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[Bug localedata/11213] localedata licencing issues


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11213

--- Comment #23 from help at softwarefreedom dot org 2012-07-16 18:50:21 UTC ---
On 07/15/2012 03:04 PM, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
> Hi Eben et al,
> 
> Petr Baudis wrote:
> 
>> I'm sorry, I didn't realize the presence of this bug earlier. We have made some
>> research regarding this on the mailing list some time ago and this is currently
>> the opinion of FSF on the matter:
>>
>>   http://sourceware.org/ml/libc-locales/2012-q2/msg00136.html
>>
>> I.e., locale data is not copyrightable, therefore it cannot be covered by any
>> licence and that is also the reason we do not require copyright assignment
>> paperwork from the locale authors.
>>
>> If you (e.g. Debian project) disagree, I encourage you to contact
>> copyright-clerk@fsf.org or SFLC for further discussions. For us developers,
>> this situation really is the best outcome since no paperwork is needed, I'd
>> say. My opinion is that the outcome of this bug should be removal of licence
>> notices (and "copyright" notices) from all localedata files to clear up any
>> possible confusion - comments?
> 
> Legal question for you.
> 
> Along with everything else it contains, the GNU C library provides a
> collection of locale data.  Localedata files include basic information
> about how programs should interact with users in a particular area:
> currency symbols, paper size, which encoding to use for text files,
> translations for "yes" and "no", and other details like that.  You can
> find the glibc locales in the localedata/locales directory of glibc:
> 
>   http://sourceware.org/git/?p=glibc.git;a=tree;f=localedata/locales
> 
> For example, the English locale for the United States is available
> from the following address.
> 
>   http://sourceware.org/git/?p=glibc.git;a=blob_plain;f=localedata/locales/en_US
> 
> Since this is mostly factual information without much creative
> content, no one paid much mind to its license.  Many locales permit
> use, distribution, and commercial use without permitting modification:
> 
> 	# Distribution and use is free, also for
> 	# commercial purposes.
> 
> Most notably, the POSIX locale contains that notice.  Some are more
> philosophical:
> 
> 	% Distribution and use is
> 
> Josh Triplett (cc-ed) noticed this in 2009 and reported it to the
> Debian project[1].
> 
> We are concerned that although these files do not contain much
> creative content, they do contain some, for example in their comments.
> We are generally not lawyers and do not know what does and doesn't
> fall under copyright protection in the United States and elsewhere.
> It is important for it to be very clear to both us and our users what
> their rights are.
> 
> Helge (cc-ed) has taken a survey of authors of locales with the notice
> that doesn't permit modification to find what license terms they
> intend.  Some findings:
> 
>  - many locale authors expected that, as part of glibc, these
>    would have the same license as glibc (LGPL-2.1+)
> 
>  - they did not intend to forbid modification, and the notice was
>    propagated from the POSIX locale by copy and paste.
> 
>  - when asked what terms they would like going forward for their work,
>    most prefer "public domain", followed by LGPL and GPL.
> 
> You can find a summary of Helge's efforts at [2], and the actual
> emails are at [1].
> 
> Unlike most of glibc, the FSF has not historically required copyright
> assignment for these files.  Independently of the above investigation,
> they were recently asked about and reaffirmed this position[3]:
> 
> 	Well that was fast. The SFLC said that this type of thing isn't copyrightable, and that 
> 	paperwork isn't really necessary. So we should be good to go. Thank you so much for all your 
> 	help.
> 
> Questions:
> 
>  - Some locales (namely km_KH, lo_LA, th_TH, and uk_UA) contain
>    copyright notices.  Are we legally permitted to remove the
>    notices or to change them to say "Authors: ..."?
> 
>  - Suppose I wanted to add the text "You may freely use, modify,
>    distribute, and relicense this file" to each of the locale data
>    files, to make it completely clear that users are free to
>    incorporate text from them into differently licensed works.  Would
>    that be legally permissible?  Would it be accurate?  Is there any
>    reason not to do it?
> 
>  - When locale authors have stated a preferred license, is there value
>    in documenting that, or would it be counterproductive?
> 
>  - If the legal heir to some author of many locales wants to be really
>    nasty, what is the worst they can do on the basis of this
>    contribution?
> 
> Thanks in advance for looking this over.
> 
> Sincerely,
> Jonathan
> 
> [1] http://bugs.debian.org/555168
> [2] http://www.helgefjell.de/debianitem.php?name=bug555168
> [3] http://sourceware.org/ml/libc-locales/2012-q2/msg00136.html

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--- Comment #24 from help at softwarefreedom dot org 2012-07-16 18:50:27 UTC ---
On 07/16/2012 04:55 AM, Keld Simonsen wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 15, 2012 at 08:13:31PM -0500, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
>> Hi Keld,
>>
>> Keld Simonsen wrote[1]:
>>
>>> Hmm, I contributed a number of locales. I always assumed that there was a
>>> copyright to each of them.
>>> I do hold a masters in legislate law.
>> [lots of helpful background snipped, including the intent of the
>> original notice]
>>
>> Thanks much for this.  I'm cc-ing the SFLC since I'm not sure they
>> automatically receive mails to that bug tracker.
>>
>> My guess is that the FSF's concerns that prompted the "this type of
>> thing isn't copyrightable" answer were USA-centric.  If I remember
>> correctly, in some jurisdictions outside the United States, the
>> eligibility of a work for copyright is based on the amount of work put
>> into it (as you remind me), while in the United States it's based on a
>> concept of creativity.
> 
> I claim that there is a lot of creativity in how the locales are written, at least
> the big ones.  As said one of my intial works were 100 pages of the POSIX.2 standard.
> And then the locales grew even further, with the advent of full ISO 10646 (Unicode)
> coverage and ISO TR 14652 extra categories.  There is a lot of design and ideas, 
> and a lot of design criteria in the locales. Including a number of theoretical landmarks,
> and something that could have been patentetd, if somebody were inclined to do such nasty things:-)
> And IMHO that has resulted in a system that still has a number of advantages over
> what big players in the market have done for i18n. 
> 
> And then there is compilation copyright according to the Berne convention - maybe you
> don't hold copyright on the data, but you hold copyright on the presentation on it and the
> collection of the combination of the data.
> 
> I would say in juridical terms it would not be safe to assume that there is no copyright on
> the locales (and charmaps and repertoiremaps).
> 
> Best regards
> keld


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