Re: [was A possible GFDL compromise] documentation eq software ?
Jeremy Hankins <nowan@nowan.org> a tapoté :
> Mathieu Roy <yeupou@gnu.org> writes:
>
> > I'm even not sure whether it's a problem to have an invariant part
> > in documentation. As my main area of work is History, I'm familiar
> > with books -some kind of documentation- that I cannot change
> > physically but I still can use fully (read, understand... and so
> > execute and modify, by writing my own text, as there's no binary
> > form involved here).
>
> You're not the only one to have this misconception, so I want to
> emphasize this point.
>
> The only way you can write your own text based on the old one is if
> the license permits you to do so. Typically with books that means the
> work is in the public domain or you've got explicit permission from
> the author.
I'm completely capable to read a book and make a summary, make a
speech about it ... there's no way to forbid that - since I have the
freedom of speech and freedom of thought.
Every scientific book is made of references, bibliographies. You do
not remodify a book someone wrote - that's pointless. If you have
something new to say, or something you want to criticize, you make
your own book. For the sake of comprehension, it helps.
It's interesting to be able to modify a book only when it's a simple
manual. Something that explain *how to* do something specific (emacs
manual) - and not when your book express a point of view (gnu
manifesto), not when a book explain how was or is something (history
and sociology books, for instance)
There no problem with that for me. We cannot modify the GNU manifesto:
who cares? If you want to make your own, inspired by this one, go
ahead. Your brain is already able to read this text, execute this
text, modify this text, reuse this text.
It's completely different than not having access to the source code of
a software or not being able to, legally, reusing the code someone
wrote.
In these cases there's nothing you can do at all.
Finally, in manual, you can have a part which is really "a manual"
specific part, which should be free. But you can have also a part that
express a political stand, for example, and this part should not be
modified, because it would be a lack of respect for the believes of
the manual author. This part should be invariant.
Just like the mail you just received: I do not grant you the right to
modify my mail.
You can quote it, explain it to someone else, forward it to someone
else. But you cannot modify it at all strictly speaking. Is it an
issue?
--
Mathieu Roy
Homepage:
http://yeupou.coleumes.org
Not a native english speaker:
http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
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