discuss: Proposal for revised license and license requirements.
Subject:
Re: Proposal for revised license and license requirements.
From:
David Lawyer ####@####.####
Date:
6 Jun 2005 00:02:07 -0000
Message-Id: <20050606000149.GB2366@lafn.org>
> On Sat, Jun 04, 2005 at 07:25:15PM -0700, David Lawyer wrote:
> > PS: This topic has been discussed previously, but no resolution has
> > ever been reached.
> >
On Sun, Jun 05, 2005 at 06:10:48PM +0000, Andrew M.A. Cater wrote:
> I'd go for a licence which was unconditionally free for modification,
> perhaps with an optional requirement for notification: I would mandate
> that documents should be required to be modifiable and quotable and usable
> for all purposes, whether commercial, for Govt. use or for personal
> profit - the "no distinction against fields of endeavour" idea.
There are some points in favor of making a document non-modifiable.
Non-modifiable means that you can modify it, provided you have the author's
permission. Thus the author can try to prevent modification that only
degrades the document: adding advertising to it, intentionally adding
untrue statements, etc. Such degradations have actually happened.
When the author wants to turn it over to someone else, they can select
who that person will be (if there is more than one volunteer).
Non-free documentation is free to use (in a sense) to create improved
documentation, unlike non-free software which can't be used to create
improved software. To use non-free documentation, you simply read it
and use what you learn plus what you learn from other sources to
write improved documentation. So non-free documentation is not a big
stumbling block to improvement like non-free software is. Of course,
it may be easier to create improved documentation from freely
modifiable documents by just copying parts of it. You can't do this
with non-free. But if you have to rewrite the whole thing from
scratch (the case for non-free) then the result may be better.
> [Shades of the Debian Free Software Guidelines - corresponding Free
> Documentation Guidelines have been proposed at various times but have
> always failed to be properly defined].
This is needed. I think that free documentation means no advertising,
(including pop-up ads, etc.) and that modifications should be
improvements rather than degradations. This implies that restrictions
on modification and display are needed to make it truly free. It's
freedom for the reader to not have to be annoyed by ads and the
freedom to not read untrue statements intentionally put into the
document (not just honest mistakes).
There's another case (besides not being able to locate the author)
where a non-modifiable doc should be allowed to be modified. That's the
case where the author modifies the doc and then changes the license to
prohibit copying (takes it off the Internet, etc.). Still another
case is where the author fails to maintain the doc. To put all this
into the LDP manifesto would make it too complicated. The
requirements are supposed to be short and simple. But I think that
most authors that don't maintain their doc would be willing to turn it
over to someone who is able to maintain it.
David Lawyer
