On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 4:34 PM, Robinson Tryon <bishop.robin...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 4:07 PM, Philip Olson <phi...@roshambo.org> wrote: >> >> I avoid the topic of licenses whenever possible but let's make a decision. >> It feels like most would prefer dual licensing for code snippets (despite >> GPL and PHP not getting along all that well, ever) so let's do that. >> Does someone here have a lawyer friend who will look over the proposed >> change? > > Sure, I'm happy to take point on that. I'll pass along the information > from this thread and let the list know as soon as I hear something > back from the lawyers. >
Hi guys, I've heard back from the lawyers and received some very helpful information about dual-licensing the documentation and dealing with copyright assignment. (General disclaimer: IANAL, and this advice should be construed as nothing more than my advice) Based on my conversations, here's a licensing paragraph that can be used on the PHP licensing page (and on individual pages of the manual, if desired): "The PHP manual is Copyright (C) the PHP Documentation Group, and is released under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. All example code in the documentation or freely submitted by the public in "user notes" is additionally licensed under the New BSD License." Regarding copyright assignment, it appears that the law is quite strict about the matter, requiring actual signatures from individuals to complete the transfer. That kind of requirement seems like enough hassle than it might discourage people from contributing user notes, which is definitely something that we all want to avoid. But don't get discouraged yet! Based on what I've heard from the lawyers, we don't necessarily need copyright assignment to include user notes in the manual. Instead of requiring assignment, we can just require a license from the individual to the PHP Documentation Group. Here's a draft of how the ToS could read: "To improve the PHP Manual, information from user notes may be periodically incorporated into the primary documentation. By submitting a user note you attest that all contributions are your own and grant the PHP Documentation Group a license to use the content of the user note in the documentation under the same terms as the primary documentation, as well as the right to re-license the content should the license of the PHP Manual change. Content that violates any copyrights will be deleted. See the Licensing Page for details." On a related note, is there any further clarification about who comprises "The PHP Documentation Group" ? It might be helpful to get that sorted out at the same time as the dual-licensing of the documentation, particularly as the documentation license specifically refers to the Group, and they appear to hold the role of shepherds of the manual, user notes, and license. Cheers, -- Robinson
