On Thu, Sep 11, 2003 at 12:26:07PM +0200, Wouter Verhelst wrote:
> As I tried to point out in the recent discussions about the GFDL (not
> sure whether that point has come through, but anyway), although the GFDL
> is crafted in a way which makes it not DFSG-free, IMHO there is nothing
> wrong with the spirit, the intention, of the GFDL.
Well, I personally have had a lot of trouble eliciting information about
what precisely the GNU FDL's intent *is*, at least when it comes to
particular properties that distinguish it from other licenses.
I think a more fruitful approach for developing a documentation license
might be to enumerate our intentions before constructing the license.
> As such, I've taken the GFDL, and modified it in a way that retains the
> spirit of the GFDL, but results in a license which is, IMO, DFSG-free.
> I'm assuming the text of the GFDL is copyrighted in the same way as the
> GPL is, so I renamed it to the "WDL", for "Wouter's Documentation
> License" -- that's just until I find a more suitable name for it.
I do not have the strength of will to perform an analysis at this point,
and commenting on parts that happen to be similar or identical to the
GNU FDL would, in my opinion, run afoul of the self-censorship on the
subject that Bruce Perens has asked me to practice.[1]
I will make a couple of meta-observations, however:
> Wouter's Documentation License
>
> Version 1.0-DRAFT
> Copyright (C) 2003, Wouter Verhelst
Since you frankly admit that this document is derived from the GNU FDL,
surely they retain their copyright in it?
If so, then it might be a good idea to ask the FSF for permission to
make a derived license.
[1] To be fair to Bruce, he did make clear that he'd prefer I didn't
post on -legal at all[2], but that is more self-censorship than I
think can muster.
[2] To be even more fair to Bruce, I gather that his actual preference
was that I disappear from any public forum anyone from the FSF might
read, and make remarks on debian-private instead.[3]
[3] http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200309/msg00357.html
--
G. Branden Robinson | When I die I want to go peacefully
Debian GNU/Linux | in my sleep like my ol' Grand
branden@debian.org | Dad...not screaming in terror like
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | his passengers.
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