Talk:Licenses

Against DRM 1.0

In my opinion, Against DRM 1.0 is a free content license.

• This license is incompatible with any technology, device or component that, in the normal course of its operation, is designed to prevent or restrict acts which are authorised or not authorised by licensor: this incompatibility causes the inapplicability of the license to the work.

• Any breach of this license [...] will automatically retroactively void this license.

The sense is clear: licensor cannot license with Against DRM 1.0 a work protected by DRM, because the license is inapplicable to works protected by DRM. Inapplicability of the license => no juridical effects.

Licensee cannot protect the work or derivative works with DRM: if licensee protect the work or derivative works with DRM, the license will be void.

Where is the vagueness? --Tom 02:32, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

I find the "incompatible with .. acts which are authorised or not authorised" passage to be vague. Which acts, exactly, are we talking about? Could this mean that a licensor can say: "I disagree with your usage of encryption to conceal your personal data, as this is not an act which I have authorized?" Moreover, there is not even a reference to the work itself in the passage, so it's not clear to me that it only refers to "acts" which are related to the work. I think this passage needs to be explicit that we are talking about reducing the rights of others to the work through DRM.--Erik Möller 02:45, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Which acts, exactly, are we talking about?

It's very simple: what does licensor authorize with the license? :-)

4. Grant of rights

Licensor authorizes licensee to exercise the following rights:

a. right of reproduction; (act of reproduction, act of multiplication...)

b. right of distribution; (act of distribution, act of diffusion...)

etc. etc. etc.

The law (EUCD) say: the expression ‘technological measures’ means any technology, device or component that, in the normal course of its operation, is designed to prevent or restrict acts [...] which are not authorised by the rightholder of any copyright or any right related to copyright.

Where is the vagueness?

The sense is clear; these acts are: reproduction, distribution... and any copyright or any right related to copyright. --Tom 03:12, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

I do agree with Erik, the wording is much too broad and vague. "acts which are authorised or not authorised" is completely unacceptable as it can mean anything (acts which are not authorized, by construction, are not part of license, in contrast to what you would like to let us think).

Instead "acts which are not authorized" are part of the license: these acts concern possible moral rights. --Tom 15:18, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

By the way, 1) EUCD is not a law but an European directive 2) when the law is vague or dishonest, it is not helpful to base an argument on it. --Antoine 13:23, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

The law (EUCD is applied with national laws) is law: if you want legally oppose DRM, you must speak the language of the law. --Tom 15:18, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

There is no point in trying to oppose what the law defines as DRM rather than what you find immoral. About EUCD, what part of "European directive" don't you understand? Each country drafts its own transposition of EUCD and transpositions can be very different from the original. --Antoine 15:28, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

A license is a legal instrument and a legal instrument must be based on law. A license not based on law is not much effective and a license not much effective realizes nothing (moral principles, ideals etc). I think that you don't know directives' compulsoriness. --Tom 20:26, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Merely repeating yourself without reading what other people answered does not make you right... I guess this makes the thread dead, unless you want to bring fresh arguments onto the table (like on the cc-fr mailing-list, by the way). --Antoine 01:12, 3 May 2006 (CEST)

Other people? Who? I'm sorry but I'm not accustomed to uncivil tones of voice. You can speak with other people. :-) Thanks. --Tom 11:08, 3 May 2006 (CEST)

No need to use strong terms like "completely unacceptable", I'm sure the Against DRM license has good intentions which are very much in line with the goals of the definition. The question is, could it be clarified and improved? Tom, could you perhaps state what your position is in this matter - are you directly involved with the license? If so, we might be able to hook you up with some legal people from Creative Commons or Wikimedia.--Erik Möller 13:28, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

I'm not involved with the license: I'm a jurist and I like this license for many reasons (what you call "vagueness", I call, in this case, "elasticity" and "knowledge of right"). A license is a technical text that must be analyzed with a technical background. In my opinion, in this simple license nothing is casual. --Tom 15:18, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

One might also refer to the debian-legal thread about Against DRM 1.0. --Antoine 14:35, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Superficial discussion. :-) --Tom 15:18, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

GNU General Public License

Any reason this license isn't included as a free content license? --Ricardo Gladwell 14:13, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

It is, under "all free software licenses".--Erik Möller 14:15, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Apologies, I missed that. Wouldn't it be better to explicitly list the GPL as many individuals use it as both a software and contennt license? - Ricardo Gladwell 14:36, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Erm, it is, under "all free software licenses", which is followed by, "including the GNU GPL ..", but feel free to arrange the page differently.--Erik Möller 22:23, 2 May 2006 (CEST)

Ricardo, I've tried to change the wording so as to make it explicit that the GPL is a proper free content license. Feel free to improve :) --Antoine 01:51, 3 May 2006 (CEST)

License characterization

I think the current rough list is fine at the moment (the high priority task is to have a clear, precise, ethically correct, internationally secure Definition ;-)). However, in the future it will be useful to characterize the licenses more precisely according to a grid of criteria. Here are some criteria I suggest:

Copyleft / non-copyleft

Well, this is easy. Let's not forget about "agregation" however. For example, the GPL is a copyleft license which allows agregation with non-GPL works; the FAL is a copyleft license which does not allow agregation with non-FAL works (unless the resulting work is not considered a derived work under copyright law).

Attribution / non-attribution

Easy as well.

Access to source code

The GNU GPL mandates access to source code. The GFDL mentions transparent versions, which may (may not??) equate to source code. I don't know about any other free content licenses requiring access to source code; are there any?

The GFDL requires a source copy of the document, which must also be "Transparent" (that is, a simple, open standard format). --Ricardo Gladwell 12:57, 7 May 2006 (CEST)

Internationalization scheme (translation / adaptation)

This one is rarely mentioned. There are roughly two main internationalization schemes currently:

• the GNU/FAL style: GNU licenses have only one legally binding version which is the original English one. The Free Art License is translated into several languages but translations are literal. The net effect is similar in both cases: the exact same concepts and clauses apply to everyone in the world.
• the CC style: licenses are not just translated, they are adapted. Consequently, licenses can be slightly different. For example, the French CC licenses have different wordings, warnings and restrictions compared to the American ones.

It is not obvious whether both of these schemes make for safe international interoperability. However, it is important that the issue is explained.