Re: Preferred license for documentation

[ilmari@ilmari.org (Dagfinn Ilmari Mannsåker)]

Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS <edmundo@rano.org> writes:

> John Goerzen <jgoerzen@complete.org>:
>
>> I should add that I want a license that guarantees that all receipients of
>> modified versions get the full original rights.  (Similar to the GPL rather
>> than BSD in that respect.)
>
> Then use the GPL, version 2 only.

You are right, but for the wrong reason (see below).

> If you use the GPL version 2 or later then future recipients may find
> they get a document from which they are not allowed to remove the odes
> to various people's goldfishes that were added as invariant sections
> under GPLv3.

Then they can just choose to license it under the GPL version 2, which
does not allow invariant sections. The "GPL version 2 or later"
copyright statement says (emphasis mine):

    This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
    the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (*at your
    option*) any later version.

The problem in this situation is the possibility of the FSF releasing a
non-copyleft (BSD-ish) GPLvX, thus not guaranteeing that all receipients
of modified versions get the full original rights.

-- 
ilmari