I find the following clause troublesome (section v):
"1.If you are distributing Open Publication works on hardcopy or
CD-ROM, you provide email notification to
the authors of your intent to redistribute at least thirty days before
your manuscript or media freeze, to give
the authors time to provide updated documents. This notification
should describe modifications, if any, made to the document."
This could mean that, for instance, if somebody decides to
include a copy of relevant parts of the Web site with a Debian
distribution, she should countact the authors every time a new CD is
prepared. This could be, at least, a problem, effectively preventing
people from redistributing the contents (which I guess is not the
target Debian is looking for).
However, this clause is found after the following statement:
In addition to the requirements of this license, it is requested from
and strongly recommended of redistributors that:
I don´t have a formal legal education, and I´m not sure if
this implies that the clausules may be satisfied, or that they have to
be satisfied.
But in short, if every author of the Web site has to be
contacted in advance for making a CD with the contents of the site, I
guess this license should not be used.
In addition, there could be some problems with translations,
if translators are not considered a part of the authoring group
(I´m not sure whether this is the case for Debian pages). Translations are
considered modified works in this license, and because of that, they must
fulfill some conditions, like including the name of the translator, a
link to the original work, a label indicating that it is a modified
work, etc. (see section iv of the license). I guess these caluses are
not fulfilled in current translations of the Debian web site.
Saludos,
Jesus.
PS: There is another clause that bothers me (section v):
"3.Finally, while it is not mandatory under this license, it is
considered good form to offer a free copy of any
hardcopy and CD-ROM expression of an Open Publication-licensed work to
its author(s)."
But since this is clearly optional, I guess it causes no harm.
Craig Small writes:
> G'day,
> I emailled last week about the website license and how I have
> suggested that we go with Open Publication License at
> http://opencontent.org/openpub/
>
> Well... I got a stunning 0 replies.
>
> I guess that means everyone doesn't have a problem with it! I'll wait a
> day or so and then schedule a time to update the license down the bottom
> of the pages. If I hear nothing then it gets changed.
>
> OK Jay, the question is when? I know this change will probably put
> a pretty heavy load on the system.
>
> - Craig
>
> --
> Craig Small VK2XLZ, PGP: AD 8D D8 63 6E BF C3 C7 47 41 B1 A2 1F 46 EC 90
> Eye-Net Consulting http://www.eye-net.com.au/ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> MIEEE <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Debian developer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>
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--
Jesus M. Gonzalez Barahona | Grupo de Sistemas y Comunicaciones
[EMAIL PROTECTED] / [EMAIL PROTECTED] | ESCET, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos
tel: +34 91 664 74 72 | c/ Tulipan s/n
fax: +34 91 664 74 90 | 28933 Mostoles, Spain
