Charles Plessy | 7 Feb 2010 16:35
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Re: Draft GR: Simplification of license and copyright requirements for the Debian packages.

Hello again everybody,

I did not have much time recently, so here is a summary email that tries to
answer in a single message all comments that I received in public or private.

1) About the exhaustive reproduction of all copyright notices.

I have the feeling that there is a consensus that we do not need to do what
laws and licenses are not commanding, but unless votes are counted with a GR,
this is only my feeeling and nothing else. I think that a GR is the right
instrument to check the consensus over big changes, and that the relaxation of
our policy of documenting all copyright notices is a big change. A GR that is
accepted by a large majority is not necessarly a waste of time, because it
dissipates misunderstantings that can arise with tacite agreements. But yes,
there are alternatives, like electing a DPL that supports this change in his
platform.

The proposition that I make is deliberatly not a Policy change. First of all,
it would introduce diffcult debates whether it can be edited later without
another GR. Second, I do not propose to replace the definition of
debian/copyright. In particular, this GR says nothing about other contents of
this file such as the URL to the sources. Rather, if accepted this GR would be
the green light for a Policy change.

2) About the source of the Debian system.

I would like to take the opportunity of this message to make a clarification on
what I wrote about ignoring the DFSG
(http://lists.debian.org/msgid-search/20100125010005.GF13715 <at> kunpuu.plessy.org).

(Continue reading)

Thomas Bushnell BSG | 7 Feb 2010 23:08

Re: Draft GR: Simplification of license and copyright requirements for the Debian packages.

On Mon, 2010-02-08 at 00:35 +0900, Charles Plessy wrote:
> 3) Is there a benefit of allowing non-free files to be distributed together
> with the source of the Debian system ?

Have you considered the harm?  It means that users can no longer assume
that whatever is in the source packages can be distributed by them under
the DFSG.  Especially since your proposal is all about making copyright
information harder to locate, you are making things far harder.

Thomas

Charles Plessy | 9 Feb 2010 01:22
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Re: Draft GR: Simplification of license and copyright requirements for the Debian packages.

Le Sun, Feb 07, 2010 at 02:08:29PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG a écrit :
> On Mon, 2010-02-08 at 00:35 +0900, Charles Plessy wrote:
> > 3) Is there a benefit of allowing non-free files to be distributed together
> > with the source of the Debian system ?
> 
> Have you considered the harm?  It means that users can no longer assume
> that whatever is in the source packages can be distributed by them under
> the DFSG.  Especially since your proposal is all about making copyright
> information harder to locate, you are making things far harder.

Hello Thomas,

Indeed, there are pros and cons for my proposal. I have mentionned in my first
message that with our current practice, our users know that – human errors
excepted – everything they get along with the sources of the Debian system is
DFSG-free.

http://lists.debian.org/msgid-search/20100124144741.GD13468 <at> kunpuu.plessy.org

However, even when all the files are DFSG-free, one can not blindly
redistribute or modify them, because we distribute works with an advertising
clause, or works that require to rename the programs in case of modification.
Therefore, one has anyway to check the licensing details for any DFGS-free file
redistributed.

About the visibility of the non-DFSG-free files: I wrote my proposal to be
broad, not as a patch to the Policy. If the GR is voted and accepted, nothing
prevents the Policy to require that non-DFSG-free files are marked as such in
debian/copyright.

(Continue reading)

Kurt Roeckx | 25 Feb 2010 18:48
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Upcomming DPL election.

Hi,

It's almost time again to start the DPL election process.  I've
set the timeline as:
nomination: Fri 5 March - Thu 11 March
campaigning: Fri 12 March - Thu 1 April
voting: Fri 2 April - Thu 15 April

That means the nomination period starts in about 1 week.

The new DPL's term starts the 17th of April.

Kurt


Gmane