Re: DFSG and fonts [was: Bug#91856: Hello]

2001-04-04 Thread Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS
Joseph Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> > > > What are they?  They need serious bugs filed against them.
> > > 
> > > e.g. doc-rfc ?  
> > 
> > The GNU General Public Licence itself may not be modified. I hope this
> > doesn't mean ...
> 
> Copyright licenses as legal documents may not be modified except by the
> holder of the Copyright under law.  As such, NO license is itself able to
> meet the terms of the DFSG and must be excepted.

You have misunderstood me, I think, and your reasoning is incorrect.

Obviously you can't just redistribute someone else's program with a
modified licence, but you might want to distribute your own program
with a modified version of the GPL. But the first paragraph of the GPL
forbids that; you would have to write your own licence from scratch.

Most licences do not have a notice saying whether the licence itself
may be modified and redistributed, but most licences are short enough
that probably nobody cares. The GPL, on the other hand, is a
significant work in its own right (nearly 3000 words), and it does
have its own copyright notice, in the first paragraph. The GPL is not
itself licensed under a free software licence.

Edmund



Re: DFSG and fonts [was: Bug#91856: Hello]

2001-04-04 Thread Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS

Joseph Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> > > > What are they?  They need serious bugs filed against them.
> > > 
> > > e.g. doc-rfc ?  
> > 
> > The GNU General Public Licence itself may not be modified. I hope this
> > doesn't mean ...
> 
> Copyright licenses as legal documents may not be modified except by the
> holder of the Copyright under law.  As such, NO license is itself able to
> meet the terms of the DFSG and must be excepted.

You have misunderstood me, I think, and your reasoning is incorrect.

Obviously you can't just redistribute someone else's program with a
modified licence, but you might want to distribute your own program
with a modified version of the GPL. But the first paragraph of the GPL
forbids that; you would have to write your own licence from scratch.

Most licences do not have a notice saying whether the licence itself
may be modified and redistributed, but most licences are short enough
that probably nobody cares. The GPL, on the other hand, is a
significant work in its own right (nearly 3000 words), and it does
have its own copyright notice, in the first paragraph. The GPL is not
itself licensed under a free software licence.

Edmund


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Re: DFSG and fonts [was: Bug#91856: Hello]

2001-04-04 Thread Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS
James Troup <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> > > While the issues on unmodifiable non-software stuff in Debian are
> > > not as clear-cut as Branden has made them out to be (I know of at
> > > least a half dozen packages in main that are unmodifiable, that were
> > > put there knowing that)
> > 
> > What are they?  They need serious bugs filed against them.
> 
> e.g. doc-rfc ?  

The GNU General Public Licence itself may not be modified. I hope this
doesn't mean ...

Edmund



Re: DFSG and fonts [was: Bug#91856: Hello]

2001-04-04 Thread Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS

James Troup <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> > > While the issues on unmodifiable non-software stuff in Debian are
> > > not as clear-cut as Branden has made them out to be (I know of at
> > > least a half dozen packages in main that are unmodifiable, that were
> > > put there knowing that)
> > 
> > What are they?  They need serious bugs filed against them.
> 
> e.g. doc-rfc ?  

The GNU General Public Licence itself may not be modified. I hope this
doesn't mean ...

Edmund


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To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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