Hi everyone,
I was reviewing the status of #238245 ("Debian web site is licensed under the
OPL which is not considered DFSG-free") and see that there have been no
actions since October last year and no discussion at debian-www.
In summary: The web pages license content should be changed from the OPL (non
DFSG-free) to some other license (DFSG-free). As it is, the current content
is not GPL compatible (so it cannot be reused, for example, in documentation
produced by the DDP project).
This issue was brought up last in October 2005 to the SPI board and they said
(based on the IRC log [2] there doesn't seem to be any minutes) that
debian-www should tell them what to do. I don't find any other references to
this in the SPI Board archives.
So, Here's the plan I propose:
a) a proper license should be decided for the website.
I suggest using a BSD-style license. The attached license is such a
license. It is based on the FreeBSD documentation license [3] and
explicitely mentions translations. In our case (the website) the
'source code' is the wml, but I leave references to other sources (SGML,
XML) that might apply to other documentation that the website might hold.
b) old contributors to the web site (i.e. all that have had CVS access to the
WWW CVS are for the past 10 years) should be contacted and ask to
agree to this license change.
c) a note should be added to the Debian site (as a News item?) describing the
license change (and the reasons for the change) and giving a 6 month
period for comments.
d) new contributors during that period should be asked to agree to the
license change and to transfer (c) to SPI (GPG/PGP signed e-mail would be
a requisite for contributing, a paper trail would be even best)
e) from here on access to the CVS of the website should be given after
clearly stating (and getting and agreement) that any and all contributions
to the CVS, unless specified otherwise with clear (c) statements in the
code, will be (c) SPI and will be considered "work under contract"
Does this sound like a reasonable plan? Who can help digging out a list
of contributors and preparing an explanatory e-mail and license change notice
for the website?
Let's please solve this once and for all.
Regards
Javier
[1] http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/ddp-policy/ch-common.en.html#s2.2
[2] http://www.spi-inc.org/secretary/minutes/20051018.txt
[3] http://www.freebsd.org/copyright/freebsd-doc-license.html
The Debian Documentation License Copyright 1997-2006 Software in the Public Interest, Inc. All rights reserved. Redistribution and use in source (WML, XML or SGML DocBook) and 'compiled' forms (SGML, HTML, PDF, PostScript, RTF and so forth) with or without modification, and translations are permitted provided that the following conditions are met: 1. Redistributions of source code (WML, XML or SGML DocBook) must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer as the first lines of this file unmodified. 2. Redistributions in compiled form (transformed to other DTDs, converted to HTML, PDF, PostScript, RTF and other formats) must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 3. Translations and derived works must be distributed under this same license. THIS DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED BY THE DEBIAN PROJECT AND SOFTWARE IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE DEBIAN PROJECT OR SOFTWARE IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS DOCUMENTATION, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
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