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Debian GNU/Linux to Declare GNU GFDL non-Free?
Syntaxis writes "There's some considerable argy-bargy in progress over whether or not GNU's own
GFDL
is a Free documentation license at all. At issue are "invariant sections" which cannot be removed from derivative works. Check out the thread culminating in the proposed motion to take action. The current consensus on Debian-legal does indeed appear to be that one of the FSF's own licenses is non-Free under the terms of the Debian Free Software Guidelines! Well, documentation for GPLed projects countermanding the very freedoms embodied in the GPL certainly seems insane to me."
Upon reading the post, however, what I see is a bean counter mentality that can really be dangerous to open source projects as a whole. I shudder at the thought of hundreds of package maintainers being contacted to deal with this "license issue", which is really a non-issue to anyone with some common sense. This time would better be spent working on real problems -- it's not like Debian has none of those ...
You obviously don't understand what the Debian project is all about. It isn't just a Linux distro; it is specifically a free software distro. They don't want anything that isn't free-as-in-liberty. That's why they have the licensing rules that they do.
In case you didn't realise, any works completely of your creation can be used in any way you like, as you're the sole copyright holder.
So the only case where you wouldn't be able to take a work you've released under GPL and include it in a closed source application is where you've either (a) originally taken source that was under GPL or similar and added to it or (b) applied patches from people where those patches were supplied in the understanding that the resulting app would be released under GPL or similar license.
In other words, your comment about releasing your own works into the public domain because it gives you more freedom are wrong.
Either you're trolling, or you don't understand the issue. Of course you can't change the license; that would make no sense. The issue has to do with the fact that the GFDL allows portions of the licensed document to be marked "invariant", meaning you can't change those parts. This is logically equivalent to what you would have if the GPL allowed authors to mark parts of their source code as unmodifiable. It essentially means that the document is not entirely free, but only mostly free. The debate within Debian has been about whether "mostly free" is good enough.
Debian isn't about to remove all documentation licensed under GFDL, only the documentation that takes advantage of the invariant sections (or some other non-modifiable features of GFDL). Unfortunately this includes most of the GNU project documentation since the GNU project has marked the usual GNU propaganda blurbs invariant.
What's strange is that according to GFDL the invariant sections must not be about the actual subject of the documentation. Instead must be "secondary sections", as described in the GFDL:
Frankly, it seems to me that the GNU project would have added the invariant sections only force their political statements to be carried everywhere along the documentation. Many people have pondered that if they request the operating system to be called GNU/Linux, why don't they add a clause in their license to demand that. Well, maybe they have started moving towards that direction.
As I understood it, the license allowed for invariant sections so that you can include "Originally written by..." at the top and then prevent anyone from changing it; I've always intended to distribute laboratory manuals under this license, and I can think of some other things I might want to make invariant, primary data for instance. In source, you might conceivably use such a clause to require someone to include a Trojan (or, gasp, an unfree supplementary component!), but since it is a document we're talking about, I do not see the problem. If I decide to make false or misleading text invariant, why use my document (or fork of a document) at all?
If I understand correctly, absolutely nothing prevents you from adding entire additional sections to the document - including, if necesarry, screaming tirades against sections you were forced to include.
Let me put it another way - I release the documentation for my software under this license. What invariant text could I possibly add that is genuinely going to interfere with someone's free speech?
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
For at least half of the talk, he spoke regarding the history of copyright and was absolutely boring at all hell (perhaps it's because I only have Lessig's Free Culture talk to compare to).
For the second half of the talk, he began to outline how he thinks the copyright office should work (he admits this isn't a perfect system, but he thinks this is how it should be). Essentially, he narrowed down all intellectual works into three catagories:
- Functional
- Biographical
- Aesthetic
Now, I believe there are some major holes in this, but I brought up the point that software licenses surely are functional works within society and therefore the GPL license itself (the actual document that you include with your software) should be free as in speech (it currently disallows derivative works).These are works that serve some sort of functional use within society. This includes text books, manuals, and software. These works should be free as in speech.
These are works that are compliations of a particular authors opinions. RMS thought these could go either way. Maybe they could have a limited period of monopolistic power (of course no longer than 2 years).
These are works that only have aesthetic value (in other words, they are the shiny things of the world). Stallman stated that a copyright system should allow a 2-3 year monopoly on such works (this means the RIAA could still do all it does but that you'd be allow to trade songs that were 3+ years old).
Stallman had no answer for this and instead spent 15 minutes explaining to me why using the term "Intellectual Property" meant that I couldn't even begin to understand the issues at hand.
I've always been a defender of Stallman but I lost an awful lot of respect for him that night. I fully support Debian in this matter.
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
If I read the GFDL correctly an Invariant Section simply concerns it self with secondary sections. Secondary sections being sections which contains information about authors, publishers and so on. They are not allowed to contain content regarding the overall subject.
To me this seems fair. Invariant sections ensures that all people involved in the creation of this document is properly credited. When writing free documents all you have is the credit and the Debian people want to take that away from you. I must have misunderstood something, this can't be right. If it is then Debian just became the bad guys. When we're developing free software / doucuments / whatever the only thing we have is our name. We don't expect to get paid, but most of us would like the credit.
I'm sure I misread the GFDL, if not I didn't I'm really disappointed with Debian.
As I see it, the greatest thing about the Debian project is the fact that they don't subscribe to the typical herd mentality so often seen in the open-source community.
I've seen many, many Debian developers using "GNU/Linux" to describe the operating system, which does give credit where credit is due.
However, the GNU project's goals often frighten me (inasmuch as I give a shit), and it's nice to see that someone in the community is willing to point out their mistakes.
Many have pointed out that you could put the content of an entire work in an "invariant" section of a GFDL-licensed document. I believe there may be certain rules regarding the proportion of invariant sections to non-invariant sections, but defeating this is akin to defeating the Slashdot lameness filters: a definite time-waster, but not impossible.
The GNU Project is shady. Make no mistake about it: The GPL restricts choice as much as an NDA would.
I often wonder how many successful works the GNU Project could claim if it weren't for the restrictions inherent in the GPL. One oft-cited (but quite relevant) example is GCC: stagnation left many unsatisfied, so EGCS was started, blah, blah, blah. Basically GNU took (with permission) the work of those who had made EGCS a much better compiler, and renamed it GCC.
To contribute to GCC, in fact, it is not enough that you GPL your code and give a license to the GNU Project. No, you have to ASSIGN COPYRIGHT of the code to GNU, basically saying that the code is no longer yours, and that you would no longer have the right to take code from an existing work (such as a commercial compiler which you wrote) and contribute it to GCC, because you would no longer own the original code due to copyright violation.
Does this remind anyone of recording companies requiring artists to hand over their original works?
Everything done in a GNU project benefits the FSF (at the very least, with added prestige) -- they can claim that they, and they alone, own the code. This includes the right to, if they chose, hire coders to develop the HURD into a useable OS kernel (refer to my sig here), and release it under a closed-source license. Or, to make major improvements to GCC and sell it commercially under a non-GPL license.
If Walter Bright decided to allow the FSF to use major portions of his C++ compiler, which he sells commercially (and includes, I believe, much better support for C++ templates than GCC), he would have to assign copyright of his code to the FSF, therefore preventing him from using it in releases of his commercial compiler in the future.
The FSF is brain-dead, folks, and kudos to Debian folks for having the cojones to point out one of the more obviously stupid flaws in a GNU license.
(Many may note the fact that I focus a bit on compiler issues here. I have followed, to some extent, the GCC development lists, and from what I have seen, it can be a pain in the ass to contribute to GCC. Apple has many improvements to the compiler in their internal tree, and I often wonder if more of those improvements would have been rolled back into GCC by now if not for the hoops they have to jump through in order to get those changes submitted.
I've seen people make feature suggestions on the list which the Apple guys say they've already done and tested internally. The response is often, "We've done this, but we weren't sure if anyone else would find it useful. We'll look into getting permission to release it." It seems obvious that getting permission to hand over copyright would make that process a little harder.
Why do I focus on compiler issues so much? Various reasons... quality of generated code on Intel vs. other architectures, KDE slowness due to C++ linkages, blah blah blah. The compiler is key to getting code to run quickly on modern CPUs, as anyone pushing a non-Intel architecture would do well to remember.)
Don't trust the FSF. Appreciate their work, but don't hand over your firstborn. They can do whatever they want, including rewrite the GPL to state that any GPL'd code may be sold commercially by the FSF without providing source code.
FSF says free the source. I say free the developer.
Somebody get that guy an ambulance!
The GFDL's Preamble states: We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free software, because free software needs free documentation: a free program should come with manuals providing the same freedoms that the software does.
But the reality seems to be that Freedom to the FSF only really matters when it comes to software. A quick look at the FSF's audio section shows that their interpretation of Freedom doesn't extend very far in other areas. Would software released under a license that allows "verbatim copying and distribution" be considered FSF free?
Debian takes a broader view that everything in the distro should be "Free". It may sound a bit anal to expect that manuals, audio and graphics should be covered by the same rights to modification, but the sad fact is that it's not just an academic point. Quake2 may be GPL software, but the graphics, music, etc are not covered by the GPL. Since Debian groups software into Free and Non-Free sections, it's important that the distinction is pointed out...regardless of whether it's Quake 2 or GCC.
Stick to public domain. GPL is no more free than Microsoft, just each end an extreme. Microsoft, no source, no tampering, no nothing. GPL, Always source, no matter what. Sure it works for some, I have a few projects I own that are GPL, incidentally because I originally unknowingly GPL'd them, and a few now that are public domain. I prefer public domain, there is little to no worries at all on it. I'm even more free in the choice because I could one day take works I put into public domain and use them in a closed source application, such as for consulting work. People will benefit from the source I had originally made, and I benefit in the fact I can use the work in closed environments.
The problem here isn't the GPL. You just don't understand it right.
If you put a project under the GPL, you can still use your own code in a closed project. Since you own the copyright, you can release the code under multiple copyrights. Releasing it under the GPL is actually better because it means no one else can use your code in a closed product.
Stick to public domain. GPL is no more free than Microsoft, just each end an extreme.
This really makes me wonder if you're trolling. This statement is just silly. With MS software you have the rights granted to you by copyright law, but they are restriced by a license. With GPL'ed software you get the rights granted to you by copyright law, plus additional rights are granted to you is you agree to the GPL. The GPL does not attempt to remove any of the rights granted by copyright, it actually gives you more. MS licences try to remove rights granted to you by copyright while not giving you any more.(BTW, this makes the GPL perhaps the most legally binding of software licences.) This is like saying that $1,000,000,000 is no better than $.01 because they're different ends of an extreme. It's nonsense. It's like saying facism is no different than democracy because they're both forms of government.
Life is too short to proofread.
The GPL was written for code, and it is very good for code.
If you've ever read interviews with RMS where he has been asked about copyright on things like music and books, he's usually very cagey. He tends to end up saying that there are interesting possibilities and difficult questions, but he's concerned with software, which is his area of expertise.
Software documentation is sort of software, and sort of literature. Writers of literature tend to be concerned about the integrity of their works more than writers of software, who usually expect their work to be enhanced and improved over the years, whether by themselves or by other people.
The GFDL is an attempt to manage the compromise between the freedom of software users to distribute derived works, and the need for literature writers to preserve the integrity of their works.
This compromise, of course is incompatible with the strict DFSG-type rights regarding software, and when a package contains code and documentation, the same requirements are applied to Debian by both.
I feel the answer is for Debian to relax the DFSG as they apply to non-program code. That's not simple to do, however. This is a fairly new problem, as it only comes from trying to make complete working distributions with professional quality documentation under GPL-like conditions, and it's going to take probably a few years to totally work it out.
I don't think anyone involved in this is insane.
The problem, as summarized and debated in the linked thread (which you should all GO READ) is that you cannot take even a small part out of a GFDL document without including all the invariant sections, even if doing so would be pointless and irrelevant. Imagine, for example, writing an article in which you wanted to quote large portions of a GNU manual--so much so that it fell outside the category of "fair use." You couldn't do so under GFDL without including the political views of the GNU Project espoused at the beginning of every GNU manual. (I.e. "Free Software Needs Free Documentation.") It is this that makes the GFDL non-free by the terms of the Debian Free Software Guidelines. If invariant sections or front/back matter were removable it would go "a long way" to making it DFSG-free.
On the other hand, nothing in the core free software philosophy says that using copyright to protect political views and other things is in-and-of-itself bad. Remember, the reason that the crusade for free software was begun is this: Instant copying via computers means that it is now more beneficial to society to exercise their inherent right to copy, than it is to restrict that right to promote innovation through monopoly. What a mouthful. :)
Nothing about the Free Software philosophy says that every single thing ever written should be freely redistributable. If I write a political essay you better believe that I'm copyrighting it so no one else can change it. I don't have a problem with them distributing it gratis or for a fee, but they sure better not change my words around. That is what copyright is good for, and what the "Invariant Sections" in the GFDL is designed to allow.
For example, say I write a math text. In the introduction, I state my views on the current state of mathematics education and my proposed solutions, some of which are embodied in the book. I certainly don't want anyone changing that and passing it off as my authorship. To make my book properly fit the "Free" philosophy, I should allow 2 things:
Furthermore, I should be able to do the following and maintain harmony with the "free" philosophy:
It is clear that while the GFDL is not up to par with the "Free" philosophy, the DFSG prohibits authors from exercising their right to protect their personal views and speech from modification. This right--to protect your personal views and expression (which source code is not, by the way)--is just as important to free speech as the freedoms outlined in the GPL.
In summary, both the GFDL and the DFSG have problems maintaining harmony with the "Free" philosophy as it should be applied to documentation. I think the GFDL has a fundamental problem with not allowing "Invariant Sections" to be ommitted, and the DFSG has a problem by not allowing an author to preserve personal views. The second problem likely comes from applying a software definition (the DFSG) to documentation. Source code is not the same thing as other writings, and the DFSG does not currently make a distinction.
Hopefully both parties here will realize what changes need to be made--and make them.
Take care,
--
Christian Sieber
You'll see that the FSF is concerned with free documentation as well. The problem here is that some people are misunderstanding the invariant section provision of the FDL. As stated in that link, not every piece of writing is the same thing as software. The FDL insists that all the technical instructions be freely modifiable so that someone who creates a derivative piece of software can also modify the manual to keep it accurate.
However, some parts of a manual might be literary or express an author's opinion. This might be a political opinion ("software should be free") or it could be a technical opinion ("monolithic kernels suck"). But whatever it is it doesn't make sense for the creator of a derivative manual to change those opinions--that would be lying about the original author's intent.
The FDL recognizes that an author may have the need to guard these sections (remember, they can't have anything to do with the instructions to use the program). It doesn't make the manual any less free.
demi
Which is perfectly fine, I'm sure, with most Debian developers and users. Use RedHat, by all means. It is good enough for personal use, maybe even as a server if you don't have to run tens of boxes (and maybe even for that, nowadays, I've heard good things about their network upgrade system, "RedHat Network" or what it's called).
As for myself, I use Debian mostly because I like its quality and stability, its reliable maintenance infrastructure (having to maintain a lot of servers makes oneself very partial to that apt-get, dpkg-reconfigure thing), and the overall sense of order that I draw from their packaging process.
Having said that, I would be more careful than you before dismissing the ethical underpinnings of the Debian organisation, or even stating them as a reason for not using Debian. That is the point in your reasoning that I'm having most trouble dealing with, akin to not taking free Unicef mugs and postcards because of all that human-rights agenda and stuff behind them.
Once upon a time, I was a rabid Amiga enthusiast. I learned a lot of things on that cute little box. Particularly, I learned to work the Video Toaster and the included Lightwave 3D. I learned it so well that I started making a living off it, doing video processing for a small publicity agency and an industrial design department at my U. Then the Amiga died, and having all that skills (well, most of them) suddenly became as useful as being the world's greatest kazoo player: who gives a shit? I had to learn something new to stay in business, because the company that made the tools I used stopped making them (or, at least, I became unable to buy them, which amounts to basically the same thing).
The same thing happened a couple more times with other commercial products (say Borland's C++ builder, Cisco's Netsys software, maybe Sun's Java in the not-too-distant future). So now I'm predictably more cautious when choosing what tools to spend time learning and using, for both work and play. Open source stuff doesn't die --not unless it really needs to die because it is replaceable with something undisputably better, and also free. And even so, nothing really dies until there remains absolutely no one still using it (I also can pull from memory several first-person examples, such as Dumpleton's OSE library, the GNU Pascal Compiler... hell, the wonderful Nethack).
Back to Debian: I appreciate greatly that the dudes putting toghether this wonderful distro are so picky regarding the license of the software (or, in this case, documentation). It saves me the work of doing that myself. I know that, for everything I apt-get install, I can spend my time learning every detail without worriying about that knowledge becoming useless and obsolete anytime soon.
So, wrapping it up: I'm also the kind of guy who looks for the tool that works. And I also place highest on my priorities to "get things done", rather than some abstract philosophical issues. But I deeply thank Debian for being so strict, even pedant, about legal issues. There is no other computer system that makes me feel as comfortable about spending any amount of time with, than a Debian system.
When I finished my MSc last year, I had to publish my thesis, and sourcecode. The university instructued us that the thesis had to claim them as the copyright owners, as they had a claim over our code and report. The lecturers were aware that we would maybe want to contest this, and noted that we'd probably have a fair point as we had never signed away our IP rights.. yet in order to be accepted our reports MUST contain the copyright info as stated, unless a alternative was agreed. I got my course director to accept the FDL as a license on my work in which I claimed the copyright, and I published my source code as an invariant section. As no other license/copyright info appeared on my sourcecode either printed or on disk, I essentially made them unable to claim ownership of it and make modifications.
Now I don't have any objections to the GPL or freedom over sourcecode in principle, I just didn't want them to claim ownership and rights over it.
So I was thankful that the invariant clause of the FDL allowed me to restrict the published sourcecode.
My take on this may be wrong, IANAL, but seemed to be the case, hence why I did it.
To: <Paul Programmer> paul@fooware.org
We're happy to inform you that your FooWare package will be included in the next release of the Debian distribution. A lot of users seem to love the software, and they also have very nice things to say about the high-quality documenation you wrote for it!
From: zealot@debian.org
To: <Paul Programmer> paul@fooware.org
Sorry to bother you, but a recent audit shows that the GFDL-licensed documentation for FooWare contains an invariant section reading Dedicated to the memory of my mother. This is a problem, because your thoughtless act takes away the freedom of other people to change this part of the documentation, As of the next release, the Debian distribution will no longer include any GFDL-licensed documents that contain invariant sections. Please change your licenseing.
From: <Paul Programmer> paul@fooware.org
To: zealot@debian.org
No, sorry, I refuse to change the licensing of the manual.
From <Edna Enduser> edna@aol.com
To: <Paul Programmer> paul@fooware.org
Wow, I'm really blown away by the wonderful quality of your FooWare package. The only thing is, it really needs some documentation. Could you please think about writing some? I use the Debian distribution, and a lot of the other software in it has good documentation. Maybe you should emulate those other programmers. You know, the best software in the world doesn't help us users unless it has good documentation.
Find free books.
I'm an active documentation volunteer so this is very important to me. I have to admit that I have always found the GFDL confusing and arbitary (like its limit of how many words you can add to a front- or back-cover text). As a non-lawyer, I found the Open Publication License to be more straight-forward.
Here is the Open Publication License: http://opencontent.org/openpub/
Its only drawback are the non-free options: option A requires permission for derivative works and option B limits commercial publication. However, this can be overcome by specifying "using the Open Publication License without Options A or B".
If you'd look in the debian-legal archives, you'd see that the debian people had quite a lot discussions with the latex people. They've now come to an agreement and are drafting a license that would be acceptable to both parties.
They are now going to do the same thing with the fsf: right now they're working on a text and a faq that explain their problems with the gfdl, and then they'll try to convince the fsf to create a new version that fixes those problems./p