Re: GNU FDL 1.2 draft comment summary posted, and RFD

[Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>]

Steve Langasek <vorlon@netexpress.net> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 13, 2002 at 11:41:13AM -0700, Walter Landry wrote:
> > You have modified the original such that the preferred form for
> > modifications has changed.  People do this all the time (e.g. recoding
> > a Perl project in Python). I don't think that there is any ambiguity
> > here.
> 
> But whose preference are you going by?

The person who last modified it.  They do have to prefer modifying it
the way they did, though.

> I don't think this is precise enough to prevent some pretty serious
> abuses, both by original authors and by modifiers of copylefted
> works.  If I wrote the original document, and prefer LaTeX over XML
> so much that it remains my preferred form even when significant
> content and markup changes have been made to the XML version, do I
> have the right to demand access to the changes in LaTeX format?

Of course not.  You're no different from anyone else in what you can
ask from the modifiers.

> If not, what are my rights if someone else converts the document to
> a PS or PDF document and works with it that way?  At which point,
> what recourse do I have if someone chooses PDF as a preferred form
> with obfuscation in mind?

If someone *really* prefers working with PDF, why is that a problem?  If
someone takes my C++ program and converts it to Ada, or converts my
English document to Russian, I can't do much with it.  That doesn't
mean that I should be able to stop them.

One small consolation.  If someone converts it to Microsoft Word, they
can't distribute paper copies, because they would have to distribute
Microsoft word alongside.  They could distribute the .doc files, but
this is no different from someone distributing java files that only
run on the Sun VM.  It is not the end of the world.  You still have
the source.

Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu


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