Re: A clarification for my interpretation of GFDL [was: Anton's amendment]
Stephen Gran wrote: > This one time, at band camp, MJ Ray said: > > The current opinion of FSF, at least. In the past, RMS has > > worked against advertising clauses far less obnoxious than > > the FDL ones. [...] > > Er, we consider the 4 clause BSD license a free license. I know. Did you just not read "far less obnoxious" in my post? > By comparing > the FDL and the 4 clause BSD license this way, you are making me think > that either you didn't know the 4 clause BSD license is considered free, > or you think the FDL is as well. If so, you are making me think your logical faculties are buggy. > Again, the FSF's opinion doesn't matter here. Not directly, but it does to some DDs (including me), and can influence the vote. Happily, not calling the FDL a free software licence is not contradicting FSF and is far less zealous than a past FSF campaign. It's a difference of opinion about manuals, not a fundamental break. -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/ Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 11:31:38AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote: > On Sun, Feb 05, 2006 at 05:55:54PM -0500, Zephaniah E. Hull wrote: > i challenge any of you zealots to come up with a REAL WORLD, PRACTICAL > proof that the GFDL is non-free (and i mean actually non-free, not > merely inconvenient. the DFSG does not require convenience, only > freedom). Alright, I'm going to give another example here, hopefully this one will get through to you. Now, remember, we have _already had_ the GR that states that as far as the DFSG goes we don't give a damn if it's documentation or software. So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in either. Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because it's not even close. And we have ALREADY decided that we don't give a damn if it's software or documentation, the fact that it's a 'secondary' section makes not one damn bit of difference, it's still non-free. > > At that point, it is the entirety of the document, it is more then one > > or two lines of text, it is _not_ a copyright statement or license > > which is covered by law instead of the license. > > neither of these things are actually covered by law - there is no > specific law that states "you may not delete or alter copyright notices > or licenses". these things are just implicit convention. I'm pretty sure that if you asked a lawyer what would happen were you to make drastic changes to the license file on a project that wasn't yours and removed the copyright notices that he'd tell you that it was likely to get you in a whole lot of trouble when they sue you for doing so. > > Now, it is still under the GNU FDL, there is still content here, the > > content, which is now the _entirety_ of the document, is something > > that by the license I can not remove and can not change. > > yes, what's left are the invariant sections. by definition, > unchangeable. you have such mastery of the obvious. What's left is main.c, an invariant section, by definition unchangeable. Unchangeable stuff is alright to have in main, right? > > unfortunately, you're sadly lacking in understanding. the document is, > in essence, no different to what it was before you deleted all the > content. you are still free to add whatever you like to the content, and > to change that as you please. you have, in fact, exercised your freedom > already BY deleting the original content. The program is still, in essence, no different to what it was before you deleted all the stuff you were allowed to delete. You can still add stuff back to it as you please. And you've even exercised your freedom in deleting the rest of it. > > more importantly, you are making the mistake of assuming that because > you deleted the contents, the *real* primary topic of the document, > that the secondary sections are automatically promoted to the status of > primary topic. that is a false assumption. by definition, an invariant > section can only be a secondary section, AND a secondary section CAN NOT > BE the primary topic of a document. so that means either: > > 1. (in the unlikely case that your auto-promotion theory is true) since > they're not secondary sections, they can't be invariant: no invariant > sections, no problem. The license has broken, you no longer have a license that allows you to do _ANYTHING_. > > 2. (otherwise) since there's no primary topic to hang them on to, the > invariant sections go too, so you have no document at all: no document, > no license, no problem. The license has broken, and strangely, the program or document, doesn't matter which, _IS STILL THERE_, it does not disappear in a magic puff of smoke. No license equals no permission to do anything AT ALL as far as distributing it. > > in either case, the outcome is ridiculous because the scenario > conditions are ridiculous. what you actually have is an empty document. > i.e. nothing. not worth worrying about. it doesn't matter in the > slightest. You have an empty program. Oh, sure, there's that main.c, which you're not allowed to touch, but the rest of it is gone so it doesn't matter, really! Look behind you, a plane! Now, we were not talking about there being some UTTERLY NON-FREE COMPONENT of the program that you're not allowed to remove, not at all. Move along, nothing to see here. > > Please, use some sense here, a large invariant section is not 'nothing', > > it actually does exist and it doesn't matter if you close your eyes, put > > your fingers in your ears, and start singing. > > some people prefer not to waste time worrying about ridiculously absurd > contrived scenarios. there are lots of real things worth worrying about > in this world. your sce
Re: Anton's amendment
"Zephaniah E. Hull" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can > do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright > statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, > not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. > > Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in > either. > > Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because > it's not even close. s/main.c/secondary.c/, but that doesn't change the argument, only the name, actually. Which is part of GFDL's problem. Regards, Frank -- Frank Küster Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Protein Folding @ Inst. f. Biochemie, Univ. Zürich Debian Developer (teTeX)
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, 06 Feb 2006 16:37:20 +0100, Frank Küster wrote: > "Zephaniah E. Hull" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can >> do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright >> statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, >> not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. >> >> Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in >> either. >> >> Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because >> it's not even close. > > s/main.c/secondary.c/, but that doesn't change the argument, only the > name, actually. Which is part of GFDL's problem. This is not a proper example. Non-modifiability of secondary.c may obstruct further improvements of the program. This is not the case with the invariant sections, which do not prevent the manual to be enhanced. Like the following example: #!/usr/bin/make -f # debian/rules file - for debian/keyring # Based on sample debian/rules file - for GNU Hello (1.3). # Copyright 1994,1995 by Ian Jackson. # Copyright 1998-2003 James Troup # I hereby give you perpetual unlimited permission to copy, # modify and relicense this file, provided that you do not remove # my name from the file itself. (I assert my moral right of # paternity under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.) # This file may have to be extensively modified Is it free? I am sure it is. Imagine that it contained "...provided that you do not remove my name from the file and the statement `Dominación mundial de Debian'"; what would happen then? You would be still allowed to make whatever modifications you want to your debian/rules, but it will contain a personal statement -- no problem at all (except some inconvenience). As for Zephaniah's first example: if you have to remove everything, you obviously don't need this documentation and it would be much better to write a new manual from scratch. Thus you can avoid the invariant sections. -- Yavor Doganov -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: The invariant sections are not forbidden by DFSG
Craig Sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Sat, Feb 04, 2006 at 04:42:41PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: >> Craig Sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: >> >> > alternatively, print a single link to either the full documentation >> > (containing the invariant sections) or to just the invariant sections. >> >> This might be a reasonable thing, but it is not what the GFDL requires. > > actually, it is. the GFDL explicitly says that you can provide a link to > an internet site - and, contrary to loony zealot propaganda, it does not > say that you must operate or maintain that site yourself. This provision allows you an exemption from the "Transparent copy" requirement; it does not allow you an exemption from the invariant sections requirements, as you note: > this is for Opaque copies, such as printed on paper or even the > apocryphal and much-whinged-about coffee cup. for Transparent copies, > it doesn't matter - even the most pedantic whinger is going to find it > hard to credibly claim that having to include some extra files in the > document or in an appropriate directory is a huge inconvenience. it's > not. quit yer whining and find something useful to do. A doc string in a GPL'd program is hardly irrelevant; or a reference card, or, for example, use in another manual. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
Yavor Doganov <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > This is not a proper example. Non-modifiability of secondary.c may > obstruct further improvements of the program. This is not the case > with the invariant sections, which do not prevent the manual to be > enhanced. Sometimes an enhancement requires removing invariant sections. For example, if you want to turn the manual into a reference card. Sometimes an enhancement requires rewriting invariant sections. For example, to correct factual mistakes or express more correct opinions. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 07:10:07PM +0200, Yavor Doganov wrote: > On Mon, 06 Feb 2006 16:37:20 +0100, Frank Küster wrote: > > > "Zephaniah E. Hull" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > >> So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can > >> do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright > >> statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, > >> not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. > >> > >> Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in > >> either. > >> > >> Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because > >> it's not even close. > > > > s/main.c/secondary.c/, but that doesn't change the argument, only the > > name, actually. Which is part of GFDL's problem. > > This is not a proper example. Non-modifiability of secondary.c may > obstruct further improvements of the program. This is not the case > with the invariant sections, which do not prevent the manual to be > enhanced. Like the following example: > > #!/usr/bin/make -f > # debian/rules file - for debian/keyring > # Based on sample debian/rules file - for GNU Hello (1.3). > # Copyright 1994,1995 by Ian Jackson. > # Copyright 1998-2003 James Troup > # I hereby give you perpetual unlimited permission to copy, > # modify and relicense this file, provided that you do not remove > # my name from the file itself. (I assert my moral right of > # paternity under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.) > # This file may have to be extensively modified > > Is it free? I am sure it is. > Imagine that it contained "...provided that you do not remove my name > from the file and the statement `Dominación mundial de Debian'"; what > would happen then? You would be still allowed to make whatever > modifications you want to your debian/rules, but it will contain a > personal statement -- no problem at all (except some inconvenience). To my knowledge your name on the copyright statement can not be legally removed with or without the statement in the copyright notice, you can be sued for doing so even if the license makes no mention of it. That makes it an invalid argument. If you add the statement in question, then yes, it _does_ become non-free. Simply because it is only a matter of degrees between that one statement, and a line of code. In addition, Debian has already modified core documents to state that we DO NOT CARE if it is documentation, sound files, picture files, code, or letters to your mother. We consider them to all be equal in the needs for freedom for them to go into main. > As for Zephaniah's first example: if you have to remove everything, > you obviously don't need this documentation and it would be much > better to write a new manual from scratch. Thus you can avoid the > invariant sections. Yes, it would be _better_ to write a new manual from scratch, but that does not change the fact that if you reduce the document to the invariant section the result is a completely non-free document. We will not ship a program with non-free image data. We will not ship a program which is mostly DFSG free but which has one or two C files under a non-free license. The same standard MUST apply to documentation, a document with sections which are non-free should not be shipped in main. If you can give a single example that's not a license file or copyright statement of a program, in main, that has components which you are forbidden to remove or modify, you might convince me, but to my knowledge there are none. And we have declared that a piece of documentation is to be held to the same standard as software. You might believe that we _should_ allow non-modifiable works as long as they don't impact the functionality of the program or document, but that has not been our stance. We don't let people ship hardware in main with non-free images, this has come up. Only in this case we are not allowed to ship only the free components, we can't remove the non-free sections of a GFDL document, and so we have no choice but to not ship it in main. Again, this might or might not be what we _should_ do, but it's too late to change our minds, we already stated that documentation is to be hold to the same standard as software, if you don't like that, then propose an amendment to the DFSG or social contract that says that we only care about sections that impact functionality, and the rest can be non-free. Good luck getting it in, but that's what you're trying to state now, and I firmly believe that the DFSG and the social contract disagree with that point of view at this time. Manoj can correct me if he believe that my reading of them is incorrect. Zephaniah E. Hull. -- 1024D/E65A7801 Zephaniah E. Hull <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 92ED 94E4 B1E6 3624 226D 5727 4453 008B E65A 7801 CCs of replies from mailing lists are requested. If I have trouble installing Linux, something is wrong. Very wron
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 09:49:51AM -0500, Zephaniah E. Hull wrote: > On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 11:31:38AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote: > > i challenge any of you zealots to come up with a REAL WORLD, PRACTICAL > > proof that the GFDL is non-free (and i mean actually non-free, not > > merely inconvenient. the DFSG does not require convenience, only > > freedom). > > Alright, I'm going to give another example here, hopefully this one will > get through to you. it was even lamer than the lastand wasn't even about the GFDL, it was about some stupid hypothetical non-free license you made up yourself. > Now, remember, we have _already had_ the GR that states that as far as > the DFSG goes we don't give a damn if it's documentation or software. > > So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can > do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright > statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, > not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. > > Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in > either. this is not the GFDL. it's not even close to the GFDL. we're talking about the GFDL, not your hypothetical non-free license. > Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because > it's not even close. of course it's not free. it specifically says you can't modify (part of) the code...in GFDL terms, primary topic of the work. > And we have ALREADY decided that we don't give a damn if it's software > or documentation, the fact that it's a 'secondary' section makes not > one damn bit of difference, it's still non-free. your bogus license says you can't change main.c - that is NOT a secondary section. even if it was a relatively unimportant bit of the code, it WOULD NOT AND COULD NOT be a secondary section. 1. if you're going to try for an analogy, at least make it match. 2. read what the GFDL actually says and stop trying to pretend that a secondary section can be any part of the document - the definition is very precise, and very restrictive: A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter section of the Document that deals exclusively with the ~~ relationship of the publishers or authors of the Document to the Document's overall subject (or to related matters) and contains ~~~ nothing that could fall directly within that overall subject. ~ (For example, if the Document is in part a textbook of mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any mathematics.) The relationship could be a matter of historical connection with the subject or with related matters, or of legal, commercial, philosophical, ethical or political position regarding them. > > > At that point, it is the entirety of the document, it is more then > > > one or two lines of text, it is _not_ a copyright statement or > > > license which is covered by law instead of the license. > > > > neither of these things are actually covered by law - there is no > > specific law that states "you may not delete or alter copyright > > notices or licenses". these things are just implicit convention. > > I'm pretty sure that if you asked a lawyer what would happen were you > to make drastic changes to the license file on a project that wasn't > yours and removed the copyright notices that he'd tell you that it > was likely to get you in a whole lot of trouble when they sue you for > doing so. that's because copyright law prohibits you from making ANY changes at all. it is only the license in a free software license that allows that. there's still no specific law that prevents changing license text or copyright notices, so stop pretending there is. so, when a free license grants the right to modify, unless it explicitly prohibits modifying the license itself or the copyright notices, then it is only politeness and convention that prevent anyone from doing that. which is why most of them DO, in fact, prohibit changing the license or taking credit for the original authors' work. > > > Now, it is still under the GNU FDL, there is still content here, > > > the content, which is now the _entirety_ of the document, is > > > something that by the license I can not remove and can not change. > > > > yes, what's left are the invariant sections. by definition, > > unchangeable. you have such mastery of the obvious. > > What's left is main.c, an invariant section, by definition > unchangeable. no, stupid. main.c is not, and can not be an invariant section. > > more importantly, you are making the mistake of assuming that because > > you deleted the contents, the *real* primary topic of the document, > > that the secondary s
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 04:37:20PM +0100, Frank K?ster wrote: > "Zephaniah E. Hull" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can > > do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright > > statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, > > not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. > > s/main.c/secondary.c/, but that doesn't change the argument, only the > name, actually. Which is part of GFDL's problem. no, code in a program could never be a secondary section. it is inherently the "primary topic" of the work - which automatically excludes it from being secondary. craig -- craig sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (part time cyborg) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
On Sun, Feb 05, 2006 at 09:14:12PM -0600, Richard Darst wrote: > On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 11:31:38AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote: > > [the topic is invariant sections] > > > i challenge any of you zealots to come up with a REAL WORLD, PRACTICAL > > proof that the GFDL is non-free (and i mean actually non-free, not > > merely inconvenient. the DFSG does not require convenience, only > > freedom). > > 1) > > A while back, someone quoted Richard Stallman (not that it's happened > just once). If that was in anything GFDLed with large invariant > sections, as philosophical things tend to be, the quote wouldn't have > been used, since it would make the message too long. Also, the kind > of quotes relevant to this discussion would be in invariant sections, > only making things more complicated. bullshit. fair use allows quoting for purposes of review or comment. a significantly larger work would simply have to include the invariant section(s). that might be inconvenient, but freedom does not require convenience. > 2) > > If someone wanted to create a work discussing this GFDL-debate, and > everyone's work was GFDLed with invariant sections, could they? > Undoubtedly a lot of what is relevant would be in invariant sections. > Would you want to try to write something under those conditions? > Invariant stuff places an unworkable restriction beyond the author > exercising due care to cite everything properly. yes, of course they could. they'd just have to include all of the invariant sections. that might be a complete pain in the arse, but that's a convenience issue, not a freedom issue. > > proof that the GFDL is non-free (and i mean actually non-free, not > > merely inconvenient. the DFSG does not require convenience, only > > freedom). > > "Everything is free, if you give up enough freedoms". convenience is not required by freedom. in fact, freedom is often inconvenient. score so far: 1 bullshit argument, 2 confusings of convenience for freedom. craig -- craig sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (part time cyborg) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
Craig Sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> no, code in a program could never be a secondary section. it is
> inherently the "primary topic" of the work - which automatically
> excludes it from being secondary.
It seems to me that this cannot quite be right, at least, not in the
way craig intends it.
If we say that the code (*all* the code, no matter what it does) is
the primary topic of a program, then surely it should follow that the
text (*all* the text, no matter what it says) is the primary text of a
document.
In other words, the primary/secondary distinction is designed to
distinguish on the basis of topic within a document, and works with a
background notion of the purpose or primary intention of a document.
So the emacs manual has a purpose and primary intention of documenting
the behavior and use of the emacs program; the GNU Manifesto bundled
with it has a very different purpose and intention, and this is part
of what is meant when it is called secondary.
Similarly, the code that prints the GNU Project message when you start
emacs up ("For information about the GNU Project and its goals, type
C-h C-p.") is not part of the purpose or primary intention of emacs.
It has a different purpose and intention: to advertise the GNU Project
to the users of emacs.
Now, someone might say that this snippet of code in Emacs is
functional, and since it is the nature of a program to be functional,
it follows that everything functional *is* by definition, primary,
then we are no longer using primary to refer to purposes and
intentions. And it is then perfectly fair to point out that it is the
nature of a document to communicate, and say that everything
communicative is, by definition, primary with in it.
That is, what is the notion of "primary" being used here? If it is
with reference to the intentions and purposes of the creator, then it
seems to me that both programs and documents can have secondary
material. If it instead refers to what the thing actually is in
itself, with reference to the nature of the kind of work in question
(documentation, which communicates, or programs, which function), then
both programs and documents are all inherently primary.
Thomas
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Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 10:40:38AM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > Yavor Doganov <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > > This is not a proper example. Non-modifiability of secondary.c may > > obstruct further improvements of the program. This is not the case > > with the invariant sections, which do not prevent the manual to be > > enhanced. > > Sometimes an enhancement requires removing invariant sections. For > example, if you want to turn the manual into a reference card. so make your reference card and include a link to the FSF's site for the full documentation. one link hardly even qualifies as inconvenient. even if you couldn't include a link and had to include the entire invariant section, you're still only talking about a convenience issue NOT A FREEDOM ISSUE. > Sometimes an enhancement requires rewriting invariant sections. For > example, to correct factual mistakes or express more correct opinions. no, you do not put words in other people's mouths. you add your "corrections" and make it clear that they are YOURS and not the original author's. craig -- craig sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (part time cyborg) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 03:17:03PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > Craig Sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > > no, code in a program could never be a secondary section. it is > > inherently the "primary topic" of the work - which automatically > > excludes it from being secondary. > > It seems to me that this cannot quite be right, at least, not in the > way craig intends it. you are wrong, and your tortured attempt at a tautology is bogus. craig -- craig sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (part time cyborg) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Anton's amendment
Alright cas, I've tried to be nice and polite. You've been throwing insults. So get this through your fucking skull, I don't care if it's made of pure neutronium or of bogons, or even some mixture. The Debian Project has declared that we will be 100% free. Period. End of declaration. We do NOT state that we will be free except for 'other boring crap', we do not state that we will be free except for 'secondary sections'. We state we will be 100% free. It DOES NOT FUCKING MATTER if it is the entire program, a itty bitty secondary section, a .c file, or a text file that the license says you must distribute with the binaries but which contains a statement and which nothing else even references. We say 100% free, my example is valid BECAUSE WE CONSIDER IT ALL TO BE THE _SAME_. Get it through your head and actually think about it for five minutes. Hell, for 5 seconds. Read what the Debian project has ALREADY DECIDED on the matter, then give us a reason why a 'secondary section' is somehow special and should be exempt from the DFSG. On Tue, Feb 07, 2006 at 10:03:26AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote: > On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 09:49:51AM -0500, Zephaniah E. Hull wrote: > > On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 11:31:38AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote: > > > i challenge any of you zealots to come up with a REAL WORLD, PRACTICAL > > > proof that the GFDL is non-free (and i mean actually non-free, not > > > merely inconvenient. the DFSG does not require convenience, only > > > freedom). > > > > Alright, I'm going to give another example here, hopefully this one will > > get through to you. > > it was even lamer than the lastand wasn't even about the GFDL, it was > about some stupid hypothetical non-free license you made up yourself. > > > > Now, remember, we have _already had_ the GR that states that as far as > > the DFSG goes we don't give a damn if it's documentation or software. > > > > So, I write a program, nice, big, with a license that says that you can > > do anything you want with it as long as you keep the copyright > > statements attached and don't make any changes at all to main.c, none, > > not for bug fixing, not for feature changes, none at all. > > > > Oh, and you are not allowed to delete it or keep it from being linked in > > either. > > this is not the GFDL. it's not even close to the GFDL. we're talking > about the GFDL, not your hypothetical non-free license. > > > Would you consider this license free? If so, you're an idiot because > > it's not even close. > > of course it's not free. it specifically says you can't modify (part of) > the code...in GFDL terms, primary topic of the work. > > > And we have ALREADY decided that we don't give a damn if it's software > > or documentation, the fact that it's a 'secondary' section makes not > > one damn bit of difference, it's still non-free. > > your bogus license says you can't change main.c - that is NOT a > secondary section. even if it was a relatively unimportant bit of the > code, it WOULD NOT AND COULD NOT be a secondary section. > > 1. if you're going to try for an analogy, at least make it match. > > 2. read what the GFDL actually says and stop trying to pretend that a > secondary section can be any part of the document - the definition is > very precise, and very restrictive: > > A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter > section of the Document that deals exclusively with the > ~~ > relationship of the publishers or authors of the Document to the > > Document's overall subject (or to related matters) and contains > ~~~ > nothing that could fall directly within that overall subject. > ~ > (For example, if the Document is in part a textbook of > mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any mathematics.) > The relationship could be a matter of historical connection with > the subject or with related matters, or of legal, commercial, > philosophical, ethical or political position regarding them. > > > > > > At that point, it is the entirety of the document, it is more then > > > > one or two lines of text, it is _not_ a copyright statement or > > > > license which is covered by law instead of the license. > > > > > > neither of these things are actually covered by law - there is no > > > specific law that states "you may not delete or alter copyright > > > notices or licenses". these things are just implicit convention. > > > > I'm pretty sure that if you asked a lawyer what would happen were you > > to make drastic changes to the license file on a project that wasn't > > yours and removed the copyright notices that he'd tell you that it > > was likely to get you in a whole lot of trouble when they sue you
Re: Anton's amendment
On Mon, Feb 06, 2006 at 07:06:50PM -0500, Zephaniah E. Hull wrote: > Alright cas, I've tried to be nice and polite. no, you've tried to be stupid and disingenuous. and succeeded spectacularly at the former. too bad you're not smart enough to lie convincingly. > You've been throwing insults. only where appropriate. and far less than your idiocy deserves. > So get this through your fucking skull, I don't care if it's made of > pure neutronium or of bogons, or even some mixture. so fucking what? you say that as if it's relevant - GFDL is free, so it's NOT RELEVANT. > The Debian Project has declared that we will be 100% free. Period. End > of declaration. apart from declaring your mastery of the bleeding obvious, what exactly is your "point"? > It DOES NOT FUCKING MATTER if it is the entire program, a itty bitty > secondary section, a .c file, or a text file that the license says you > must distribute with the binaries but which contains a statement and > which nothing else even references. then toss out all GPL programs, and pretty nearly everything except public domain and BSD-licensed works - because they ALL have restrictions on modifications which are similar to those in the GFDL. > Get it through your head and actually think about it for five minutes. > > Hell, for 5 seconds. unlike you, i actually HAVE thought about it. my conclusion is based on evidence, reasoning and logic. yours appears to be based on moronic dogma. > Read what the Debian project has ALREADY DECIDED on the matter, then > give us a reason why a 'secondary section' is somehow special and should > be exempt from the DFSG. 1. frankly, i don't give a fuck what a vote says - my thoughts are not determined by what the majority says, i make up my own mind. if i didn't, i'd have used Microsoft crap like all the rest of the sheep. similarly, voting doesn't change reality. a billion people could vote that the earth is flat but it wouldn't make it so. 2. even aside from that, debian has not yet decided whether the GFDL is non-free or not. that's what this whole stupid fucking argument is all about. or did you somehow forget what you were supposed to be arguing about? face it, you're a moron and shouldn't be wasting the time of your betters with your facile attempts at debate. your arguments are lame, your examples are cretinous, and your "analogies" are just fucking absurd. go find something more suited to your "talents". crayons, perhaps. craig -- craig sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (part time cyborg) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
