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GNU Releases Free Documentation License
Bananenrepublik writes "The GNU Project has released the GNU Free Documentation License. It is meant 'to assure everyone the effective freedom to copy and redistribute it [the documentation], with or without modifying it, either commercially or noncommercially.'"
First thoughts: Excellent stuff! I'm glad to have "the GPL of document processing" nicely laid out. ;) Roll on w3c and the DOM and any other transparent document models!
I also approve muchly of "Opaque formats include PostScript, PDF, proprietary formats that can be read and edited only by proprietary word processors, SGML or XML for which the DTD and/or processing tools are not generally available, and the machine-generated HTML produced by some word processors for output purposes only." I'm not convinced about some of the layout specs ("first page", "title page", "adjacent pages" - can't we have a one-paragraph "this is GDL'd" with pointer to appendix Z?) It also needs to define "compilation copyright" - what is it? Is it Yet Another American thing? (I thought that around these parts, anything you "write" was automatically copyrighted... confusing.) If the GPL is but one open-source license for software, is there an "open-source" definition for documents? (How much is www.transparent-source.org going for?
~Tim
--
Rushing on down to the circle of the turn
RMS just wrote in to say that there has been a few minor last-minute corrections to the license. I'm sorry that I do not have any more details at the moment, but please do not use this license just yet.
Is it just me, or does the Opaque/Transparent
distinction seem too vague to be enforcable?
The portion indicating that HTML is sometimes
but not always opaque seems the best example of
this, but overall the distinction seems to be
problematic.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Here is the problem.
A publisher like O'Reilly produces technical manuals, under the license an author chooses. If a would-be author (who is about to do a lot of work) wants advice on licenses, O'Reilly is stuck between a rock and a hard place, they want to support open source, but they have to admit that the author will probably make more if it is not an open source license on the book. For some reason people like writing software but find documentation a chore.
However what seems to work very well is if O'Reilly can work with the author to produce both a book and connected documentation. An example is Programming Perl where the online documentation started life as the book rearranged (and without the bad jokes). If the online documentation is exactly the book, people act as if the book is a cheap rip-off. If there is a clear division, then they don't.
But if you do the above, the online documentation gets maintained and the dead tree version does not. At some point you need to re-synch. But what pair of licenses allows that?
Personally I think that it would be good to create some sort of arrangement where the exact text and arrangement of a document may or may not be free, but it and all its derivatives must allow the technical information in them to be free to use in any other document using either of the pair of licenses. IOW O'Reilly or anyone else can come out with clearly differentiated books, but the information contained in such has to be available as free documentation.
But the devil is in the details...
Cheers,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
I've speed read the whole deal and find it seems to be lacking some key stuff:
1. Excerpts. What if a print magazine is doing an article on Widgets, and wants to quote two paragraphs from the GDL'd Widgets Manual. Is it possible? Does the Magazine have to GDL itself? GDL that article? Since the magazine has a circulation of >100 does that have an impact?
2. Private use. Some guy wants to take a whole GDL document, modify it with his comments and give it to the 115 people in his lecture class. Does he also have to give them floppies since the distribution is > 100?
3. Inclusions. Some guy is writing a GDL'd document and wants to include a longish section of a non-GDL'd document. Is this illegal, as it would be with code under GPL? Suppose I want to quote a large chunk of text that is genuinely public domain. Does the license now infect that text in other places?
I was never a massive fan of GPL, although it has its uses. I think GDL will have its uses too, but it is a minority license suitable only for a certain set of technical documentation.
-----
You give the documentation away, and you make money by...? By what? Support of the documentation? That is, you get paid for adapting, modifying, and or re-writing the documentation? I don't think this works.
I'd really like to see the incentive model for writing free documentation. Programmers do free software for fun and fame. That's their compensation. Writing documentation, however, is not fun, and also doesn't give one any brownie points in the community. Writing documentation is just plain hard work. What's the compensation for that work?
Also, book writing (even large books) is still a one-person show (as opposite to software writing). And if the book you write is good, you can easily make some money out of it. So what is the incentive to give it away? You get credit for software by the community. As a documentation writer, no one even remembers your name in the community. So going to a traditional publisher seems a more natural way for one, in terms of money, as well as fame. And if you don't trust traditional publishers (or don't find one), you can still publish your work yourself.
Including public domain text should be safe, but I'm not sure about other licenses. It would be ironic if you could not include GPL'ed code (beyond fair use) in a GDL'ed manual.
From: Richard Stallman
Subject: doc license
To: webmasters
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 02:17:51 -0700 (MST)
Please do not put up the doc license yet.
A few last minute details have come up.
Ditto for object files, executable files, etc., though not quite as much generally.
But, in theory, a Linux i386 executable can be created that, aside from some initialization code, looks as much like plaintext in expressing the program's logic (e.g. it could be Java code) as can similar PostScript code with similar initialization code.
If you're looking for a 100% reliable way to automatically determine whether a particular form is "opaque" vs. "transparent", you'll no more find it than you'll find one that distinguishes between "source code" a la the GPL and the alternatives.
That sort of thing is left up to humans to assess, in courts of law, for legal issues like this.
Practice random senselessness and act kind of beautiful.
The other problem is that there are all sorts of possible pathological cases.
For instance, Postscript is described as an "Opaque" format, but supposing someone follows the dictums of TINYDICT, and writes their documents in raw Postscript, then despite the fact that Postscript is usually considered "Opaque," it is, in fact, the "Transparent" form.
That's probably the most pathological (and perverse-sounding) case, and is one that I brought up in some discussions on the license last year.
HTML is a necessarily ambiguous form.
In such a case, HTML is the "most transparent form available."
In practice, I don't think this will be a big problem. After all, am I likely to sue someone for releasing "freely," under the "GDL," some documentation in a form that I don't much like? I think not...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Well, I just had my first documentation book published (not counting inhouse software manuals), the Samba Administrator's Handbook, ISBN 0-7645-4636-8) so I thought I'd make a few comments from an author's viewpoint.
I'd really like to see the incentive model for writing free documentation. Programmers do free software for fun and fame. That's their compensation. Writing documentation, however, is not fun, and also doesn't give one any brownie points in the community. Writing documentation is just plain hard work. What's the compensation for that work?
Writing is work, boring and tedious, I spent a lot of nights writing when I'd have rather been snuggling with my honey, playing with daughter, building Lego, surfing the web or even configuring my Linux boxes.
I don't think I've gotten any brownie points in the community, though the 5 star review on Amazon was nice. I haven't gotten any book related email either, and I'm not hard to track down (the joy of having a unique last name).
Financially I've done alright though, the advance helped me buy my house.
Also, book writing (even large books) is still a one-person show (as opposite to software writing).
Or a two or three person show, but I get your gist. You don't have 20 member teams writing books.
And if the book you write is good, you can easily make some money out of it. So what is the incentive to give it away? You get credit for software by the community. As a documentation writer, no one even remembers your name in the community. So going to a traditional publisher seems a more natural way for one, in terms of money, as well as fame. And if you don't trust traditional publishers (or don't find one), you can still publish your work yourself.
I could publish any book myself I wanted to, but the printing costs would probably astronomical (unless I used the production printers at work), the distribution costs would be astronomical, and forget getting my books to a brick and mortar bookstore, at the moment, if you want a wide audience for a dead tree book, you probably need to work with a publisher.
Once you do work with a publisher, you can't just write any book you want to. You need to sell your concept to them, submit sample chapters, compromise on what they want to publish, it becomes more of a collaborative effort than one person blindly dumping 400 pages of Word files to the publisher.
It was an interesting time, certainly an ego trip to see my name on Amazon, but I don't think I would do it again for free, the non-financial rewards wouldn't justify all the time and effort.
George
The main problem with GPL'ed software in general is the question "how can I make a living writing free software." Companies like Red Hat, Caldera, and the rest of the Linux start-ups answer this question by providing technical support for a fee. However, not all programs lend themselves to this economic model. While it may be appropriate for complex software like operating systems and server programs, it is not nearly as feasable for desktop applications -- particuarly if they are very intuitive and user-friendly. A program that's easy to use won't need much in terms of tech support.
Besides providing support services, historically the only other significant way open-source programmers have been able to support themselves directly is to write & sell books. (ESR and Larry Wall spring to mind as examples of this model of compensation).
As a programmer, I'd hate to think that after putting hundreds or thousands of hours of my time into writing an open-source program, the only way I could make any money would be thru banner ads and selling tee shirts and stuffed toys. If I wanted to sell souvineers for a living, I wouln't have busted my ass getting an engineering degree. When you pour your blood, sweat, and tears into somthing, you deserve to be rewarded for your effort. If ego gratification is enough of a reward for you, that's fine; but remember that even the most altrustic programmer still needs to provide for himself and his family.
The problem with the free documentation licence is , like the GPL, it has a "viral" nature. Let's suppose I write program foo and release it under the GPL, then release a basic user's manual under the FDL. Because of the viral nature of the FDL, I could not then go write a book (foo In A Nutshell) that expands on the FDL'ed documentation. Strictly interpreted, even quoting a single line of FDL'ed text could render the entire new document FDL'ed. Even paraphrasing the original text might not be enough to get it out from under the FDL, given the translation clause.
Look at the Declaration of Independence : because it's in the public domain, anyone can publish a copy of the DoI without restriction. However, if I take the DoI and intersperse it with a line-by-line analysis of what it means, this derivitive work is fully copyrightable. However, if I did the same thing with a FDL'ed document, I would have to give up all rights to the new work, regardless of if I wanted to or not. I should have the freedom to decide how to assign my intellectual property rights.
Tim O'Reilly has done some great things for the open-source community, has made a good bit of money doing it, and has helped many open-source programmers, and has given a lot back to the community. But even a publisher as open-minded at O'Riley & Assc. would have to think twice about publishing a book that could be copied & resold by anyone.
"The axiom 'An honest man has nothing to fear from the police'
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?