Re: gospel of matthew
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Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
debian-legal and DPL added to distribution. This bug concerns appropriate copyright notice in the Debian Installer Guide which adapts substantial material originally written by me. My license allows use under DFSG compliant guidelines, but requests attribution. I initially requested attribution in May, 2003, a DIG author admitted to using my work in writing this section of the DIG, but requested I submit a patch (I'm not familiar with Debian's document system and patches -- I'm not a DD). Joey Hess is now proposing a rewrite to excise any citation of my materials which is unacceptable as: - The woody DIG already cites my work and is now obsolete stable. - I would prefer attribution to excision. - Denying contributors proper credit reflects poorly on the Debian Project and discourages future contributions to Debian documentation by third parties, a contribution by which the Project would benefit greatly. on Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:56:32AM -0400, Joey Hess ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Karsten M. Self wrote: Section C.4 of the Debian GNU/Linux Installation Guide is based on notes I wrote for performing a chroot installation of Debian under an existing GNU/Linux system. The current version of the manual has modified this work, but is still clearly based on the documents I wrote originally in 1999, and further ammended in 2002 and continue to maintain, with most recent modifications in May, 2004: http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Debian/install-under-chroot.html http://kmself.home.netcom.com/Linux/FAQs/DebianChrootInstall.html http://twiki.iwethey.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/DebianChrootInstall The terms for distribution of my work is clearly stated: ? 2002-2004 Karsten M. Self (kmself@ix.netcom.com) This document may be freely distributed, copied, or modified, with attribution, this notice, and the following disclaimer: THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED AS IS WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. I don't feel it would be healthy for the readability (or usability) of the manual if the copyright notice included a list of every minor contributor or web page read by a contributor, or if it had a copyright statement more complex than the current one: An entire section of the Debian Installer Guide (DIG) substantially running to approximately four printed pages adapted and consolidated from my longer work of approximately ten printed pages is not what I'd consider a minor contribution. I'm more than dismayed that the Debian project which places such an emphasis on scrupulously adhering to software licensing requirements has been dragging its feet for over two years and repeated requests to rectify this situation, and it's now suggested that a rewrite to excise any of my content would be preferable to simply giving credit where due, as repeatedly requested. I've written and adapted my documents for over five years. I've made the work freely available, with copyright notice and attribution. My own notes are the first Google result for debian chroot install (the second, ironically, is my original request to be credited in the DIG). For my own part, I'm both proud of my contribution and glad it's been adopted as part of official Debian Project documentation. I perform professional duties as as systems and network administrator, tech writer, and trainer. What I'd like is to be able to point to this as an example of my work. The current situation does not allow me to do this. I'm more than happy for the Debian Project to use the work. I expect credit as detailed in my copyright notice. The DIG has been adapted somewhat from the woody edition, which appeared in section 3.7, which was closer to my original, but is still clearly a derived work. I'll include a summary of major similar sections below, but note: - The major difference is that the DIG and my original method is substitution of debootstrap for the use of the potato 2.2 base tgz image. - Specific examples, including the partition table example and others, are adapted straight out of my work, with minimal changes. - The general process mirrors the procedures I spelled out. There are some changes (mostly improvements ;-) Copyright ? 2004, 2005 the Debian Installer team This manual is free software; you may redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License. Please refer to the license in Appendix E, GNU General Public License. The GPL v2 section one states that a work my be copied and distributed if: you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice. ...of which the notice I've written is compatible with the GPL. The GPL's disclaimer of warranty suits my needs. FWIW, I
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
IANAL, IANADD, but it's hard for me to imagine that there is any sensible or just way to resolve this other than to credit Karsten with a significant contribution to the Guide. Such a guide is of course largely factual and could bear many resemblances to Karsten's without constituting plagiarism or a violation of his copyright; but he presents strong evidence that the way this guide actually was written involved copying and adapting portions of his creative expression. Plagiarism would, I think, be too strong a word, and he is something less than a co-author of the Guide; but it seems reasonable for him to ask for some acknowledgment. Cheers, - Michael
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
Karsten M. Self wrote: debian-legal and DPL added to distribution. I'm afraid that by escalating this unnecessarily, as well as resorting to certian rhetoric (for which I cannot be bothered to do a point-by-point rebuttal), you've convinced me it's best I bow out of the discussion, permantly. There are about 200 other d-i contributors who can commit some fix or the other for this. I hope that they keep license compatability and the general badness of ad-hoc licenses in mind when doing so. -- see shy jo signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
on Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 04:16:29PM -0400, Joey Hess ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Karsten M. Self wrote: debian-legal and DPL added to distribution. I'm afraid that by escalating this unnecessarily, as well as resorting to certian rhetoric (for which I cannot be bothered to do a point-by-point rebuttal), you've convinced me it's best I bow out of the discussion, permantly. There are about 200 other d-i contributors who can commit some fix or the other for this. I hope that they keep license compatability and the general badness of ad-hoc licenses in mind when doing so. I'm more than happy to license compatibly to any specified DFSG license, including GPL, for use here. I am the original author, that's my prerogative. My issue isn't specific licensing terms. It's not use. It's attribution. GPL licensing, e.g., with attribution, would be satisfactorially. Peace. -- Karsten M. Self kmself@ix.netcom.comhttp://kmself.home.netcom.com/ What Part of Gestalt don't you understand? Jeff Waugh: Can't see the trees for the trees... - http://zgp.org/pipermail/linux-elitists/2004-January/008588.html signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
Dropped [EMAIL PROTECTED] What the hell were you thinking? Throwing a tantrum and screaming at every email address you can find doesn't make your argument more valid (on the contrary, it suggests that you don't have much of an argument at all). On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 12:36:14PM -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote: Joey Hess is now proposing a rewrite to excise any citation of my materials which is unacceptable as: - The woody DIG already cites my work and is now obsolete stable. A past error does not prohibit the maintainer from excising any part of the work, at his discretion. You don't get to say you made a mistake in the past, so you're not allowed to remove my work now. - I would prefer attribution to excision. Being DFSG-free is a prerequisite for being in Debian, but being DFSG- free does not compel Debian to include a work. Your preferences don't make excision of a work unacceptable. - Denying contributors proper credit reflects poorly on the Debian Project and discourages future contributions to Debian documentation by third parties, a contribution by which the Project would benefit greatly. If your work is excised, then there is no contribution which is being denied attribution. It's saying please offer contributions under the same license as the rest of the work, which is a legitimate, useful, and common thing to require. The reasons you have cited are reasons why *you* don't want your work excised, not reasons why it is unacceptable for Debian to do so. I don't know how you can confuse the two. The fact that you're trying to coerce a maintainer to include a work instead of attempting to address his reasons for doing so, is enough for me to agree with Joey's decision. -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
on Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 04:34:54PM -0400, Glenn Maynard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Dropped [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fair enough for now. What the hell were you thinking? That after three years of trying to get appropriate credit I might as well take this to the top. Throwing a tantrum and screaming at every email address you can find doesn't make your argument more valid (on the contrary, it suggests that you don't have much of an argument at all). And saying that suggests you haven't looked over the evidence I've presented, including extensive quotations of my documents in the DIG. If this was your work, and your goal was portions of section C4 originally written and copyrighted by Karsten M. Self, this contribution was acknowledged by package maintainers / authors, and you'd been trying to get said credit for three years, you might have a similar level of frustration. The Debian Project is doing the wrong thing. Nothing you've said changes that. On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 12:36:14PM -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote: Joey Hess is now proposing a rewrite to excise any citation of my materials which is unacceptable as: - The woody DIG already cites my work and is now obsolete stable. A past error does not prohibit the maintainer from excising any part of the work, at his discretion. You don't get to say you made a mistake in the past, so you're not allowed to remove my work now. This is an area I'd prefer not to go into, but you're mistaken. - I would prefer attribution to excision. Being DFSG-free is a prerequisite for being in Debian, but being DFSG- free does not compel Debian to include a work. Your preferences don't make excision of a work unacceptable. Debian are already including the work, in violation of its stated licensing terms. - Denying contributors proper credit reflects poorly on the Debian Project and discourages future contributions to Debian documentation by third parties, a contribution by which the Project would benefit greatly. If your work is excised, then there is no contribution which is being denied attribution. There is the existing Woody documentation. It's saying please offer contributions under the same license as the rest of the work, which is a legitimate, useful, and common thing to require. I wrote a work which was appropriated, without my knowledge, without my authorization, and absent any request on my part, in conflict with the licensing terms I'd specified. I wrote a work which is free to be used, quoted, copied, modified, and distributed. With attribution and a short copyright notice. If you have any specific DFSG issues with: ? 2002-2004 Karsten M. Self (kmself@ix.netcom.com) This document may be freely distributed, copied, or modified, with attribution, this notice, and the following disclaimer: THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED AS IS WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. The disclaimer itself is a largely a subset of the BSD disclaimer, noted: THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. As I've indicated: if it's licensing that's a hang-up, I'm more than happy to license the work under an established DFSG license. Given that the existing work is under GPL, this would be suitable. My own terms are intended as broader than, but compatible with, the GPL. The reasons you have cited are reasons why *you* don't want your work excised, not reasons why it is unacceptable for Debian to do so. I don't know how you can confuse the two. I'm saying that excising the work would be unacceptable in light of past copyright violations. The fact that you're trying to coerce a maintainer to include a work No, the work has already been included. It was included without coercion. What I'm requesting is credit for work included. instead of attempting to address his reasons for doing so, is enough for me to agree with Joey's decision. I believe you misunderstand the situation. Peace. -- Karsten M. Self kmself@ix.netcom.comhttp://kmself.home.netcom.com/ What Part of
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 04:34:54PM -0400, Glenn Maynard wrote: The fact that you're trying to coerce a maintainer to include a work instead of attempting to address his reasons for doing so, is enough for me to agree with Joey's decision. That doesn't actually seem to me to be what he's doing. Rather, the DIG maintainer saw his HOWTO, liked it, and incorporated it in the install guide. There's a major difference. -- The amount of time between slipping on the peel and landing on the pavement is precisely one bananosecond -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
Glenn Maynard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: A past error does not prohibit the maintainer from excising any part of the work, at his discretion. You don't get to say you made a mistake in the past, so you're not allowed to remove my work now. Regardless of what we do in future versions, we're currently distributing material in violation of a copyright holder's license. Our choices are pretty much: a) Remove the material concerned from the installation guide in woody and sarge and get new versions uploaded to the archive. Apologise profusely. Potentially still be sued. b) Add attribution to the current version of the guide. The copyright holder has indicated that he'd let the matter drop in that case. c) Ignore the issue. We are *breaking the law*. The correct response is Oh, fuck, how can we fix this, not Stop complaining, it's against our policy to attribute people so we'll remove your material instead. -- Matthew Garrett | [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 12:36:14PM -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote: The Debian Project has been distributing this work in violation of my copyrights. I've previously requested this be remedied in 2003, the situation remains uncorrected: http://lists.debian.org/debian-boot/2003/05/msg00489.html Hello Karsten, You got an answer to this email which state: Sure, I remember reading your page, among others, as I was drafting that, 11 months ago. If you feel you should be listed, please list yourself. So, did you list yourself at that time? [There is no answer from you in the archives.] Cheers, -- Bill. [EMAIL PROTECTED] Imagine a large red swirl here. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:08:24PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: Regardless of what we do in future versions, we're currently distributing material in violation of a copyright holder's license. Our choices are pretty much: a) Remove the material concerned from the installation guide in woody and sarge and get new versions uploaded to the archive. Apologise profusely. Potentially still be sued. b) Add attribution to the current version of the guide. The copyright holder has indicated that he'd let the matter drop in that case. d) Add attribution to the installation guide in woody and sarge, and remove the material concerned from the archive for the next stable release. This seems like If you remove my work from your current version, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. I hope you can understand why I don't believe that arrangement is acceptable--it's no different than if you don't give me $100, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. c) Ignore the issue. We are *breaking the law*. The correct response is Oh, fuck, how can we fix this, not Stop complaining, it's against our policy to attribute people so we'll remove your material instead. I don't see (c) happening; if it is, then Karsten's complaint was unclear (which shouldn't be surprising, given its length). Karsten is asserting that a) is doing the wrong thing, which is ridiculous. -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
Glenn Maynard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:08:24PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: a) Remove the material concerned from the installation guide in woody and sarge and get new versions uploaded to the archive. Apologise profusely. Potentially still be sued. d) Add attribution to the installation guide in woody and sarge, and remove the material concerned from the archive for the next stable release. Sure. That's fairly equivalent to (a). This seems like If you remove my work from your current version, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. I hope you can understand why I don't believe that arrangement is acceptable--it's no different than if you don't give me $100, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. Yes. And? I don't see (c) happening; if it is, then Karsten's complaint was unclear (which shouldn't be surprising, given its length). Karsten is asserting that a) is doing the wrong thing, which is ridiculous. (c) /is/ happening. Karsten asked for attribution in 2003. And (a) /is/ doing the wrong thing - fixing the situation now doesn't excuse us from the guilt of having been violating his copyright for the past few years, especially when it was pointed out to us some time ago. We've been offered a reasonable way to settle the situation. Karsten's well within his rights to bring legal action, but instead he hasn't even threatened to put it on Slashdot. Which bit of We've been knowingly violating a license for over 2 years, and so we're the bad guys is unclear here? -- Matthew Garrett | [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, 1 Jul 2005 13:01:26 -0700 Michael K. Edwards wrote: IANAL, IANADD, but it's hard for me to imagine that there is any sensible or just way to resolve this other than to credit Karsten with a significant contribution to the Guide. Such a guide is of course largely factual and could bear many resemblances to Karsten's without constituting plagiarism or a violation of his copyright; but he presents strong evidence that the way this guide actually was written involved copying and adapting portions of his creative expression. Plagiarism would, I think, be too strong a word, and he is something less than a co-author of the Guide; but it seems reasonable for him to ask for some acknowledgment. Agreed. -- :-( This Universe is buggy! Where's the Creator's BTS? ;-) .. Francesco Poli GnuPG Key ID = DD6DFCF4 Key fingerprint = C979 F34B 27CE 5CD8 DC12 31B5 78F4 279B DD6D FCF4 pgphU1GdnjznP.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, 1 Jul 2005 16:34:54 -0400 Glenn Maynard wrote: [...] - I would prefer attribution to excision. Being DFSG-free is a prerequisite for being in Debian, but being DFSG- free does not compel Debian to include a work. Your preferences don't make excision of a work unacceptable. Wait one second... Of course excision is possible, but is it really a good idea? I don't think so. Karsten's document seems to be valuable: DIG writers chose to derive a section from it. And it's GPL-compatible: Karsten's license seems to be, but anyway Karsten himself states he's willing to relicense the document under the actual GPL, if it's considered necessary. Given the above mentioned facts, I don't think we should drop his copyrighted material, just because he asks what he deserves: credit for what he wrote. - Denying contributors proper credit reflects poorly on the Debian Project and discourages future contributions to Debian documentation by third parties, a contribution by which the Project would benefit greatly. If your work is excised, then there is no contribution which is being denied attribution. Obviously, but why do you want to reinvent the wheel? Free program development should be based on code reuse whenever it's suitable. The same applies to free manual development. It's saying please offer contributions under the same license as the rest of the work, which is a legitimate, useful, and common thing to require. This is legitimate, but Karsten is willing to offer his work under the same license as the DIG, so I don't see a reason to drop his 'contribution'... The reasons you have cited are reasons why *you* don't want your work excised, not reasons why it is unacceptable for Debian to do so. I don't know how you can confuse the two. The fact that you're trying to coerce a maintainer to include a work instead of attempting to address his reasons for doing so, is enough for me to agree with Joey's decision. AFAICT, Karsten is not trying to coerce anyone. Actually, Karsten did *not* contribute anything. He wrote a document and published it under a strange license. *Then* some DIG writers found that document and decided (without any coercion) to write a DIG section as a derivative of it. But they failed to comply with its (really permissive) license. Karsten is just asking that they comply with his license and publish the DIG with an appropriate copyright notice. He's even willing to relicense his document, if there are doubts about the GPL-compatibility of his strange license. IMHO the best solution is * Karsten relicense (or dual-license) his document under the GPL * DIG maintainers simply add a name in the copyright holder list Think about it: Karsten wrote a valuable document and is offering it under the GPL; in these times of non-free documentation everywhere, how can you ask more from him? -- :-( This Universe is buggy! Where's the Creator's BTS? ;-) .. Francesco Poli GnuPG Key ID = DD6DFCF4 Key fingerprint = C979 F34B 27CE 5CD8 DC12 31B5 78F4 279B DD6D FCF4 pgppmYoszkPXL.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:58:07PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: Sure. That's fairly equivalent to (a). Just in case I wasn't clear, the point was that the fix for past stable releases, and the fix for unstable and the next release, are unrelated; it's reasonable to do entirely different things, as long as the violation is fixed in all cases. Your choices were listing fixes for stable and fixes for unstable side-by-side. This seems like If you remove my work from your current version, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. I hope you can understand why I don't believe that arrangement is acceptable--it's no different than if you don't give me $100, I'll sue you for your violation in the last version. Yes. And? So you think it's acceptable to have a work in main, whose license is if you're Debian, you're never allowed to remove this work, or I'll sue you for an unrelated, already-fixed[1] past violation? I don't like throwing around overly loaded words, but I can't find any word short of extortion that accurately represents what this seems to be. (FWIW, I did recently criticise Bruce Perens for his use of the same word, but that was due to opening the conversation with it, right in the subject.) Which bit of We've been knowingly violating a license for over 2 years, and so we're the bad guys is unclear here? Debian has offered to correct it, in a perfectly acceptable and legitimate manner. In my viewpoint, (a) is not wrong in any ethical or moral way (legally, I don't know and would prefer not to guess); coercing Debian maintainers to include a work in future releases against their will and judgement is. [1] assuming that the stable release gets fixed soon, of course -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Sat, Jul 02, 2005 at 12:17:43AM +0200, Francesco Poli wrote: Wait one second... Of course excision is possible, but is it really a good idea? I don't think so. That's not d-legal's decision, or the DPL's. It's the maintainer's decision. There are procedures in place to overrule a maintainer. If you really think that such a thing is a good idea, follow them. Debating the merits of rewrites is far off-topic for d-legal. Think about it: Karsten wrote a valuable document and is offering it under the GPL; in these times of non-free documentation everywhere, how can you ask more from him? I believe I saw Joey offering to rewrite the documentation, with his own time, and only asked to have the relevant sections identified. I'm not sure that I see the entire situation, since a quick review shows the GPL on one side and ad-hoc on the other--the GPL isn't an ad-hoc license. Karsten didn't make any real attempt to summarize the situation, though, instead dumping pages of past history on the list and expecting us to pull out a fine-toothed-comb, and I don't have the time or interest to do that. I do know that I see Joey being reasonable, apologizing, and offering to help fix the problem, so I have zero tolerance for Karsten's demanding, who-do-you-think- you-are, you-can't-remove-my-work, fix-it-my-way-or-else, I'm-going- over-your-head attitude. -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
This one time, at band camp, Glenn Maynard said: On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:58:07PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: So you think it's acceptable to have a work in main, whose license is if you're Debian, you're never allowed to remove this work, or I'll sue you for an unrelated, already-fixed[1] past violation? I don't like throwing around overly loaded words, but I can't find any word short of extortion that accurately represents what this seems to be. Do you really not understand actual license issues? There is, as I understand it, a currently released work, which knowingly incorporates a substantial amount of Karsten's work, and violates his license in doing so. This is not some hypothetical case that is being beaten to death on -legal about whether some stipulation or other is free enough, this is a real case of Debian violating a license. The past violation is not fixed. That is the only important thing here. If maintainers want to do a blackbox rewrite so as to avoid the onerous condition of adding the line 'some parts written by Karsten Self', then that is up to them to deal with for future releases. That is not the issue here, and if you think it is, you've missed the boat. Which bit of We've been knowingly violating a license for over 2 years, and so we're the bad guys is unclear here? Debian has offered to correct it, in a perfectly acceptable and legitimate manner. In my viewpoint, (a) is not wrong in any ethical or moral way (legally, I don't know and would prefer not to guess); coercing Debian maintainers to include a work in future releases against their will and judgement is. You are wrong on two points as far as I can see: Debian has not offered to correct it. What has been offered is excision from future releases. This does nothing for present and past releases. Karsten is not attempting to coerce anyone to do anything. He has simply stated fairly straightforward facts. Debian has been violating his license for several years; he would like it corrected in released works. If Debian continues to use his works, they should abide by his license for future releases. If, for some obscure reason, the maintainers feel it is easier to rewrite four pages of text than properly credit a long term contributor to the Debian project, then that is their prerogative, but it is not relevant to the discussion at hand. Also, rather simply put, I think we would be doing badly by the project as a whole if we were to start telling contributors that we would rather excise their work and rewrite it rather than acknowledge a contribution. -- - | ,''`.Stephen Gran | | : :' :[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | `. `'Debian user, admin, and developer | |`- http://www.debian.org | - signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
on Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 05:08:27PM -0500, Bill Allombert ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 12:36:14PM -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote: The Debian Project has been distributing this work in violation of my copyrights. I've previously requested this be remedied in 2003, the situation remains uncorrected: http://lists.debian.org/debian-boot/2003/05/msg00489.html Hello Karsten, You got an answer to this email which state: Sure, I remember reading your page, among others, as I was drafting that, 11 months ago. If you feel you should be listed, please list yourself. So, did you list yourself at that time? No, I did not. I don't know the process for listing myself. As I've stated under the current bug discussion (bug #316487), I'm not a DD, I'm not familiar with the Debian documentation tools. Moreover: I didn't add the material to the documentation in the first place, and I see no reason why execution of license compliance issues should be up to me. I've opened a bug at this time so that the maintainers of this package will address the oversight. [There is no answer from you in the archives.] I don't recall if I responded at the time or not. I don't believe either case materially affects the current situation. Peace. -- Karsten M. Self kmself@ix.netcom.comhttp://kmself.home.netcom.com/ What Part of Gestalt don't you understand? First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me. - Rev. Martin Niemoller, 1945 signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 04:16:29PM -0400, Joey Hess wrote: Karsten M. Self wrote: debian-legal and DPL added to distribution. I'm afraid that by escalating this unnecessarily, as well as resorting to certian rhetoric (for which I cannot be bothered to do a point-by-point rebuttal), you've convinced me it's best I bow out of the discussion, permantly. Karsten's complaints look surprisingly similar to yours in #265620. dave... -- David Schleef Big Kitten LLC (http://www.bigkitten.com/) -- data acquisition on Linux -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 09:02:46PM -0400, Stephen Gran wrote: Do you really not understand actual license issues? There is, as I understand it, a currently released work, which knowingly incorporates a substantial amount of Karsten's work, and violates his license in doing so. This is not some hypothetical case that is being beaten to death on -legal about whether some stipulation or other is free enough, this is a real case of Debian violating a license. The past violation is not fixed. That is the only important thing here. If maintainers want to do a blackbox rewrite so as to avoid the onerous condition of adding the line 'some parts written by Karsten Self', then that is up to them to deal with for future releases. That is not the issue here, and if you think it is, you've missed the boat. I don't think anything of the sort, and if you think I do, you're not paying attention in the slightest. Debian has not offered to correct it. What has been offered is excision from future releases. This does nothing for present and past releases. I see Karsten claiming that nothing is being done, and yet: on Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:56:32AM -0400, Joey Hess ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: which is ... today. Joey was actively communicating, working to resolve the issue. Karsten didn't happen to like how he intended to resolve it, so he waylaid that discussion. It's probably entirely true that this issue sat unresolved far longer than it should have, but it's ridiculous to claim that Debian, *currently*, is being unresponsive on the same day that you're discussing the issue. All in all, if I was working with someone trying to resolve a licensing issue, he decided that he didn't like the perfectly legitimate option I'd selected, started screaming at the DPL and d-legal to override me, claiming unresponsiveness--despite discussing the issue that very day--and claiming that it's unacceptable to remove a work at my discretion, I'd probably have a similar reaction that Joey did--throwing my arms in the air and letting someone else deal with that person. In any event, this is going nowhere. The options are clear (as previously enumerated); adding an attribution in the past stable releases and removing the material in unstable and future releases seems perfectly reasonable (or, for faster response, adding attributions to both, and then removing the material as it's rewritten), as far as I can see. Unless someone has something new to add, I'm dropping this. -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
Glenn Maynard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:58:07PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: Yes. And? So you think it's acceptable to have a work in main, whose license is if you're Debian, you're never allowed to remove this work, or I'll sue you for an unrelated, already-fixed[1] past violation? I don't like throwing around overly loaded words, but I can't find any word short of extortion that accurately represents what this seems to be. No. In that case I'd say So sue us. Demanding that something never be removed is more unreasonable than rewriting something that we stole. Demanding acknowledgement isn't. Really. Listen to yourself. Are you honestly claiming that someone asking that we acknowledge his (involuntary) contribution to Debian is an unreasonable act? Are you honestly claiming that choosing to rewrite that text instead of giving due credit is not petty? Which bit of We've been knowingly violating a license for over 2 years, and so we're the bad guys is unclear here? Debian has offered to correct it, in a perfectly acceptable and legitimate manner. The manner in which we've offered to correct it is plainly not perfectly acceptable to Karsten, otherwise it would have been accepted. In my viewpoint, (a) is not wrong in any ethical or moral way (legally, I don't know and would prefer not to guess); coercing Debian maintainers to include a work in future releases against their will and judgement is. You think it's ethical to rewrite a perfectly good section of text rather than give appropriate credit to the original author? I think you're mad. -- Matthew Garrett | [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 12:36:14PM -0700, Karsten M. Self wrote: This bug concerns appropriate copyright notice in the Debian Installer Guide which adapts substantial material originally written by me. My license allows use under DFSG compliant guidelines, but requests attribution. I initially requested attribution in May, 2003, a DIG author admitted to using my work in writing this section of the DIG, but requested I submit a patch (I'm not familiar with Debian's document system and patches -- I'm not a DD). Ok, change committed. You are now attributed in the administrivia section. Thanks for the great doc. - David Nusinow -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
(It's all well and good to say one's dropping a thread, but so much harder to stick to. Trying, trying ...) On Sat, Jul 02, 2005 at 03:20:31AM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: Really. Listen to yourself. Are you honestly claiming that someone asking that we acknowledge his (involuntary) contribution to Debian is an unreasonable act? Are you honestly claiming that choosing to rewrite that text instead of giving due credit is not petty? I've never claimed that asking for acknowledgement is unreasonable; merely that removing the work is a legitimate alternative. I don't care if rewriting the text is petty; there can be valid reasons for doing so, and the task of weighing those reasons should be the maintainer's. In my viewpoint, (a) is not wrong in any ethical or moral way (legally, I don't know and would prefer not to guess); coercing Debian maintainers to include a work in future releases against their will and judgement is. You think it's ethical to rewrite a perfectly good section of text rather than give appropriate credit to the original author? I think you're mad. It's clear that Joey had reasons for wanting to do so, if he was going to offer his own, personal time to do the rewriting. The fact that he was prepared to do so is proof enough, to me, that there were reasons more compelling than not wanting to give acknowledgement. (I really don't care what those reasons were.) For example, I've rewritten small source files because the license text was over fifty lines long with many dozens of contributors listed, and there was no way to determine which of those contributors actually had a hand in that code. So, I rewrote a perfectly good bit of code rather than give credit to the original authors, because giving credit took nearly a whole page of text in the manual. There are perfectly legitimate reasons (besides being mad) to rewrite to avoid crediting--and if you or the author of the code/text being rewritten don't agree with those reasons, d-legal isn't the place to dispute them. (Of course, one or the other does need to be done, both in unstable and in existing stable releases--either credit the author, or stop using it; nobody is claiming that doing nothing is an acceptable option.) -- Glenn Maynard -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Bug#316487: debian-installer-manual: Missing copyright credit: Karsten M. Self for section C.4
On Fri, Jul 01, 2005 at 11:15:36PM -0400, David Nusinow wrote: Ok, change committed. You are now attributed in the administrivia section. Thanks for the great doc. You suck. You know you just ended a potentially great and entertaining flamewar by leaving one side without arguments? ;-) (jk, of course. Thanks for doing the reasonable thing) -- The amount of time between slipping on the peel and landing on the pavement is precisely one bananosecond -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
