Richard Stallman wrote:
The goal of invariant sections, ever since the 80s when we first made
the GNU Manifesto an invariant section in the Emacs Manual, was to
make sure they could not be removed. Specifically, to make sure that
distributors of Emacs that also distribute non-free software could
Joe Wreschnig [EMAIL PROTECTED] schrieb/wrote:
The only manpower required should be a clause that allows converting
the document to be under the GPL, much like the clause used in the LGPL.
This would result in the most possible restrictions while still being
GPL compatible.
That would imply
Lack of forced distribution is not censorship. Get a clue, or a
dictionary.
Heh.
Why that ugly, non-free GPL license demand from me to
distribute source code? Source would still be freely available from
the FSF website! Lack of forced distribution do not harm a
freedom!
-free manuals. And further objections to the FSF
claiming while doing so that they are free manuals. These policies *are* a
significant change.
--Nathanael Nerode
From Richard Stallman on the debian-legal list
(http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200308/msg01323.html):
Second, the FSF is not working on changing the GFDL now. We intend to
continue to use invariant sections that cannot be removed, as we have
always done.
This seems to
Jerome Marant, missing the point AGAIN, said:
I claim that a speech is not software documentation and shall not be
considered as such. You shall not modify someone speech, you shall
not cut some part of someone's speech and tell everyone that you
wrote it, and so on.
There are limits everywhere in
Richard Braakman wrote:
On Sun, Aug 24, 2003 at 06:26:07PM -0400, Nathanael Nerode wrote:
In any case, your argument for Invariant Sections applies just as well to
^-(here I refer to Richard Stallman's argument)
programs as it does to manuals!
Would you consider
Jerome Marant said:
Quoting Nathanael Nerode [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
Jerome Marant, missing the point AGAIN, said:
^^^
Considering your attitude, I'm not going to discuss this with you
any longer.
--
Jérôme Marant
My sincere apologies for the tone. I
Jerome Marant said:
Software in Debian is 100% free. It doesn't prevent Debian to
distribute something else than software.
From this sentence, I see that you are not fluent in English.
(It doesn't prevent Debian from distributing something other than
software would be correct.)
Perhaps this is
Richard Stallman wrote:
It's not just a continuation of the status quo that is taking place
here. The FSF has adopted an expansionist policy with respect to
Invariant Sections.
The choice of words in this text that you cited indicates a desire to
cast the FSF's actions in a harsh
I propose something like the following as an addition to the Debian web
pages, at the bottom of http://www.debian.org/intro/free. I offer this
up for revision and use by the Debian community, or anyone else.
Motivation: some people seem to wish to remain in denial about the
project's
On Thu, Aug 28, 2003 at 01:54:31AM -0700, Rick Moen wrote:
This reminded me of something I noticed earlier today. The Securing
Debian Manual at
http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/securing-debian-howto/ has in its
front material the following:
[...]
Permission is granted to copy, distribute
Andreas Barth wrote:
I don't think it's good manners to try to push a certain view by
putting it on the web sites. No, first finish the discussion in d-l,
and the you _might_ put additions on the web site. (Though I think
it's even then not the right place for that; but that's a different
point
://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html.
(Reminder to Debian people: that page is public domain. If you want to
include part or all of it in an more official Debian statement, please,
please do so!)
--Nathanael Nerode
Richard Stallman wrote:
This is an illuminating comparison, because the practical problems of
the GFDL (and I won't claim there are none) are basically of the same
kind (though of a lower magnitude) than those of the 4-clause BSD
^^^
Replace this with greater
Steve Langasek wrote (in
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200309/msg7.html):
Does this mean that the gcc maintainers don't agree with this list's
interpretation of the GFDL, or that they don't regard this as a high
priority between now and the release?
I believe that
Don Armstrong:
You should be able to find caselaw involving a case where a work was
improperly placed in the public domain (ie, the person dedicating it
to the public isn't the copyright holder,) but as the US system is a
law in action, you'll need to find a case where someone placed the
work
RMS said: (in re
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200309/msg00652.html):
All I want to say about the new issue is that a small fractional
increase in size for a large collection of manuals is not a big deal.
That's not enough to make a license non-free.
The GFDL, however,
Perhaps we have hit the key parts of the disagreement, finally. I would
love to get some further clarification from RMS on his views, so I have
asked a few questions below. I have made 4 points in response to this
one paragraph, but the questions are in points 3 and 4.
RMS wrote:
By
Brian T. Sniffen wrote:
OK. I have a copy of Emacs here, licensed to me under the GNU GPL2.
I have made some modifications to it, and updated the changelogs and
history notes. I wish to give it to a friend. Section 2b requires
that I distribute my new program, Sniffmacs, under the terms of
RMS wrote (in
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200309/msg00776.html):
Part of the document can be a separate file,
because a document can be more than one file.
This detail of wording doesn't make a difference that I can see.
Aha. I just found a way to put GFDL manuals
Matthieu Roy wrote:
Does everybody on that list, that thinks that GNU
political/historical/philosophical/ texts must be DSFG compliant to be
distributed by Debian, also thinks that the Debian logos must be DFSG
compliant?
There's a difference at the moment between distributed by Debian and part
not grant a trademark license. If it is
applied to a trademark, you should be sure that you are not violating
trademark rights.
It should be trademarked by SPI as a trademark representing the Debian
Project.
I believe this would solve all problems.
--Nathanael Nerode
Richard Stallman wrote:
Yes. Debian will remain 100% free software. That's the first line of the
Debian Social Contract. This means that everything in Debian must be free
*software*.
That is one possible interpretation, but since it is based on
asserting that manuals, essays,
Richard Stallman wrote:
Remember the hypothetical emacs reference card, which must be
accompanied by 12 pages of additional invariant material? Sounds like a
big deal to me.
If the GPL were used, it would have to be accompanied by 6 pages
of additional invariant material.
RMS wote:
For the sake of avoiding confusion, please note that I use software
in the meaning I believe is standard, referring to computer programs
only.
This is not what I believe to be the standard meaning or the historically
correct meaning, but thanks for avoiding confusion.
The main
Project contributors and members who feel the same
way, where should we attempt to be heard so as to have some influence on
the GNU Project as a whole?
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
is totally off the wall. But we're getting off the topic.
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
? Then push it at Creative Commons?
:-)
--Nathanael Nerode
titles
and contents perhaps qualify? ;-)
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
The DFSG lists three specific licenses that are meant to satisfy its
criteria. Nowadays some Debian developers tend to say that these
three licenses are listed as exceptions to the rules of the DFSG, but
I think that is a
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 01:15 US/Eastern, Nathanael Nerode wrote:
I'd like to nail it as open as humanly possible, so I'd like to apply to
to anyone receiving a derivative work based on the work as well, unless
there's a legal complication in that.
Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
Well, that's
RMS wrote:
A manual is free if you can publish modified versions as manuals.
Brian T. Sniffen wrote:
And is a text editor free if you can only publish modified versions as
text editors -- not as manuals or tetris games or news-readers or web
browsers?
This is absolutely a *critical* point.
Brian Sniffen:
Thanks for the response -- I hadn't noticed that phrasing before.
But if I give *you* a copy of Sniffmacs under the Sniffen GPL,
wouldn't you then be bound only to give others the SGPL, not the GGPL
with its Preamble?
Now we get into a subtle point of copyright law. This is how I
Richard Stallman wrote:
The main difference between a program and documentation is that a
program does something, while documentation is passive;
By this argument, source code to a program (of the sort which must be
compiled to run) is not a program.
That's a pedantic
Richard Stallman wrote:
Being able to use some of the text for something of a different kind,
such as an essay about the funding of free software, is something above
and beyond the call of duty for a license.
This is clearly the key point where Debian and the FSF diverge. I think
there is
Glenn Maynard wrote:
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:47:26AM +0200, Thomas Hood wrote:
IBM distributes the Linux driver and the binaries in a tarball that
it says is licensed under the GPL.
http://oss.software.ibm.com/acpmodem/
No source code is provided for the DSP binaries. (N.B., past
Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
We reject the GFDL because it is not merely incomptability of
licenses.
Here's the test. I want to write a brand new program. I insist it be
free software, but I am otherwise entirely agnostic about which free
software license I use. I will use any license.
I
Richard Stallman wrote:
I don't think
it needs to be possible to use text from manuals in a program.
A manual is free if you can publish modified versions as manuals.
And is a text editor free if you can only publish modified versions as
text editors -- not as manuals or
definition of software I use.
(Software is a more useful term for discrete/digital data than for
continuous/analog data, because continuous/analog data can't be reproduced
without data loss, making the software inseperable from the hardware to some
degree.)
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
Glenn Maynard said:
We can interpret DFSG#2 to mean the form closest to source that still
exists if we want, but it's extremely questionable to try to interpret
preferred form for modification as preferred form for modification,
or any form, no matter how unreasonable it is to edit, if the
Barak Pearlmutter said:
The GNU manifesto is in
Debian right now, right where it belongs: /usr/share/emacs/21.2/etc/GNU
and analogous locations in emacs20 and xemacs.
And how precisely does it belong there? That's a stupid, obscure location.
:-)
(OK, perhaps you meant Whereever upstream puts
suggesting it to someone in a position to do something.
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Barak Pearlmutter wrote:
About the README offer you allude to, do you really think an
upstream author's statement:
Copyright blah blah blah ...
Distributed under the GNU GPL v2 ...
Source licenses for inclusion of this code in proprietary programs
are available from the author for $10,000
Barak Pearlmutter wrote:
But you're allowed to paraphrase anything, so what's your point?
You can even paraphrase non-modifiable essays. In an essay RMS
explained that he used to work at ... and then Symbolics ... and he
felt that ... and so he climbed to the mountain top and hacked for
forty
the
Standard Version.
This is effectively an 'invariant program' requirement which doesn't even
allow the modified programs to use the same names as the originals.
Doesn't look free to me.
--Nathanael Nerode
Barak Pearlmutter wrote:
The phrasing of almost all license boilerplate
(eg the GPL boilerplate) allows them.
Nothing licensed under the GPL can be non-modifiable. So I'm not sure what
you mean by this
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden
consider to be object code (not
source code) in your interpretation.
--Nathanael Nerode
It's very short license. It could be reached at:
http://cvs.icculus.org/horde/chora/co.php/LICENSE?rt=physfsr=1.2
This is certainly DFSG-free; it's the same as the license for zlib. (See the
zlib1g package in Debian.)
point), and someone won the right to make DD compatible materials
without limitation. (The mechanics weren't and aren't patented and the design
was different.) I can't find the case reference but perhaps someone else can.
But beware of patented games, and proliferating trademarks.
--
Nathanael
5. Reciprocity. If You institute patent litigation against a
Contributor with respect to a patent applicable to software
(including a cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit), then
any patent licenses granted by that Contributor to You under
this License shall
a rewrite, in both places where this phrase occurs, to
, excluding those notices that do not pertain to any part of the Derivative
Work.
Thanks.
--Nathanael Nerode
I wonder if there are any legal issues if I took the description
of the api and implemented my only library, which would be for
my purposes a sufficient replacement.
Clean room reimplementation is legally safe (in most countries,
anyway). For instance, if you take a free program designed to
Adrian wrote:
But for a user, it should be very clear that there are legal risks when
using libdvdcss.
Yes: accordingly, I believe the note should be changed as noted below.
Besides this, is it 100% clear that the debconf note and install-css.sh
couldn't fall under some forbidden promotion or
Nathan Hawkins wrote:
Your proposal would change that. I oppose it, and I would oppose it just
the same if you wanted to call them Loki, Kali or Hitler. (To pick a few
at random.) Using names of evil, real or imagined, is not something
that would be helpful to Debian. That kind of publicity we
Debian NotBSD ;-)
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Ben Reser quoth:
Ignore the trademark issue. The copyright issue should be much clearer.
Surely SPI knows who made the logo and that person can certify that it
is an original work? If SPI can do that they have a case of a clear
derivative work. If SPI can't do that then Debian needs a
Branden Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
I have little patience for superstitious beliefs, and less still for
people who claim to be defending the tender feelings of the ignorant.
Brian T. Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED] then writes:
But why use names correlated with evil when other options are
debian-legal wanted to check with you whether it was drawn entirely from
scratch, or whether it made use of any pre-existing clip art in the 'swirl'
design. If it was drawn from scratch, whether you'd ever licensed anyone
else to use it other than Debian. And if it wasn't all from scratch, if
Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote:
snip
Stop right there. You didn't invent the software I wrote, regardless of
what the overloaded US Patent Office might think.
Sure I did. Well, if you're writing some software to do
Diffie-Hellman key exchange, that Diffie and Hellman most certainly
*did* invent
posted mailed
Martin Braure de Calignon wrote:
I wanted to know if the binary files in the
eagle-usb-{utils,data,source} package are free.
No.
When I get the source of the package (apt-get source), there is a
LICENSE file in the root directory which says that the package is GPL.
But in
Aurelien Jarno wrote:
Hi all!
I have just packaged a driver for wifi cards. The driver is licensed
under GPL, but the cards needs a non-free firmware to be uploaded in
order to work.
I don't know in which section the driver should go? main or contrib. I
have been told that the driver
Marco d'Itri wrote:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I have just packaged a driver for wifi cards. The driver is licensed
under GPL, but the cards needs a non-free firmware to be uploaded in
order to work.
I will quote from policy 2.2.2:
Examples of packages which would be included in
Marco d'Itri wrote:
On Oct 11, Evan Prodromou [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I think it's a question of what dependence means for contrib. If the
driver absolutely _depends_ on using the non-free firmware, it should
be in contrib. If the non-free firmware is optional, it should go into
main.
Matthew Garrett wrote:
Nathanael Nerode [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
If the driver does not provide any significant functionality without the
firmware, it belongs in contrib.
If there are some cards which the driver drives which work without the
firmware, it can go in main.
Nowadays very
Marco d'Itri wrote:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Of course, there's shades of gray, here. If all the driver does is emit
a message CAN'T FIND NON-FREE FIRMWARE, ABORTING without the firmware,
it's hard to say that it doesn't depend on the firmware. But if the
This applies to almost every driver
Marco d'Itri wrote:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
This package should be removed from Debian before Debian gets sued for
copyright infringement.
Can you cut this bullshit please? You know well that Debian is not going
to get sued.
Well, the corporations issuing the firmware haven't been bought
Andrew Suffield wrote:
On Wed, Sep 22, 2004 at 06:22:45PM -0400, Nathanael Nerode wrote:
snip
The point in a traditional common-law trademark is that we don't want
someone to go out and start Debian Computing, Inc., use the Debian
open-use logo, and proceed to run a competing organization
MJ Ray wrote:
On 2004-09-22 23:22:45 +0100 Nathanael Nerode [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:
A trademark license *has* to prohibit such things. Prohibiting
misrepresenting the origin of the *logo* doesn't suffice. We have to
require that the logo, and anything confusingly similar, is not
used
Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote:
But trademarks don't cover works. Your whole message treats
trademarks as a funny sort of copyright which sometimes doesn't follow
chains of derivation. They aren't. They're a completely different
beast.
For example, your model doesn't deal at all with the
Don Armstrong [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
A few licenses have started to show up (some merely proposed licenses)
with patent reciprocity clauses like the following two examples:
[From the Open Software License v 2.0]
10) Termination for Patent Action. This License shall terminate
Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist
* Package name: powervr
Version : 2.01.21-7
Upstream Author : [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
* URL : http://www.powervr.com/Downloads/Drivers/Index.asp
* License : Restricted
Description : PowerVR XFree86 drivers and
Brian Sniffen wrote:
Would the following be considered Free by anybody here?
If You institute litigation against any entity (including a
cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that the Work
or a Contribution incorporated within the Work constitutes direct
or
Brian T. Sniffen wrote:
Nathanael Nerode wrote:
Brian Sniffen wrote:
Would the following be considered Free by anybody here?
If You institute litigation against any entity (including a
cross-claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit) alleging that the Work
or a Contribution
.
Raul Silva
On Dec 31, 2003, at 3:16 PM, Nathanael Nerode wrote:
debian-legal wanted to check with you whether it was drawn entirely
from
scratch, or whether it made use of any pre-existing clip art in the
'swirl'
design. If it was drawn from scratch, whether you'd ever licensed
anyone
else to use
bugs. Perhaps undistributable and
non-free. Of course, such bugs shouldn't really be necessary, since
undistributable stuff should be removed from the archive immediately, but
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
I did a quick review after seeing the message to debian-legal; the *changes*
look fine (several are very valuable improvements, such as the addition of
or copyright law to the first clause). But I never did review the
original licenses, which I should
From the point of view of Debian, it
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Wed, Jan 28, 2004 at 03:44:23AM -0500, Nathanael Nerode wrote:
I spotted the following problem in part of the text which isn't actually
part
of the license:
Except for the limited purpose of indicating to the public that the Work
is
licensed
Daniel Quinlan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Better assurance that Debian will find a license acceptable when applied
to software and a coordinated way for Debian to provide feedback on
licenses under development means that Debian can have a greater impact
on licenses under development and much less
Henning Makholm wrote:
I ran over Nathanael's list of bugs to provide an independent
assessment from a d-l point of view; here are my findings. Note that
some of the activity seems to be in response to pings from NN earlier
today.
Thanks for doing this, by the way. Once I'd made a list of the
3. If User breaches any term of this license or commences an
infringement action against any copyright holder then the User's
^^^
Sloppy and overbroad. This should refer to any holder of copyright in *this
Software*, at the very least
Yeeech. What a monster. It's not DFSG-free.
(1)
3.6 You must include all of the original copyright, labels or other
notices on the Licensed Software on any copies of the Licensed Software
which You make; and include with the distribution of any Modifications
You create a copy (or an offer to
Michael Adams wrote:
In response to your most recent comments, I have further amended the
draft license for the JasPer software. It appears that Image Power
will approve the license as written below. I am still awaiting official
approval. I think that this license should address all of your
Walter Landry wrote:
Andrew Suffield [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Sat, Jan 31, 2004 at 06:40:59PM -0800, Michael Adams wrote:
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person (the User)
obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
Software), to deal in
However, there seem to me to be a few obvious caveats:
* I would not want to be blamed for bad advice someone else added to
mine; thus I would want modifications to be indicated;
This is just fine and DFSG-free.
* I would not want someone else to change my biography provided in the
About the
Branden Robinson wrote:
(in
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/debian-legal-200402/msg00145.html)
lots of really good stuff about endorsements
I agree with Branden entirely. Uh, what he said.
Sorry for the me-too-ism.
--Nathanael
Matt Palmer wrote:
Hands up anyone who wants to take on the job of official d-legal summariser.
Heh.
I can think of a few people who *could* take the job, unfortunately, those
qualified also tend to be those most qualified in other areas.
Branden would do an *excellent* job. He's probably too
Eric Dorland [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Hello all,
I received a rather disturbing email from Andre Dahlqvist (quoted
below with URLs) today that I'm having trouble with, and I'd like
opinions and advice on how to proceed. debian-legal might be a better
forum for this, but I think it has some deep
Oleksander Moskalenko wrote:
* Henning Makholm [EMAIL PROTECTED] [2004-02-28 12:21:11 +]:
Scripsit Oleksandr Moskalenko [EMAIL PROTECTED]
I'd like to package an html manual for the package I'm preparing.
However, it's covered by the Open Publication License v 1.0.
well within your
rights under the DFSG to not allow the artwork to be used outside of
the source, or comply them to modify it. Again, I'm hoping someone
from debian-legal will correct me if I'm wrong.
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
US citizens: if you're considering voting for Bush
on the GFDL
problems)? It comes up a lot.
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
US citizens: if you're considering voting for Bush, look at these first:
http://www.misleader.org/ http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/
http://www.house.gov/reform/min/politicsandscience/
. ;-)
I've snipped the rest because it all seems fine and is pretty much the same
as the Clarified Artistic License.
--
Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org
US citizens: if you're considering voting for Bush, look at these first:
http://www.misleader.org/ http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar
of an aggressively enforced
patent in Canada; the patent has expired everywhere else, but Debian is
worldwide.) So we can't rely on aspects of US copyright law which are not
widely accepted, unfortunately -- and fair use is one of those elements
which isn't widely accepted.
--
Nathanael Nerode
I'm going to try to be clear about where debian-legal is coming from.
We've gotten a lot more careful about licenses in recent years after being
burned several times by surprising license interpretations. And by people
trying to do odd, non-free things with their copyright licenses (usually
posted mailed
Siggy Brentrup wrote:
[Please Cc me on replies since I'm not subscribed to d-legal]
Hi,
I'm adopting the spamprobe package which is under the QPL (Qt public
license). The package has a broken configure.in script that results
in linking against libdb3.so even when
Diego Biurrun wrote:
FYI: No need to CC me, I'm subscribed.
Branden Robinson writes:
On Tue, Mar 16, 2004 at 05:03:09AM +0100, Diego Biurrun wrote:
I am Diego Biurrun, the MPlayer documentation maintainer, not to be
confused with Gabucino, who has made a few appearances on this
Francesco Poli wrote:
Hello everybody,
I would like to know your opinion about the Creative Commons
Attribution License 1.0:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/1.0/legalcode
I searched the -legal archives, but I was not able to find a clear
statement about this license...
Is
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1
Jeremy Hankins wrote:
| Nathanael Nerode [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
|
|Francesco Poli wrote:
|
|
|] If you distribute, [...] the Work or any Derivative Works or
|] Collective Works, You must [...] give the Original Author credit
|] reasonable
Number Six wrote:
What's the dispensation on this:
Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
^^^
I thought the whole hoopla over GFDL was invariant
Humberto Massa wrote:
Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS wrote:
Don Armstrong [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
It seems rather clear that those source files are just machine
code for the device firmware, and as such, are not the prefered
form for modification.
Agreed. So the files are not DFSG-free.
This
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