[copyleft-next] Comments on 0.1.1

Martin Michlmayr tbm at cyrius.com
Sun Feb 10 20:37:47 UTC 2013


Here are some comments regarding version 0.1.1 and copyleft-next in
general.

Richard mention his "lengthy" commit messages at FOSDEM and wondered
whether they're too long.  I must say that I like the detailed
explanations for changes.  This will come in handy in 5 or 10 years
when nobody can remember the rationale for a change.

Section 4 contains the following explanation:

| "Legal Notices" means copyright notices, license notices,
|  license texts, and author attributions, but does not include logos,
|  other graphical images or trademark legends.

While I find it useful to have the explanation in the paragraph,
it seems inconsistent because all other definitions are at the end
of the license.  Is there a reason this one is different?

Section 11 says "unless You cure".  I was going to propose a simpler
term than "cure" until I realized this is actually a legal term:
http://research.lawyers.com/glossary/cure.html
Given that you're looking for contributions from developers and hoping
that developers will read the license, would it make sense to maintain
a list of "special" words (e.g. in the FAQ).  This way, people know
a) not to replace them in patches and b) can read about their precise
legal meaning.

Definition of "Corresponding Source":
|    provided under (i); and (iii) a list clearly identifying all Separate
|    Works (other than those provided in compliance with (ii)) that were

When I read this, I was wondering whether this should say something like
"Separate Works (including a clear identification, such as version number)"

|    specifically used in building and installing the Covered Work (for
|    example, a specified proprietary compiler including its version
|    number). Corresponding Source must be machine-readable.

And here I'm wondering whether the "for example, ..." should be removed
and moved to the FAQ instead.  OTOH, it's nice to have a clear example
in the license itself.

I've also attached some patches that fix various formatting issues.  I
didn't want to send a pull request as you probably disagree with some
of the changes.  You can apply those you like with "git am", or I can
send a pull request.

-- 
Martin Michlmayr
http://www.cyrius.com/
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