[Bf-docboard] License for docs

Sat Jun 25 16:13:45 CEST 2016

Hi Reiner,

If the correct aberration OCL or OPL is not the point,
what counts is the reported license text.

"... the content of the Blender Manual is available under a [CC-BY-SA 
4.0] License"
is not a my interpretation, it's a (valid) fact.

OpenSource not equals public domain.

If you are a member of the Blender developers, you could propose a 
license change (GPL > MIT).

I can only ask you to follow the license terms of both licenses:
OpenContent or CC-BY-SA, if you make a new pull.

Tobias

Am 25.06.2016 um 15:26 schrieb reiner.prokein:
> Hi Tobias,
>
> Thanks for the link to the Open Content License. This raises already 
> the next point.
> >> OpenContent License (OPL)
>
> There is OCL and OPL. That's two different license types from what i know.
> Now, is the Blender manual under the OCL or the OPL license?
> >> So CC-BY-SA fully replaces the OCL for manual versions from now on.
>
> This is your interpretation of it, which i can partially even 
> understand and follow. I also wish to have Blender under MIT license 
> instead of GPL.  But interpretations are not licenses. And i cannot 
> rely at interpretations. I have to follow the license by law. And i 
> already showed where the trouble is.
>
> Well, at least i have tried. I guess i have no other choice than to 
> clearly state that my fork has nothing to do with the invalid Blender 
> licensing, and is trying to follow the proper open source rules.
> Kind regards
>
> Reiner
> Am 25.06.2016 um 14:19 schrieb Tobias Heinke:
>> Hello Reiner,
>>
>> I called the replacement OCL -> CC0 invalid.
>> So CC-BY-SA fully replaces the OCL for manual versions from now on.
>>
>> The manual is literature.
>> GPL and CC-BY-SA are compatible.
>>
>> OCL also _demands _attribution. 2 a)
>> 2b) is about license mixing
>>
>> https://wiki.blender.org/index.php/BlenderWiki:Copyrights#Open_Content_License
>>
>> The attribution of the authors includes the following link:
>>
>> https://developer.blender.org/project/profile/53/
>>
>> The legal system allover the world are changing the license has to 
>> adopted to these.
>>
>> Tobias
>>
>> Am 25.06.2016 um 11:38 schrieb reiner.prokein:
>>> Hi Tobias,
>>>
>>> Thanks for your explanations and thoughts :)
>>>
>>> Sorry for the following wall of text, but i have the feeling that i 
>>> need to answer a bit more detailled. In short my points are:
>>>
>>> - A chosen valid OS license stays valid until all involved accepts 
>>> the change. So current CC license for the Blender manual is not 
>>> legal at this point since this did not happen.
>>> - Re-licensing of modifications is break of license. Double 
>>> licensing is break of license.
>>> - CC is bad choice for code and text like a manual
>>> - Besides all that, and assumed that the new Manual would be under 
>>> CC, Blender is already breaking it by not crediting in a proper CC way.
>>>
>>> The a bit longer answer ^^ :
>>>
>>> That somebody writes a new and better license makes the old license 
>>> not invalid. That the chosen license model is officially not 
>>> continued anymore, means that nowadays nobody puts its content under 
>>> such a license anymore, neither. The licensing stays still valid. 
>>> The only valid way of changing a OS license that i know of is that 
>>> everybody involved agrees to move to the new license type. And we 
>>> know that this did not happen with the Blender manual.
>>>
>>> It would be of course interesting to know at what point a valid open 
>>> source license reaches end of life, and can be broken without 
>>> consequences (besides simply ignoring it and hoping that nobody 
>>> raises his voice). But i couldn't find a precedent.
>>>
>>> Maybe you could write the Free Software Foundation to ask what they 
>>> have to say about it? It's definitely a highly interesting topic!
>>>
>>> >> https://www.blender.org/manual/about/license.html
>>> Well, the last sentence of the license page in its current incarnation means that i personally should be fine. It says that previous manual versions before 2.77 are back under OCL. I rely at the Blender 2.76 manual, and so i could simply change the licensing of the manual to OCL again. Which i will most probably do now.
>>>
>>> But everybody after 2.76 is in trouble now in case he wants to fork the manual. Which might affect me again. It is not impossible that i might upgrade my fork at one point to newer Blender versions, including the manual. Plus new manual authors are troubled now too. Since the current licensing is imo still not at the legal side of the fence. See below.
>>> >> And you have to indicate, what is your content and what is owned by the "Blender Documentation Team":
>>>
>>> This is imho simply impossible. I have to delve a bit further here. First let's cover the licensing how i see it at the moment.
>>>
>>> The original license of the whole manual was OCL, and it comes as a whole. You cannot put parts of the text under this license, and modified parts under a different license then. Even the images were OCL already, you cannot change their licensing unasked neither. You don't write a new manual here which you could put under your license. You do modifications to the existing content.
>>>
>>> This is allowed. But it implies that you have to respect and to follow the original licensing. Not to put your modifications under your licensing. I cannot rewrite some code lines and set it under Apache license while the whole file is under GPL. I would break the GPL license by that. And same counts imo for CC and OCL and the Blender manual. The OCL license affects the Blender manual as a whole, not parts or modifications of it. And so every modification is also automatically OCL licensed.
>>>
>>> Imho, when you really want to use CC licensing, then you would need to rewrite the whole Blender manual from scratch so that you don't breach the OCL license.
>>>
>>> Now let's have a closer look at the chosen CC license as the substitute.
>>>
>>> It's a really nice license, and well suited for creative things like images or songs. But it has one nasty issue. The CC license requires to credit everybody involved. In a proper CC way. You have to follow this part here: "*Attribution*  —You must give appropriate credit 
>>> <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/#>  " . And it is even written down what a proper way to credit is, and what not.
>>>
>>> Currently it is not clear what part of the Blender manual comes from what author. Not even the names of the authors for the Blender manual are available to give credits. So Blender already breaks the chosen CC license here.
>>>
>>> I personally have my doubts if it is a clever move to use CC at all alone for the crediting point. CC is not meant for code or text for good reason. Let's show you why.
>>>
>>> Let's for one second assume that you can relicense modifications to an existing code, pardon, text. So i have put a OCL part into it too. The impractical part of mixed and/or CC licensing for the text of a manual is that from now on every changed and unchanged part in the manual should be commented like below. It's no code, there is no header area where you could put the licensing part. So you need to do it directly above the changes so that it is clear who wrote what. Remember, CC requires proper crediting. And you must make clear what part is written by what author. And you must provide a way to contact him/her.
>>>
>>> Just in case, we would talk about the Blender manual here, not my forked version.
>>>
>>> --------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> This part of the manual is under CC-BY-SA 4
>>> Title "Moving a vertice".
>>> Author "John Doe" - link to his profile page / contact data
>>> Source "thelink" - link to draft
>>> License "CC-BY-SA v4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/>." - link to full CC license text.
>>>
>>> <insert Manual text here>
>>>
>>> - End of License block, in worst case one sentence later!
>>>
>>> This part of the manual is under OCL
>>>
>>> <insert Manual text here>
>>>
>>> - End of License block, in worst case one sentence later!
>>>
>>> This part of the manual is under CC-BY-SA 4
>>> Title "Moving a vertice a bit further".
>>> Author "Jane Doe" - link to her profile page / contact data
>>> Source "thelink" - link to draft
>>> License "CC-BY-SA v4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/>." - link to full CC license text.
>>>
>>> <insert Manual text here>
>>>
>>> - End of License block, in worst case one sentence later!
>>>
>>> --------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> Happy interruptions. It should be clear now why CC is a bad move for text and code. And the more changes you make, the more fractured the manual becomes. When you go the CC route, then you have definitely a crediting problem as shown.
>>>
>>> I might still overlook some wormhole here that works around all the mentioned issues and more. As told i am no lawyer. But that's how i see it at the moment. Ah, Licensing fun ^^
>>>
>>> Just curious, why the pressure to change the licensing at all? Why not keep everything under OCL as it was? This would be the easiest solution for everybody.
>>>
>>> Kind regards
>>>
>>> Reiner
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Bf-docboard mailing list
>>> Bf-docboard at blender.org
>>> https://lists.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-docboard
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Bf-docboard mailing list
>> Bf-docboard at blender.org
>> https://lists.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-docboard
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Bf-docboard mailing list
> Bf-docboard at blender.org
> https://lists.blender.org/mailman/listinfo/bf-docboard

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.blender.org/pipermail/bf-docboard/attachments/20160625/1b6ea301/attachment.htm 