Re: [Fwd: Licensing of translation work [Was: Problemas de rosetta]]

[Clytie Siddall <clytie@riverland.net.au>]

On 19/06/2006, at 5:59 PM, MJ Ray wrote:

> Daniel Nylander <info@danielnylander.se>
> > FYI regarding license issues in Rosetta.
> [...]
> > From: Jordi Mallach <jordi@sindominio.net>
> [...]
> > First of all, we don't think the copyright is being "transfered" to
> > Canonical. At the very least, it would be shared between Canonical  
> > and
> > you, the Rosetta Contributor.
>
> I don't understand what original creative contribution is made
> to this translator's work by Canonical Ltd or its employees.
> The contribution from Rosetta seems mechanical and derivative.
> Why is Canonical's assertion of copyright valid?
>
> This copyright assertion isn't described on https://launchpad.net/ 
> legal
> - why not and when are translators told about it?

Also, if we have previously assigned copyright for our translations,  
e.g. to the Free Software Foundation, what right has anyone else to  
change that assignation?

Complete translations have been imported into Rosetta and modified,  
without consultation or permission, by people simply logging into  
Rosetta, not members of the original translation team. These  
translations are usually not reviewed, nor is any quality-assurance  
procedure normally followed.

Rosetta has serious access-control and QA issues, and now we have our  
copyrights being changed. While Rosetta facilitates participation, it  
does not yet meet the de facto standards that projects like Debian  
have worked so hard to attain. These may not be formal standards, but  
we have learnt to put in place information and processes within the  
language team (e.g. access control, QA) and across the whole project  
(e.g. licensing, submitting translations, managing updates, working  
with upstream) which produce high-quality, reliable and sustainable  
translations. Not only is Rosetta not doing this, it is also allowing  
existing translations to be damaged. I find this very worrying. :(
> > The sole reason Canonical is adding this header is because we want  
> > to be
> > able to share the translator's work across different, freely licenced
> > products that are available for translation in Rosetta. As not all
> > projects use the same licence, this is necessary to be able to do  
> > it no
> > matter what.
>
> Why isn't the work licensed appropriately at the time of input
> into Rosetta?  Having Canonical Ltd assert copyright doesn't
> seem necessary and AIUI doesn't let Canonical share the work
> across different products in the way described - even if the
> copyright assertion is valid, Canonical can't relicense the
> whole work without the consent of the other copyright holders.
> That is to say: this doesn't achieve the sole reason given IMO.
>
> What is the status of the Launchpad refactoring apparently
> required for Rosetta to be released as free software?
Does assigning copyright to the FSF, for example, prevent others  
relicensing the work? If not, would the GPL afford that protection?

from Clytie (vi-VN, Vietnamese free-software translation team / nhóm  
Việt hóa phần mềm tự do)
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/vi-VN