On 10/27/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell(a)gmail.com> wrote:
The CC licenses 'solves' the legally unclear
boundary of derivative
works by claiming that anything which includes the work which doesn't
meet their criteria of collective works is derivative:
"or any other form in which the Work may be recast, transformed, or
adapted, except that a work that constitutes a Collective Work will
not be considered a Derivative Work for the purpose of this License."
I'm not so sure that doing so is wise: The boundaries of a derivative
work are created by law, not the copyright holder. So while we can
pretend to declare what a derivative work actually is, should our
definition disagree with the law we will lose that argument every
time.
It clearly says "for the purpose of this license," meaning that this
is what it is referring to when it talks about derivative works in the
rest of the license. I think you are misreading it.
Their definition of a collective work is similar to
the GFDLs:
Compare
"in which the Work in its entirety in unmodified form, along with a
number of other contributions, constituting separate and independent
works in themselves, are assembled into a collective whole."
with
"A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate
and independent documents or works"
The full quote from CC-BY-SA-2.5 is:
"Collective Work" means a work, such as a periodical issue, anthology
or encyclopedia, in which the Work in its entirety in unmodified form,
along with a number of other contributions, constituting separate and
independent works in themselves, are assembled into a collective
whole. A work that constitutes a Collective Work will not be
considered a Derivative Work (as defined below) for the purposes of
this License.
Which is pretty clear, and gives some pretty practical examples.
That's what I mean by "more clear". GDFL gives no real indication what
it is referring to when it says "compilation".
Notice the words 'separate and independent' ?
This is the key
criteria used define collective/aggregate works in both the licenses.
Right. Except that one is much clearer in its use of them than the
other one. The CC-BY-SA-2.5 clause makes it pretty clear what the
authors of the license have in mind -- it is a nice mix of legalese
and readable text. The GDFL clause does not make it very clear -- it
is legalese. That's all I'm saying.
This is, in part, a stylistic difference between CC
licenses and some
other licenses. The CC licenses are written in a way which combines
non-binding narrative in the body of the license proper while most
other licenses provide such content in separate documents or as part
of a preface. The inclusion of such materials makes the license
appear more friendly, but it could be argued that doing so may result
in misunderstanding.
I fail to see how articulating the intentions of the license will
create more misunderstanding than resorting only to terse legalese,
but I suppose this is a different of opinion.
FF