RE: GPL and DFSG Compatibility of Proposed Document Licences

FSF's own "GNU Free Documentation License" is also not compatible with their GPL. [1]  It doesn't seem surprising that a license intended for documentation or specifications is incompatible with a license intended for software.  

In commentary on FSF's GFDL they note "Of course, if these scripts are generally useful for other tasks, it is a good idea to release them separately under the GNU GPL." [2]  The options under consideration do something similar in licensing the types of things likely to be put into code in a different way (e.g. under the W3C Software License which is compatible with GPL).[3]

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License#GPL_incompatible_in_both_directions 
[2] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl-howto.html 
[3] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#SoftwareLicenses 

>-----Original Message-----
>From: public-html-request@w3.org [mailto:public-html-request@w3.org] On
>Behalf Of Lachlan Hunt
>Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2011 8:44 AM
>To: public-html
>Subject: GPL and DFSG Compatibility of Proposed Document Licences
>
>Hi,
>   To help resolve the question about GPL compatibility of the W3C's proposed
>licences, I mailed debian-legal to ask for advice on this issue in relation to the GPL
>and DFSG.  The response so far provides some good rationale explaining why
>both options 2 and 3 are incompatible.
>
>Thread starts here:
>http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2011/04/msg00058.html

>
>Responses with rationale:
>http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2011/04/msg00061.html

>http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2011/04/msg00062.html

>
>--
>Lachlan Hunt - Opera Software
>http://lachy.id.au/

>http://www.opera.com/

Received on Thursday, 28 April 2011 18:46:30 UTC