licenses of their choice. (I checked with Eben Moglen). The sed developers agreed to do exactly this not long ago, though I don't believe it's actually been released yet. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
On Sat, Mar 25, 2006 at 02:09:02PM -0500, Steve M. Robbins wrote: Frank said: assume a document licensed under GFDL, with no invariant sections (and ...) has a front cover text (like A GNU Manual) and a back cover text [...] What should the developers do in order to make it DFSG-free [...] This implies that a document with no invariant sections, but with one-sentence front- and back-cover sections does not meet the DFSG? Is that Debian's position? For example, GMP has Front-Cover Text A GNU Manual and Back-Cover Text You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software and no invariant sections. Must I really throw this document out of Debian (BTS 335403)? Hmm. :/ Short as these are, they are still problematic from a free documentation standpoint. What if I borrow heavily from the GMP manual, but include this material in a work that's I've written primarily myself? Is it really fair to require that I label my work A GNU Manual? Since the GFDL limits the front-cover text to five words or less and you only get one front-cover text per work under this license, I can't even supplement it with a more accurate cover text of my own. The back-cover text is even worse, because it requires me to make a statement which I consider misleading -- I do *not* consider the freedoms the GFDL gives me to copy and modify manuals to be (sufficiently) similar to those granted by GNU software. (Parodoxically enough, if this statement were *not* a GFDL Back-Cover Text, I would be more inclined to agree with it and thus, be willing to distribute a document including the claim in question; but as it stands, I consider it a bug that I'm forbidden to fix...) So yes, the current manual seems to fail the DFSG as confirmed by the latest GR, and can't be distributed in main for etch without a license change. I would hope that this doesn't mean throwing it out of Debian, though; if we fail to secure even such a modest licensing change as to make such cover texts removable, then I would encourage you to consider at least shipping the documentation in non-free. -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.debian.org/ signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
On Sun, Mar 26, 2006 at 01:08:16AM -0800, Steve Langasek wrote: On Sat, Mar 25, 2006 at 02:09:02PM -0500, Steve M. Robbins wrote: This implies that a document with no invariant sections, but with one-sentence front- and back-cover sections does not meet the DFSG? Is that Debian's position? For example, GMP has Front-Cover Text A GNU Manual and Back-Cover Text You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software and no invariant sections. Must I really throw this document out of Debian (BTS 335403)? [...] So yes, the current manual seems to fail the DFSG as confirmed by the latest GR, and can't be distributed in main for etch without a license change. I would hope that this doesn't mean throwing it out of Debian, though; if we fail to secure even such a modest licensing change as to make such cover texts removable, then I would encourage you to consider at least shipping the documentation in non-free. OK; let's concentrate on requesting such a modest licensing change. I have approached the GMP developers both on the GMP list and privately. It turns out that the copyright is assigned to FSF so they have no authority (or so they claim) to change the license. I was advised to contact FSF about it. I'll bet that this is not the only documentation copyrighted by FSF and licensed under the GFDL with only short cover texts standing in the way of Debian's acceptance. If so, I expect it will be more efficient if we can approach the FSF for a blanket license change. I also expect that some readers of debian-legal have a contact or two within the FSF. I imagine that writing directly to someone would be more effective than an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Perhaps someone who's been there could offer tips on who and how to approach this? While I don't mind writing the emails to pursue this, I don't really feel I'm best qualified to articulate the nuances of Debian's position on the matter. Perhaps one of the debian-legal readers would prefer to take up the charge? Thanks, -Steve -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
Steve M. Robbins [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: For example, GMP has Front-Cover Text A GNU Manual and Back-Cover Text You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software and no invariant sections. Must I really throw this document out of Debian (BTS 335403)? I'll bet that this is not the only documentation copyrighted by FSF and licensed under the GFDL with only short cover texts standing in the way of Debian's acceptance. If so, I expect it will be more efficient if we can approach the FSF for a blanket license change. I also expect that some readers of debian-legal have a contact or two within the FSF. I imagine that writing directly to someone would be more effective than an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Perhaps someone who's been there could offer tips on who and how to approach this? A useful approach in this case might be to note that these cover texts are, in effect, endorsements, and would be better treated in the way that the GFDL already treats Endorsements sections. I would think that the FSF does not wish people to stick these cover texts on just anything (which is, funnily enough, currently required for anything derivative of a GNU manual). -- Jaakko Kangasharju Kokoo kokoon koko kokko! Koko kokkoko? Koko kokko! -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
Steve M. Robbins [EMAIL PROTECTED] I have approached the GMP developers both on the GMP list and privately. It turns out that the copyright is assigned to FSF so they have no authority (or so they claim) to change the license. I was advised to contact FSF about it. Please ask them what assignment they signed. The standard one in http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/gnulib/gnulib/doc/Copyright/assign.manual?rev=1.1view=auto contains the clause: Upon thirty days' prior written notice, the Foundation agrees to grant me non-exclusive rights to use the Work as I see fit; which I think will let them release under any licence they choose. Even better, it looks like any *one* assigner can get those rights, rather than needing to hunt all assigners down. Maybe I misread. I'll only know once someone tries. I'll bet that this is not the only documentation copyrighted by FSF and licensed under the GFDL with only short cover texts standing in the way of Debian's acceptance. If so, I expect it will be more efficient if we can approach the FSF for a blanket license change. I also expect that some readers of debian-legal have a contact or two within the FSF. I imagine that writing directly to someone would be more effective than an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Perhaps someone who's been there could offer tips on who and how to approach this? I don't think there's much hope of a prompt change from the FSF, who no longer seem interested in free software manuals. Many friends of FSF have requested that FDL be debugged at least, but it's not going to happen for months yet, if ever. It seems to be far more effective to contact authors directly and explain the situation: we would like free software manuals and FSF is moving towards more and more FDL-adware, including requiring new projects at Savannah and Gna to allow adware copies of their manuals. While I don't mind writing the emails to pursue this, I don't really feel I'm best qualified to articulate the nuances of Debian's position on the matter. Perhaps one of the debian-legal readers would prefer to take up the charge? I don't think most -legal readers understand debian's position on FDL any more. It's rather different to the usual freedoms. Hope that helps, -- 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]
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
Steve M. Robbins wrote: Frank said: assume a document licensed under GFDL, with no invariant sections (and ...) has a front cover text (like A GNU Manual) and a back cover text [...] What should the developers do in order to make it DFSG-free [...] This implies that a document with no invariant sections, but with one-sentence front- and back-cover sections does not meet the DFSG? Is that Debian's position? Yes, by the project-wide GR such a document does not meet the DFSG: This means that works that don't include any Invariant Sections, Cover Texts, Acknowledgements, and Dedications (or that do, but permission to remove them is explicitly granted), are suitable for the main component of our distribution. Steve M. Robbins wrote: For example, GMP has Front-Cover Text A GNU Manual and Back-Cover Text You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software and no invariant sections. Must I really throw this document out of Debian (BTS 335403)? Yes. You could package it separately in non-free, however. - Josh Triplett signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: GFDL'ed documents with Front Cover text
Steve M. Robbins [EMAIL PROTECTED] This implies that a document with no invariant sections, but with one-sentence front- and back-cover sections does not meet the DFSG? Is that Debian's position? Debian's position is: : that works that don't include any Invariant Sections, Cover Texts, : Acknowledgements, and Dedications (or that do, but permission to remove : them is explicitly granted), are suitable for the main component of : our distribution. -- http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_001#amendmenttexta Otherwise, I think they aren't suitable for main, as before. For example, GMP has Front-Cover Text A GNU Manual and Back-Cover Text You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU software and no invariant sections. Must I really throw this document out of Debian (BTS 335403)? Including that document in Debian is a bug. If upstream won't fix the bug, I can't see how you can, sadly. -- 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]
