Clarification about the octave-gpcl licensing conditions
I am confused about the the licensing conditions of the octave-gpcl package and I need some advise from the debian-legalers. I am both the upstream author and the maintainer of octave-gpcl. This package provides the Octave (www.octave.org) binding for the General Polygon Clipper library (http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~toby/alan/software/). The GPC library is released under a non-free license and is also packaged for Debian by me (libgpcl0 and libgpcl-dev). The problem arises because the octave-gpcl packages produces a loadable module (or plugin) in the form of a *.oct file that is loaded by Octave at run-time. However, Octave is released under the GPL (not the LGPL) meaning that it is not allowed to link any non-GPL compatible product against it and redistribute the whole thing. The situation seems to be similar to that of the readline library. My questions are: (1) should I move the octave-gpcl package from contrib to non-free? (2) If I could keep octave-gpcl under a GPL-compatible license (although it links against a non-free library), wouldn't that be an infringement of the GPL, which is Octave's license? (3) In any event, would it be legal at all to distribute Octave add-ons that link against non-free external libraries? (4) How would the situation be if Octave were released under the LGPL? [Please, keep Cc: to [EMAIL PROTECTED] I hope the cross-posting is not abusive. M-F-T set accordingly.] Thanks, -- Rafael -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: photo licenses
On Thu, 9 Nov 2006 09:53:49 +0200 Yasen Pramatarov wrote: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 22:26:42 +0100 Francesco Poli : [...] The issue here is making available all the necessary data for modifying the work in an optimal way: doing otherwise puts the original author in an unfair position of advantage with respect to the recipient(s), when the need (or will) to make modifications arises. IMO just making available the images is enough. Because all you need for the image manipulation is... well just the image. This can be true for many cases: whenever the image itself is the preferred form for modifications. For many other cases it's false: think about a PNG image generated from an SVG image (with Inkscape or Sodipodi, say). In most cases the preferred form for making modifications to that PNG image is in SVG format (so that you have all the vector objects, you can set opacities as you like, you can uncover hidden parts of the shapes, and so forth...). These case-by-case differences in determining the source form should be no surprise, since they happen for programs, as well. For a binary executable compiled from C code, the source is in C *in most cases*. But sometimes the C code is automatically generated from a grammar description (bison comes to mind): in that case, the preferred form is probably the grammar description. For a Python script, the source is often the script itself. But not necessarily: it could be generated from something else... If we're looking for the ultimate preferred form, then the unscaled JPEG that went out of the digital camera will never be enough - they are converted and compressed in camera from the sensor's RAW-data. The specific camera may not support saving RAW-files, but out there are many models that support RAWs. Does that mean that for each image there should be RAW-file? It's not a matter of finding an ultimate form. It's a simple practical matter: if someone modifies a work in some form (because he/she prefers to do so), but only distributes another form (which is generated from the other one), then, well, it's *not* Free Software. Hence sometimes the source for a digital photo could be a raw uncompressed image. Some other times, the source could be the JPEG created by the digital camera. Or even a preprocessed JPEG. It depends on what you (as modifier of the work) prefer: if you retain the form that you consider preferred, and keep it secret, then, well, you are playing an unfair game that hurts the community. I think it should be crystal clear: I cannot think of other ways of explaining it better... If an image is usable in the compressed form, meaning the size is large enough and the compression is small enough, there are many ways of modifying it. If this form has these advantages over the other possible forms, it could well be the preferred form for modifications. Please don't be afraid that agreeing on the preferred form definition of source means that authors will always be asked to distribute 160 Gbyte of raw uncompressed data! Practical considerations can well shift the preferences toward more compressed formats! If a form is so unpractical (for instance because files in that form are usually really *huge*), then it probably won't be preferred: the original author will probably be the first to get rid of it, thus showing that it's not his/her preferred form for modifications... Graphic designers do it all the time. Because they *prefer* doing it? ;-) While some data is being lost in the manipulation process, it doesn't mean the licence should require the largest available jpeg/raw to be distributed. It does *not*! The GNU GPL requires the *preferred* form, not the *largest* one! Even is it's just a compressed jpeg that came out of the camera, sometimes (most of the times:) it's a good idea to postprocess it a little before using it. Because those who are going to further modify it *prefer* postprocessing it a little before modifying it? ;-) Then it seems the postprocessed image is the source! P.S.: IANAL, but I'm an amateur photographer so I know a bit about raw/jpegs and their form for modifications. IANAL either, and I'm an amateur (digital) photographer as well. -- But it is also tradition that times *must* and always do change, my friend. -- from _Coming to America_ . Francesco Poli . GnuPG key fpr == C979 F34B 27CE 5CD8 DC12 31B5 78F4 279B DD6D FCF4 pgp4zAWrViDuM.pgp Description: PGP signature
Comments on the second public CC draft
Hi all! In a recent message[1] to the cc-licenses list, a new draft of CC-v3.0 licenses was announced. The message included some documents as attachments: * BY-NC-SA v 3 (102506) (US).pdf * BY-NC-SA v3 (102506) (unported).pdf [1] http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/cc-licenses/2006-October/004459.html In the following I comment on the draft whose filename is `BY-NC-SA v3 (102506) (unported).pdf'. Please note that the anti-TPM clause has already been discussed a lot, hence I won't comment any further on it. Please also note that I cannot cross-post this message to cc-licenses, since that mailing list is not open to non-subscribers and handling a cross-post between open and closed lists would result in a real mess... :-( The title of this draft is | Creative Commons | Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 I am analyzing CC by-nc-sa v3draft license: why isn't there any highlighting for the clauses that vanish in the other v3draft licenses? I am especially interested in by-sa and by, since they are the only two that have some hope to meet the DFSG... I think that clarity in this respect would be very important. Clause 4(a) states, in part: | If You create a Collection, upon notice from any Licensor You | must, to the extent practicable, remove from the Collection | any credit as required by clause 4(d), as requested. If You | create an Adaptation, upon notice from any Licensor You must, | to the extent practicable, remove from the Adaptation any | credit as required by clause 4(d), as requested. This concerns me... I have previously discussed the issue on debian-legal, but I'm not yet convinced that this clause meets the DFSG. The most in-depth (and long) discussion on this topic that I recall starts more or less with http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2006/03/msg00092.html What I do not understand basically boils down to: How can a license (allow a licensor to) forbid an accurate credit and meet the DFSG at the same time? I think that stating This Adaptation is based on the Work _foo_ by James O. Hacker is an accurate credit, as long as it's true. Allowing James O. Hacker to force me to purge such a credit seems to significantly restrict my ability of modifying the work (see DFSG#3). Hypothetical example: Walter Writer writes the novel _Good Title_, under CC-by-v3 and Nazi Ned creates an annotated version, titled _Good Title, from a neo-nazi Perspective_. Assume that Nazi Ned states by Nazi Ned and Walter Writer Walter requests to be removed from authorship credits. Fairly enough. Ned removes his name. I don't think that the above credit would be accurate, so no problem here. What if Ned stated the following? by Nazi Ned, based on Walter Writer's _Good Title_ Is that acceptable? Or can Walter request (under clause 4(a)) that his name be removed from the based on ... statement? Clause 4(b) states, in part: |b. You may Distribute or Publicly Perform an Adaptation only under | the terms of this License, a later version of this License with | the same License Elements as this License, or a Creative | Commons license for another jurisdiction (either this or a | later license version) that contains the same License Elements | as this License (e.g., Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 | Japan). It's worth noting that CC licenses have a mandatory version-upgrade mechanism and also a mandatory jurisdiction-change mechanism. This can weaken the copyleft of ShareAlike licenses, and possibly trigger weird clauses such as sue me in Scotland (found in CC-by-2.5/scotland, for instance). Authors, you have been warned! Clause 4(c) states, in part: |c. You may not exercise any of the rights granted to You in | Section 3 above in any manner that is primarily intended | for or directed toward commercial advantage or private | monetary compensation. This clause forbids selling the Work (fails DFSG#1) and discriminates against a field of endeavor (fails DFSG#6). I hope that clause 4(c) is entirely absent from CC-by and CC-by-sa, but unfortunately there's no clear indication in this draft. Clause 4(d) states, in part: | in the case of a Adaptation or Collection, at a minimum such | credit will appear, if a credit for all contributing authors | of the Adaptation or Collection appears, then as part of these | credits and in a manner at least as prominent as the credits | for the other contributing authors. Credit must be at least as prominent as the credits for the other contributing authors. Even if the licensor's contribution is not comparable to others? I think that this restriction is excessive and fails to meet the DFSG. I mean: Walter Writer incorporates a short poem by Paul Poet into a novel that includes 21 chapters written by Cindy Coauthor and 25 chapters written by
