Re: A possible GFDL compromise

[bts@alum.mit.edu (Brian T. Sniffen)]

Jacobo Tarrio <jtarrio@trasno.net> writes:
>  Third: if we were to enumerate each and every right in the license, it
> would be much longer and more complex (and imagine if we started combining
> the rights "you must not limit the recipient's ability to make and
> distribute new copies of excerpted versions of this document"). Thus, a
> single, simple clause I proposed: "if the format or physical medium this
> work is distributed in limits the recipient's ability to exercise the rights
> given by this license, access to a copy of this work in a format or physical
> medium that allows for the exercise of the rights must be provided".
>
>  That would mean -- if you want to modify it and cannot because you don't use
> Word, you have the right to obtain from your distributor a plain text copy.

So if I distribute any text document in hard copy, I should be
prepared to provide a Braille edition, as well as translations into a
variety of obscure languages?  I don't think that's Free either.  I
like the idea of what you're trying to do, but I think any phrasing of
this requirement is either going to leave loopholes or cover too much:
it will either be exploitable or non-free.  This is a social problem,
and best solved with social means, not with precise technical phrasing.

-Brian

-- 
Brian T. Sniffen                                        bts@alum.mit.edu
                       http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/