New Scientist Tries Out Copyleft

uchian writes: "New Scientist has an article about The GPL, open source, and how attempts are being made to apply the philosopy to areas other than software. Little new ground is covered, but it is interesting that the article itself is "Copyleft", so you are free to redistribute, modify and copy as long as long as your derivative work is also copyleft."

Comments

Open Company

[webword]

About 2 years ago I wrote The Open Company Manifesto. (Sorry for the self promotion, but it is related to this posting.)

Re:Open Company

[shomon2]

I find that Ricardo Semler, author of Maverick (you can read about him a bit here) has applied already some of these principles in his Brazillian company, Semco.

I think that rather than manifestoes, you need to be the right guy in the right place to make this kind of thing work: in the end, sharing information and power is a natural thing, and closing those things and aggressively protecting them are just animalistic tendencies that can't stand up to their more peaceful alternative.

Proof of this is that Semco survived the terrible 80s inflation in Brazil, simply through the advantage that everyone in the company actually was enthusiastic about the company and was 100% committed to it's survival. You don't need reams of management theory to do this, just a bit of common sense.

Ale

GNUArt !!!

[mirko]

The problems with open music, however, haven't put people off trying open source methods elsewhere.

They actually forgot to mention GNUArt which is my attempt to apply the GNU General Public License to Art.

We also opened a Gallery which we slowly fill with whatever quality stuff (mostly music and photographs but, hey, the one who criticize are supposed to help too ;-) we get from unselfish artists.

That's it, hope it'll raise some interest.

Re:Legal Protection

[RazzleFrog]

They seem to define copyleft as "We have a copyright but we are waiving it so that it can be redistributed".

In their words - "We haven't given up our copyright on this article, but we have agreed to waive many of the exclusive rights a copyright normally bestows."

So if you abuse their copyleft notion then you will find out that they do still have a legal copyright.

I personally think that copyleft is silly. It should be copyfree but I guess that isn't as catchy as copyleft.

Re:Legal Protection

[b_pretender]

We better be careful of WHO modifies the story...

<snip>

Stallman's move DID NOT resonate round the computer science community and now there are NOT thousands of similar projects. The star of the movement is NOT Linux, RATHER WINDOWS XP, an operating system created by MIT student BILL GATES in the early 1990s and installed on around 180,000 million computers worldwide.

What sets open source software apart from commercial software is the fact that it HAS A VIRAL NATURE, in both the political and the economic sense. If you want to use a commercial product such as Windows XP you WILL BE HAPPY FOREVER. But if you want to run Linux or another open source package, you can do so without paying a penny--although IT WILL BE EQUIVALENT TO SUPPORTING THE COMMUNIST PARTY.
</snip>

Re:Legal Protection

[JanneM]

Neither GPL or copyleft are copyright free. Instead they leverage the power of copyright to function. If GPL were turned down in court, say, it would mean all GPL code reverts with full copyright to the original copyright owner. It would not mean the stuff would become free, quite the opposite. Their copyleft definition mirrors GPL very well, and 'copyfree' would have very wrong connotations.

/Janne

Re:Wow... News for nerds

[moonbender]

New Scientist is not "some dumbfuck magazine", it's a respected and well-founded source quoted and linked to regularily on Slashdot. It's not like articled on the GPL are abundant in the prominent non-IT press, especially not ones considering wider effects of copyleft.
Incidently, German c't (computer mag, as you might know) ran a similar, long article in one of their past issues, describing how the open source could affect other parts of the social and economic world.

New Scientist not always good guys

[Charles Dodgeson]

I wonder when they will do a piece on spamming. They have been engaging in opt-out spam of UK Universities. It's even been taken up by JANET CERT. Here is an excerpt from a posting from a JANET CERT member

I reported to New Scientist that there had been unfavourable responses to their bulk mailing activity. They have asked if I can tell them particular sites where there were many complaints and they will consider dropping those en masse from their mailing list.

Sorry I can't find any publically accessible archive of the discussion on the UK mail managers' list.

"open source" cola-- whatever.

[NoInfo]

From opencola's formula page

An important note: this is *not* the recipe for "OpenCola" -- that is, the canned beverage from OpenCola that you may have received at a trade show, or other venue or outlet. Making canned cola requires millions of dollars in abstruse gear and manufacturing gizmos. It's easier to make nerve gas than manufacture cola. This is a kitchen-sink recipe that you can make all on your own. It is *our* kitchen-sink recipe. We figured it out somewhere between coding the COLA SDK and debugging the Linux build of the clerver.

Copyright vs Copy Left

[Alien54]

Actually. I would not mind the law being changed to state that Copyright would gracefully change into Copy Left after a certain respectable period of time, with appropriiate penalties for alteration and lack of attribution, or false attribution, etc.

Also, I wonder about grandfathering older works into changes in copyright law, but I can see both sides of this one.

Re:Copyright vs Copy Left

[Rogerborg]

• I would not mind the law being changed to state that Copyright would gracefully change into Copy Left after a certain respectable period of time, with appropriate penalties for alteration and lack of attribution, or false attribution, etc.

It's a noble idea, but you really need to go and have a careful read about what copyleft is. The most important thing about copyleft is that it is fully copyrighted. Everything else depends on that. If it's not copyrighted, you can't enforce the rest of the terms, which allow very specific exceptions to the copyright.

For copyrighted work to change into copyleft, you have to add license terms. There is, in fact, nothing to stop any copy right holder adding copyleft terms to any existing copyright work. Copyleft adds rights.

What would be a problem is enforcing it on all copyrighted works in general, because that punishes rights holders. To enforce the copyleft, you'd have to keep the sanctity of copyright, while adding a whole new set of mandatory licensing terms. We could do it with a determined enough political will, but it'd be a hard one to explain to your average Jane Voter or Joe Politico, let alone Karl Corporate, who would vomit blood at the very thought of having any of his precious rights diluted one second before the final expiry.

I do honestly think that we're better of just having copyright expire after a fixed term and having the work enter the public domain. We'd be better off campaiging for our current Disney whoring politicians to stop extending copyright time limits than to try for a hard to understand, hard to enforce compromise.

Things other than software?

[s20451]

Does the idea of copyleft make sense for things other than software? I'm thinking of the phrase: "Redistribute, copy, and modify, so long as your derivative work is also copyleft." If, for example, research results are published under copyleft, would that mean that any subsequent work that cites the research would also have to be copyleft? If the research were used to create a device, would the device have to be copyleft? The broad definition of "derivative work" is making me somewhat uncomfortable ... I want my research to be used for any reason, anywhere, by anyone, without worrying about the implications for them.

Re:Things other than software?

[Diabolical]

It's not exactly necessary to use Copyleft. You can take all kinds of Open Source licenses. In your case for instance you could use the BSD style license... It allows others to do whatever they want without having to open source their work as long as they credit the original author/programmer/whatever...

The article is speaking mainly about Copyleft because that's more interesting to the writer.. Most articles/publications are copyrighted. This could become a problem if you want to publicize something based on that article because you would have to need the original authors consent. If articles are copylefted they can be used without having to ask for that consent provided that they give credit where credit is due.

It seems fair that the derivative article needs to be copylefted as well. After all, if they prohibit future derivative work they essentially rip off the original author of his brainchild. By using his work they are morally obliged to use the same kind of license.

Re:Things other than software?

[s20451]

It seems fair that the derivative article needs to be copylefted as well.

It seems fair, but it also seems like this would exert an undue influence on future research. If I do work based on an article, I will give citations where necessary (as is required in scientific publishing), but my work is my own, and I want to be able to distribute it however I please. I'm concerned that researchers might copyleft their work, which would force me to copyleft my work if I cite them, or use their ideas ... and because my work is copyleft, subsequent works have to be copyleft, and so on, until the ultimate research is only tangentially related to the original, but still carries the same copyleft. I would probably refuse to go along with such a scheme.

Re:Things other than software?

[Wateshay]

The GPL works with software because you have very few rights as it is to modify and redistribute the software. By granting you some extra rights (namely to freely copy and modify), the GPL can ask for you to give something back in return. If you don't want to give back, then you don't get to modify.

On the other hand, there are well-established fair use rights in published materials which you have regardless of whether the author specifically grants them to you. Since it is already legal for you to cite the work or create a device based on the work, the author has no legal basis from which to require you to do anything you don't want with your own work. Conversely, since you don't have the right to modify and redistribute the author's work, he/she can ask something further from you.

The biggest issue I have with copyleft of written materials is that I don't really think many of the same needs apply. I can see how a GPL'd piece of documentation might possibly be useful, since it could be helpful to have a large number of people working on the documentation. As far as other types of writing goes, though, I personally would not want someone else to have the right to take what I said and distort those words to their own use. Of course, that's just my opinion and other individuals are free to copyleft their written works as they like.

Re:Things other than software?

[Rogerborg]

• If, for example, research results are published under copyleft, would that mean that any subsequent work that cites the research would also have to be copyleft? [...] I want my research to be used for any reason, anywhere, by anyone, without worrying about the implications for them.

Copyleft is a bad word to use. It's too vague and open to misinterpretation. If we're talking specifically about the GPL, then yes, that's exactly what it means.

The GPL is an extremely powerful tool. Like most tools, it can hurt the ignorant. I have seen professional software developers sneaking GPL code in closed source projects, then looking at me with hurt puppy dog expressions when I tear into them for trying to steal other people's copyrighted work. "But it's free!" they explain, never having actually read (or understood) the GPL.

The GPL means exactly what it says. Copyleft, free beer, free speech, all of those are irrelevant buzzwords. It says, and it means:

This work is copyrighted. It belongs to the people that wrote it. You can't copy or use it [important pause ] unless you agree to follow these very strict restrictions on how you use it: provide source, do not remove this license, do not modify this license, apply this license to any derivative work including a much larger work that directly includes this work in any way.

Those are the cost of using GPL code. If the cost is too high, don't use it. Pay a different cost to source the information/code/text elsewhere.

In your case, if you find some GPL research that you want to build on, but without making your research GPL, then treat the GPL work as a fully copyrighted work. You can quote selectively from it using the existing fair use defence, put your nuts on the line, and release your work as an original non-GPL (and non-copyrighted, or explicitely "copy without restrictions" work) work. If you want to include the entire GPL work, then you can do that, if you pay the cost, which is to GPL your derivation. If the GPL work is by a single author, hey, feel free to approach them and negotiate for a version of their work without a GPL license, just as you'd do right now to obtain the right to make a substantial copy. The GPL gives you more options, not fewer.

It never fails to amaze me how many people are unaware of the implications of the GPL. Microsoft calls it viral, a cancer. Love it or loathe it, it's absolutely true. That's the point of it! Rejoice in that. You can't strip the GPL off a piece of work, but you can extend it to other works. The body of GPL licensed work will only grow, never shrink.

The only debate is whether that's a bad thing or a good thing. I view it as a good thing, because right now it's giving more options, and you can choose to use non-GPL sources. When we reach the point where there are no non-GPL sources, we might have to start thinking about how this impinges on a few very, very narrow issues, like national security (but not on protecting corporations). That's a long way off though. Until then, the GPL means what it says, and it says: "There's a cost to using this. Pay it, or find another way."

Re:Things other than software?

[Diabolical]

The only thing this would lead to is a more open form of science. At this moment science is more and more looking like a business. Companies that are claiming a patent on a cancer cell etc.. that kind of thing should be open sourced to enable research for cures.. If things like this keep closed and are only used for getting companies rich then there is something fundamentally wrong.

If your research is important to others, why not grant them the right to use your work to further their goals. As long as they abide by the fact that you grant them this right based on copyleft and have to copyleft their research as well..

It is of course YOUR choice to release your work under the copyleft. And if you use someone else's work that has been copylefted you know what the consquences are. You don't HAVE to use their work.. you can always try to find another way to come up with the same solution or information. I understand that you are required to give citations, but if the original author does not allow you to use his work.. what then?

I thought, and correct me if i'm wrong, that science was to benefit humanity as a whole, not just some parts of it... If you dicovered something that you only want to use for your own ends you rob the rest of the world of something that might enable them to conquer certain situations just because they could have come up with a solution based on something you published. Maybe even something you would have never thought of before.

It happens al too often that a medicine for some disease does not work as they wanted only to find out by accident that it does work for other things. This might have implications to other peoples lives. What if they did never find out by accident that a intended cure for the flu actually cures someone with ebola. The companie throws away their research without knowing it could probaly save thousands of lives.

Re:Things other than software?

[Rogerborg]

• If articles are copylefted they can be used without having to ask for that consent provided that they give credit where credit is due.

and they follow all other licence terms, e.g. for the GPL: provide source; do not remove or modify the GPL license; add the GPL license to any including or deriving works; and any other terms, no matter how minor.

I know it was probably just a slip, but it's exactly that kind of sloppiness that leads to me having to ream a developer once every few months for trying to sneak full GPL code into our closed source product because "It's OK, it's free, I kept the copyright notice and I was going to tell tech pubs to put a credit in the documentation."

Re:Things other than software?

[LMCBoy]

Citation and use of ideas don't constitute copyright infringement. You'd have nothing to worry about.

Re:Things other than software?

[Elbereth]

Make it public domain. I've always preferred public domain over any other "open source" license. If I wanted to put restrictions on something, I'd make it free for non-commercial use. Other than that, I can't imagine why I'd care someone was using my code. Well... unless it was being used to control ICMBs.

Re:Things other than software?

[fajoli]

Does the idea of copyleft make sense for things other than software?

Only in so far as there is value in copying beyond fair use.

Many people use copy machines to make copies of documents that under copyright laws they should not. From a liability perspective, a library would find value in using "copylefted" documents in these cases. Signs over copy machines reminding us not to make copies of copyrighted materials could instead suggest copying of "copylefted" materials is permitted.

Publishers of compilations, such as magazines or journals, might find some value in not having to purchase copyrights to material where the author is only interested in wide distribution. The "copyleft" would indicate the author's intentions with hopefully more legal weight than a disclaimer somewhere in the text.

Distributors of digital products such as cable companies and broadband provider's may find some value in a source of unencumbered content to provide to their customers.

"It's a Wonderful Life" is one of the few feature films that has entered the public domain. Its popularity can probably be attributed to the ability of broadcasters to show it without royalties.

The question might be what incentive, other than the aforementioned wide distribution, the author would see from copyleft?

Re:Things other than software?

[anthony_dipierro]

I will give citations where necessary (as is required in scientific publishing), but my work is my own, and I want to be able to distribute it however I please.

A properly written copyleft will still allow you to distribute your derivitive work as you please. What it won't allow is for you to sue others for infringing copyright on that derivitive work.

Re:Things other than software?

[anthony_dipierro]

Does the idea of copyleft make sense for things other than software?

Certainly. Imagine if Slashdot was copylefted, and required all submissions to be copylefted. Then anyone could take the writeups, images, posts, moderation results, etc. and create his/her own Slashdot. Maybe they'll make Anonymous Cowards get an automatic +2 bonus. Maybe they'll let you moderate the stories. Maybe they'll have their own moderation system. The possibilities are endless.

This message is licensed under the Qing Public License.

Re:Things other than software?

[WNight]

Would you particularly care about someone who wanted to use your research, but who didn't want to let you use their research?

Frankly I'd call them a freeloader.

That's why I release everything I write (as limited as the list is) under the GPL. You're perfectly welcome to take it and use it, hopefully someone new to programming can learn from it as I learned from open code (predating the GPL license, but not the mentality).

However if you want to take what I've done and then sell it as closed source you're cheating the customer. They're getting less, being charged more, and not rewarding the real author. The same feelings would apply if I were a scientist researching anti-cancer drugs, or anything else.

In other news :

[raindog151]

Today, the McDonalds corporation agreed to finally 'open source' the recipe for making their trademark Big Mac 'Special Sauce' in return for the marketing rights to 'Tux the Penguin' (a popular open source icon) toys in their childrens meals.

Just minutes after signing this groundbreaking deal, the McDonalds CEO Jack Greenberg ran through the conference hall wearing a pair of bikini briefs apparantly made of 100$ bills, screaming something about salad dressing and kraft singles. More details at 11.

I hereby

[hrieke]

Announce that my DNA is copyleft, from this day forward.
If any cute Geekgirl wishes to gain access to my DNA, please send a picture and an essay on the effects of GPL and the software industry and what effects this will have on humanity in whole.
Redheads with green eyes can skip the essay.
Thank you.

A Symbol to mark Open Content

[Beautyon]

Every article or image that is produced by copyright concious organizations is marked as being copyrighted, with the © and owners name.

Its high time that there was a unique, instantly recognisable symbol for everything that is released under one of the new copyright licences.

The article in question does not have a symbol to mark it as Open Content or Copyleft or Free Content. Unmarked articles are by default, copyrighted upon creation according to the Berne Convention, so if the article was not about copyleft content, one would immediately assume that it was copyrighted if you were to come across it. You would immediately refrain from using it for fear of being sued, and they could claim that it was not freed, because it is not marked as freed.

If this idea of freed content and the freed content itself are to spread, then all content released under these licences needs to be clearly marked as freed; as clearly as the IP that is traditionally copyrighted.

At this page we have created a set of graphic devices to solve this problem.

Using the old © inverted is about as inelegant a solution as you could dream up. It sends the wrong signals, that in some way, Open Content or Copyleft is "upside down", "wrong way around" or the polar opposite of Copyright, which it is not. Copyright is seen, almost universally, as A Good Thing®. The opposite of a good thing is a bad thing. The use of the inverted © conveys a kind of "upside down crucifix" vibe which is counterproductive.

The new symbol solves this problem, scales graphically for both print and web, and conveys the idea that the properties that it is attached to are licenced content.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[euphline]

Unfortunately, the (C) symbol is used because of specifications in the US Copyright law. (And possibly International?) "Copyleft" authors want the same protections of the copyright laws as copyright authors...

Copyleft authors just choose to openly license their work. If you give up the copyright, you can't keep others from taking your work, stealing it, and making it "closed source".

-jbn

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[Beautyon]

"...can be misinterpreted as two symbols"

Possibly. They were bound together in the container to unify them. The fact that the "O" is not immedately recognised of course will change if the symbol spreads everywhere.

Whatever symbol is eventually adopted, what is certain is that some graphic device has to be used to mark content as freed, otherwise, for reasons that I've stated, content that is not marked will not be freed, and in fact, can be possibly "revoked".

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[Rogerborg]

• Your symbol, especially the small versions, can be misinterpreted as two symbols. The first would be the O in a circle that I don't recognise. The 2nd is the © that is familiar. Therefore I would assume that this mean something new as well as traditional copyright instead of your intended 1 new thing

Um, look, that's exactly what copyleft is. First and foremost, it's copyright, completely and fully under traditional copyright laws. There are also licensing terms which allow very specific exemptions from copy restriction, as long as the costs are paid.

It makes complete sense to retain the © symbol in any copyleft document, as it helps to stop lazy or ignorant derivers ignoring your licensing terms and just passing copies around left right and centre, eventually making the work (illegally) public domain after a few copies. That doesn't help the copyleft cause at all.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[Beautyon]

Doh! You are absolutely correct.
We will change it over; this is important.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[pmc]

The article in question does not have a symbol to mark it as Open Content or Copyleft or Free Content.

Apart from the backward © symbol in what must be about 144pt type. (This is in the paper edition).

I'd suggest ©++ for copyleft symbol. And this is not an entirely facetious suggestion either - the © is commonly available (and so are +) (unlike your "oc" symbol), and it clues up people that there is something over and above the usual copyright going on.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[Pentagram]

Or maybe ©-- would be more appropriate, since it's a weakening of copyright.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[BluBrick]

This is a great idea, but your symbol, outside of the philosophy behind it, does not convey "openness". To my mind, the heavy bold outline enclosing the o and the c suggests restriction and lock in, which is probably not what you want to convey.

I would have suggested using a pair of open handswith their palms up, similar to the charades sign (sign language as well?) for a book. The open hands imply openness, of course, but also convey the impression of a gift, which is a much more positive idea.

As copylefted material is explicitly copyrighted as well, this symbol could still be used in conjunction with the traditional copyright symbol, and it would signify that there is more than just copyright to this work.

Just a thought.

Re:A Symbol to mark Open Content

[WNight]

"Wah, it's not free, I can't steal it!"

Works released under the GPL are completely free in all ways, except for allowing you to close-source them. Nobody really cares though because if you're the type to want to do that, you're not likely to be the type they care to help.

In part, you're right, the idea of the GPL is to spread the GPL. To reach a point where it's become so much easier to create new works based on the existing library of GPLed works (thus meaning that almost everything is copyrighted) that copyright law gets reformed to something that serves the people.

(BTW, part of the reason that few people buy software for Linux is because the bar is MUCH higher. Nobody will buy a half-assed compiler when GCC is free. Nobody will pay for someone's VB traceroute program when 'mtr' is free. If you want people to buy your software, offer someone better than what comes installed by default. (And better enough to warrant the money - MS Office may be nicer than Star Office 6, but not $600 nicer.))

Open source Tomato

[morie]

Once you look for it, it is everywhere!

I just spotted an open source tomato. Inside are little seeds, that contain all the code to construct the tomato yourself. You can do this, but you have to include the little seeds yourself as well. You can even modify it, but the seeds will have to be modified also!

The whole thing was produced by "Nature". It can be used in open source sandwiches, open source burgers etc. as well!

Re:Open source Tomato

[euphline]

Open source tomato, maybe... but open source CORN? No way. Many, many farmers now use "Roundup ready corn" that is patented by Monsanto. They are not allowed to save any of it for seed... and both they and the grain elevator that cleans it can be sued if they do. So, much of the country's corn is closed source.

-jbn

Re:Open source Tomato

[Alsee]

an open source tomato ... but you have to include the little seeds yourself as well.

No you don't.

-

GMO patents

[Hard_Code]

"I just spotted an open source tomato."

This is funny considering that the big agribusinesses are now "patenting" their genetically modified organisms, making them sterile, or otherwise forcing farmers and others to go to THEM for what would otherwise be in nature an "open source" organism. Hmm...maybe instead of "funny" I should have said "sickening".

CopyLEFT?

[Fesh]

Ok, I'll admit it's catchy. But how about copywrong? Or better yet, and more accurate, copyresponsibility?

Oh No!

[fireboy1919]

Not New Scientist!

Does that mean the GPL is impossible, too?

open cola actually closed

[lightray]

I thought that the "opencola" thing was pretty nifty... but it turns out, as you might expect, that it's just a PR stunt, although admittedly one for an open source supporting company. The source (recipe) they give does not generated the binaries (cola) they distribute. From the website:

An important note: this is *not* the recipe for "OpenCola" -- that is, the canned beverage from OpenCola that you may have received at a trade show, or other venue or outlet. Making canned cola requires millions of dollars in abstruse gear and manufacturing gizmos. It's easier to make nerve gas than manufacture cola. This is a kitchen-sink recipe that you can make all on your own. It is *our* kitchen-sink recipe. We figured it out somewhere between coding the COLA SDK and debugging the Linux build of the clerver.

Even so, it would be fun to try making some. But there's nothing new here: cola recipes have been around for decades, and the folklore process that propagates them is the original form of open source.

Re:Legal Protection

[Jace of Fuse!]

One could have endless fun mutating that over many iterations...

My first reaction was to turn it into a Slashdotism filled rehash (Trolling Goats, Beowulf Clusters, Cowboy Neal, and Natalie Portman...)-- but since the idea is CopyLeft, I'm sure that'll be done before this is all over with. Perhaps, by more than one person.

Language negotation

[KjetilK]

Great stuff! I have a few pictures, and without being a good photographer, I might as well release them.

However, you might want to look at Language Negotation. It is very useful when you develop multilingual sites. It is excellently implemented on Debian's site

See also the babel site

Fair Use

[samael]

I suspect that any quoting that falls under Fair Use (and therefore wouldn't be breaking copyright ordinarily) wouldn't fall foul of copyleft either.

I'm not sure I'd like to be the first person to take that one through the courts tho.

Wrong, Wrong, Wrong!

[BlackGriffen]

"And so the experiment goes on. As a contribution to it, New Scientist has agreed to issue this article under a copyleft. That means you can copy it, redistribute it, reprint it in whole or in part, and generally play around with it as long as you, too, release your version under a copyleft and abide by the other terms and conditions in the licence."
I guess I'm nit-picking a bit, but there is a subtlety they missed in the article: you only have to release the modified code under copy left if you plan to release it. So if I were to, say, fix all of the problems with the 2.5 series Linux distros, I don't have to release the source code. If I release it, then it has to be copyleft, but the choice to release it is still mine.
I guess it would be pointless to modify an article and not redistribute it, but the phrasing above misrepresents copy-left.
BlackGriffen

Re:Wrong, Wrong, Wrong!

[BLAG-blast]

I guess I'm nit-picking a bit, but there is a subtlety they missed in the article:

Well, it is open source, so feel free to correct it. ;-)

Can be misconstrued

[BlackGriffen]

"copyfree" could also be misconstrued as "free from being copied" or some other nonsense. Copyleft may be a bad pun, but at least it's pretty clear that "left" is the opposite of "right"

BlackGriffen

Re:Legal Protection

[Rogerborg]

• [My word "copyfree"] means that people are "free" to "copy" the work as long as they refer back to the original author. There is a very good reason I chose Copyfree and not copyright. Also, remember the difference between freedom and free beer.

You, my friend, have a very poor grasp of the issues, and are part of the problem. The big problem with "copyleft" (e.g. GPL) at the moment is that far too many people simply don't understand that it is fully copyrighted, and that to use it you must follow completely the very strict and explicit terms given. One of those terms might be "credit the author", but that's usually the least of the terms you have to comply with to not be engaged in theft, which is grounds for both criminal and civil action. The GPL for example lists many many more terms than "credit the author" and you need to go and read it before contributing any further to this debate.

If you can't be bothered reading or comprehending the GPL, then just stop there and back the fuck off, because you are probably engaged in stealing copyrighted work, and that's a criminal offence. I am sick and tired of explaining this to the programmers in my department, and sooner or later I'm going to let one of them slip GPL code into our closed source product with their name all over it, them I'm going to contact the copyright owner and suggest that they contact our legal department regarding the theft of their work, and I'll not shed one tear for any thieving developers who get strung up by the balls.

Let me spell this out to you: copyfree is a worse term than copyanything-else because it encourages people to not read the license terms. I have heard "But it's free!" from professional software developers engaged in theft of GPL code so often now that it makes my blood boil. Anything that makes it even easier for lazy idiots to become thieves is a bad thing.

Great idea, but how about this -

[cryptochrome]

I think this is an excellent idea, but it runs into the inherent problem of the proliferation of slightly different open source/content licenses, each with their own particular quirks. The biggest one that comes to mind is the difference between the GPL license, and the less restricted BSD license. Both have their advantages, but I wouldn't put them under the same symbol.

Therefore I would suggest that the open source/content "industry" should exercise some compromise and come up with a standard set of licenses based on the existing pantheon - as few as possible - and then seek to enshrine them in law alongside the more conventional copyright. The resulting copyright and various OC rights should have an easily recognizable and distinguishable family of symbols (letters in circles I imagine). This tactic also invites the re-examination of the purpose and implementation of copyright law, which as we've all been griping about has been steadily eroded in favor of corporations lately. Sounds like a job for EFF and openlaw to me. Who in congress is sympathetic to this cause?

Open Audio License - meant for rave

[MemeRot]

I found the discussion of the OAL pathetic. Mainstream bands? Does this guy have no clue? The people that should release under OAL are electronic musicians or dj's, and it would probably be mostly amateurs. There is particularly a huge opportunity for amateur dj's to make mix cd's of amateur musicians' music. Since they would be allowed to sell them as long as they credit the original artist, rather than being forced to try to license all the music from record companies at ridiculous fees. Or giving away the cd's with 'For Promotional Use Only' written on them, which is actually still not legal. The techno/rave culture's focus on music that's made on computers, can be remixed on a computer, traded over a computer, and with everyone wanting to be a dj or producer or remixer seems a fertile ground for the OAL. The do it yourself attitude mimics that among the open source software community. People want to give music away, or want to take music others make and do something to make it their own. Not allowed with conventional audio licenses. Jimmy Buffet fans don't have much to gain.

What I think should be teemed up with the OAL is the 'source code' of the music. If I make a song and release just the finished .wav file, that's like distributing a binary of a program. Hard/impossible to really modify. If I release not just the song, but also all the individual .wav files that I used as samples, and a file describing how they're laid out (a .acd file for me because I primarily use Sonic Foundry products) then others are legally free AND TECHNICALLY ABLE to remix the song, use some elements, whatever. One of the neatest things that Sonic Foundry does is have remix contests on their Acidplanet.com site where artists like Beck or Madonna or the Beastie Boys make the original tracks (meaning all the component .wav files) available for a remix contest. It's then so easy to remix, cut up the samples, put in your own favorite loops, vocal samples, etc., really make the song your own. Just releasing the music would be like just selling OpenCola without the recipe on it. You need the 'source' for it to be truly open.

Re:Legal Protection

[joshuaos]

Agreed. I think the idea of a copyleft is a kludge. What we really need is no license at all. After all, if information is free, who am I to say where and when my work can and cannot be copied? If I produce information, I want only to be known as the mind (or one of the minds) behind that information, not to retain control. I simply want credit, which I think could be quite easily acomplished.

Cheers, Joshua

Re:Woo Hoo!

[istartedi]

No, no, you've got it all wrong. It's OK to control the chickens. Controlling the eggs is heresy. You've goaded me into posting my grocery store piece about the GPL. It's also available on Google's USENET archive if you search for it:

Nevermind where they are getting the value from, the bottom line is: are
they getting it?

As a customer, I look at a product and say: Does it do what I want? Is the
price reasonable?

If the answer to both these questions is YES, I buy the product.

The only way Free Software loses is by failing the 1st question, and that
happens quite a bit. Either a system is efficient at answering my two
questions, or it isn't, and Free Software is not the efficient system that
its advocates would like you to think it is. It's like, I want to buy eggs,
and the guy at the supermarket says:

"we have no eggs, but we have chickens. You can take the eggs for free when
they lay".

There is a long line for the free eggs, and the guy estimates the wait will
be 6 hours. Do you sit around waiting in line for eggs, or do you go next
door and buy them? Then this guy walks in and says:

"Hi, I'm Mr. IBM. I'd like to buy a chicken".

"Fine" says the clerk. "That'll be $1500."

So, Mr. IBM gets fresh eggs every day any way he likes them.

"This is ridiculous" you say. "I'm going next door".

"No" says the clerk. "selling eggs for money is evil. Eggs want to be
free".

"But you just sold a chicken for $1500. How is that any less evil than
selling eggs?".

"Don't ask me to explain it" says the clerk. "There is this bearded guy who
comes around preaching every day at 11 and he has a lot of followers. I'm
afraid to upset them".

The clerk had a wild look in his eye, so I stayed the full 6 hours. Quite
frankly, I was afraid what he might do with the meat cleaver.

I never went back to that market.

--$teve

Counter-copyright and dedicate to public domain

[EricEldred]

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/cc/cc.html
is an alternative to copyright. The sign [cc] indicates not copyright, but shows support for the public domain and stands for a willingness to share information the way traditional science has always operated. New Scientist ought to consider it instead of their license.

Please consider [cc] along with licenses for open or free works, which depend on copyright. As you know, all works are now copyrighted when first created and will not enter the public domain until the copyright term expires (if it ever does), some 70 or 50 years after your death. We need the public domain in order freely to recycle old works into new, now.

The OpenLaw site (http://openlaw.org) shows how Open Source or Free Software principles can be applied to legal projects, traditionally the domain of well-paid individual attorneys.

anti-plagiarism software and copyright

[peter303]

"What the net giveth the net taketh away"

The recent scandal by several historians shows that it becomes increasingly difficult to steal someone else's work and claim it as your own. The net makes it easy to find and copy other people's work. At the same time improved search engines make it easier to detect that this has happened.

What this doesn't address is money. Though it is easier to maintain authorship priority on the net, it doesn't prevent people from making free copies.

Re:OpenCola

[istartedi]

Hey dummy. You are sadly misinformed. In a bitter twist of irony, it was the ostensibly pro-regulation Clinton administration that decided to be slack in enforcing regulations against "herbal supplements" some of which are in fact potent drugs. If you don't believe me, just search for "penny royal"+"abortion". Several women have had severe problems with it, and I recall reading an article in The Washington Post about a woman who died from it. Other supplements have recently been shown to cause liver damage.

Why was the Clinton admin slack against these supplements? The only thing I can figure is that at the time "alternative medecine" was fashionable among the academic elite circles in which the Clintons traveled.

Now, I'm not suggesting that the government ban all of these things. I certainly wouldn't want to have to get a prescription for aspirin. OTOH, when pitchmen are touting products that can put you in the hospital after 10 years of normal use, or even a single use, something needs to be done. What do you suggest as an alternative to regulation?

Let's fix the article

[T.E.D.]

I notice that lots of folks have criticisms about the article. I certainly do too. (eg: RJS must be having kittens about now for being referred to as having started the Open Source movement). And I know the ususal /. solution is to spell out these criticisms in follow-up postings.

However, this situation is different. Since the article is copylefted, rather than complain about it, let's just fix it! :-)

So if anyone posts a criticism about the article here, post a "show me the source" reply. :-)

Couple of minor points..

[sid_vicious]

Though they talk about Stallman a lot, the article tends to blur 'free software' and 'open source'. I could see RMS forking this article.

And also, from the article: "[Linux source code] contributions are reviewed by a panel and the best ones are added to Linux." (emphasis mine)

Yeah, reviewed by a panel of one?

This page is illegal

[streetlawyer]

Congratulations to Slashdot for now giving us ... the first Open Content Licence Conflict!

All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective companies. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-2002 OSDN.

I'm afraid that the numerous reproductions of the article in comments on this page can't both be "owned by the Poster" and meet the conditions of the New Statesman licence regarding redistribution. Sue each other at will.

Nicely explained ... but misleading at first?

[caduguid]

This is a great post and I'm personally going to make a note of your bolded/emphasized summary of the GPL, because it is so clear. (I'm trying to work on a Master's thesis on the question of whether GPL-ish licenses have any place, beyond software, in the context of international development. Your bolds and important pauses make it clear what the GPL is.)

I found one aspect of your post confusing, though, at first.

Q. If, for example, research results are published under copyleft, would that mean that any subsequent work that cites the research would also have to be copyleft? [...]
A. [...] If we're talking specifically about the GPL, then yes, that's exactly what it means.

In fact, that isn't what it means. (Although you may have been mostly referring in your response to the latter part of the original poster's question, which I omitted above, I didn't realize it at first.)

As you explained later for those who took the time to read your full post --
In your case, if you find some GPL research that you want to build on, but without making your research GPL, then treat the GPL work as a fully copyrighted work. You can quote selectively from it using the existing fair use defence [...].

IMHO, this is exactly right. The license, GPL or otherwise, is a copyright license and as such, restricts only what copyright will allow. If normal copyright would permit the citation, (i.e., footnotes/bibliographies/appropriately-brief quotations), then you have nothing to fear from copyleft.

Open source music is live and well

[DaoudaW]

But it's already clear that some of the strengths of open source software simply don't apply to music. In computing, the open source method lets users improve software by eliminating errors and inefficient bits of code, but it's not obvious how that might happen with music. In fact, the music is not really "open source" at all. The files posted on the OAL music website http://www.openmusicregistry.org so far are all MP3s and Ogg Vorbises--formats which allow you to listen but not to modify.

Only nerds would confuse the medium (MP3, Ogg ) with the music. To see Open Source Music in action go to a Folk Music Festival or Jazz Club. What you'll see is late-night jam sessions full of old-timers demonstrating licks for neophytes who then incorporate them into new music. You'll also see older musicians excited to learn a new style from younger musicians. These venues are hothouses of creativity where everyone is borrowing, adapting and perfecting. Sounds pretty much like Open Source to me!

Re:OpenCola

[istartedi]

Education. The government is not a $6 trillion nanny

LOL!!! Where does most education take place? Who pays for it? And what do teachers spend most of their time doing?

Re:Open Content?

[bcrowell]

It's just a poorly researched article. They talk about non-software copyleft as if it was either theoretical,

• "Music and most books are not like software, because they don't generally need to be debugged or maintained...I do not want to weaken the winning argument for open sourcing software by tying it to a potential loser," (ESR quote)

or a failure

• The main problem is that the experts Sanger wants to recruit to write articles [for Nupedia] have little incentive to participate. They don't score academic brownie points in the same way software engineers do for upgrading Linux, and Nupedia can't pay them.

From reading the article, you wouldn't have any idea that there were many successful open-source book projects, and many more that are free as in beer.

ESR and Sanger are both referring to the relative lack of success the bazaar model, but that doesn't mean that copyleft itself is a failure outside of the software world.

I think Nupedia's problems also have less to do with the issue Sanger discusses than with poor design of the project. I tried writing a Nupedia article, and it was a horrendous experience. Many of the reviewers were excellent, but among them were some who were just very difficult to deal with, and I spent weeks and weeks going around in circles trying to satisfy them, just to get my 5-paragraph article through the system. Most of these people had never even bothered to fill out their bio forms, so it wasn't even clear whether they were qualified to review the article for content.

It's not even true that the bazaar model is a complete failure outside of software. For instance, this book was written using the bazaar model. And even when it comes to doftware, I think ESR's ideas are more of an idealization than a realistic description of how open source works.

Re:Woo Hoo!

[istartedi]

That's ridiculous, eggs are scarce, physical goods, software is non-scarce, abstract.

Software is a representation of labor on the part of the developer, which is not abstract or non-scarce at all. People who make your argument see only the golden egg, and forget about the goose (or chicken).

They are not comparable, and your entire argument is an exercise in strawmannery.

They are comparable. The eggs are programs. The programmers are chicken--afraid to participate in the entreprenurial system and content to find foundations, charities, or corporations who will pay them adequatly in exchange for the reduced risk. This in and of itself doesn't bother me. Risk is not for everybody. It's the moral posturing I find offensive. I have seen no better explanation of what the Free Software advocates desire. They think it's perfectly fine to sell themselves to a company, but they think it's immoral to sell what they produce. The Free Software movement is already replicating a classic soviet-style economy in which people line up for goods, waiting on the producers. If you don't believe me, just install that nice user-friendly HURD OS.

OS music with computers

[TeknoHog]

It seems many people are not aware of the 'tracker' music created on computers. The files are like source, they contain the samples and the instructions how they are played. Anyone can modify them. I've done a few collaborations with a friend, we would just exchange the file as we progressed, rarely meeting in person. And it's great to be able to take samples out of other people's projects. It's too bad that tracker music is rare outside the demo scene.

Of course it is possible to convert these into mp3 or whatever, if you want to distribute them in 'binary only'.

Things other than software? Sure.

[caduguid]

Q. Does the idea of copyleft make sense for things other than software?
A. Only in so far as there is value in copying beyond fair use.

On the question of utility, (and supposing for the moment that we like the viral aspect of copyleft/GPL), I think I would amend the answer above to:
It does, to the extent there are (potentially) valuable uses of your content which would not be covered by the doctrine of 'fair use'.

Copyleft not only removes restrictions on copying and redistribution, but also for modification and redistribution. It is a license for collaboration.

So, if you can think of any way that someone else might build off copyrightable content you have created, (be it research/writings, music, art, maps ...),
and if you want to allow them to do so freely and without reliance upon permissions from you, (i.e., you don't care about having the right to veto changes you disapprove of),
and you can live with the possibility of them getting paid and you not,
BUT you feel that in return for your giving them these extra rights to make use of your work, they should agree to continue to give these rights to whomever else wants to work on the result (the combined product of your original work and their modifications/additions to it),
then, YES, Copyleft makes sense.

Examples? (I don't know, I never said I create content.) :-)
Off the top of my head:
Maybe you made a wonderful map of a region, but you want to leave open the chance that others will improve on specific areas and pass the whole thing along. (and you're willing to take the risk that they botch the whole thing up)
Maybe you don't mind if people take your song, add an extra verse, (or change a person's name), and pass it on. (and you're willing to take the risk that some bozo will fill that verse with beowulf clusters and profanity)
Maybe you've made a simple customized textbook and you'd be pleased as punch if people drop out the half where you didn't really know what you were talking about and replace it with something really informative. (and you're willing to take the chance that they drop out the half where you did really know what you were talking about and leave the junk half).

Copyleft makes as much sense in the non-software world as it does the software world... But maybe (original thought coming on?) in the non-software world giving away these freedoms is harder to take.

Actually, now that I think of it: it's not that coders are less sensitive, but could it be that in software the functional aspect of code is a built-in bozo filter for ill-conceived changes? (If the modifications break it they probably won't get far. Few people, (MSFT jokes aside), will have a strong/ideological attachment to broken/malfunctioning code. In changing writings/music/art I see more liklihood of offending the original author. (and now wait to be corrected by protective coders and/or those mercilessly flamed by them.)

Re:Woo Hoo!

[MadAhab]

Why would I wait on HURD? Linux and the *BSDs work now, and they've been created by nothing more than enlightened self-interest on the part of the producers.

Frankly, intellectual property - particularly when its restrictions never lift, as in the cases of binary-distributed software and of ever-lengthening copyright - is monarchist, both as a matter of historical heritage and as a matter of political philosophy. Real capitalism regards it as a necessary evil.

Rid yourself of moral posturing until you can get those monarchist tendencies out of your system.

Re:Damn, no patch tool. How about this anyway?

[Antaeus Feldspar]

How about:

Although the files are easy to play and listen to, they are not the "source" of the music, but rather its end result. Even in electronically composed music, where it is easier to distribute the "source" files from which the listenable end product is derived, there are relatively few musicians making those "source" files available.

I couldn't quite figure out how to work in the phraseology about "source" being the form preferred for modification of the work.

Also, there is at least one open-source musician who does make his source files available: Void Main.

Re:Sidesteps the issue

[Pogue Mahone]

kitchensinkPL

"You are free to use this product as you please, as long as you wash it down the drain afterwards."

Re:Woo Hoo!

[istartedi]

It's only dolts like you who think that you should be paid every time somebody besides the original purchaser uses the software

Ad hominem, but I'll address the rational part: When software is free, there are precious few "original purchasers".

I can tell I've touched a raw nerve with some people... that always happens when you confront a bad religion, which is essentially what the GNU philosophy is.

To be fair, I painted with a broad brush. Their *are* capitalists in the Open Source world, it's just that they aren't *software* capitalists. They are capitalists in some other industry who happen to have business models where software fits in as a loss-leader. It's like giving away razors to sell blades. Businesses with Free Software first-sale as the only line of revenue simply don't exist. Turn over any successful "free software business" and you will find consulting, services, distribution, customization, or something else that really makes the money. I addressed all of that in the USENET posting.

Try to keep an open mind. I don't hate you. In fact, whoever you are, I love you as a fellow human being enough to care that you don't continue to believe lies.