Re: Draft new DFSG - r1.4

[Raul Miller <rdm@test.legislate.com>]

Ian Jackson <ian@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
> 4. Documentation and other non-software works
> 
> Certain kinds of documentation or other non-software works may have
> further restrictions.
> 
> (a) None of the exceptions listed in this section apply to a work
> which is documentation for software.  Documentation for software is
> documentation to which a conscientious programmer would wish to make
> corresponding changes when they modify the software.
> 
> (b) A document which states an opinion, as an opinion, need not be
> modifiable.
> 
> (c) The licence for a document which specifies a standard of some kind
> (for example a Standards Track RFC) need not be modifiable, provided
> that the licence still permits the creation and distribution of
> modified versions, for at least the purposes of developing new
> standards, according to the procedures for the standards process in
> question.
> 
> (d) An artwork which is expressive and not functional need not be
> modifiable.
>
> (e) When we say that a work need not be modifiable, we mean that
> restrictions may be placed on:
> 
>  i. the creation and/or distribution of modified versions;
> 
>  ii. the distribution of parts of the work, rather than the whole;
> 
>  iii. distribution of the source code, if this is different from the
> form of the work usually distributed (and, we also mean that the
> source code need not be available); and
> 
>  iv. reverse-engineering.

I'm stalled here.

[1] What does it mean to disallow reverse engineering on a statement
of opinion?  On a work of art?  A standards document?  It seems to me
that if reverse engineering is a concept applies to the work then the
original should have been modifiable.

[2] What is a standard?  Can someone simly declare a work to be
a standard, or is there some further criteria?

-- 
Raul