[Foundation-l] Re: Copyright issues...walking on thin ice

Wed Aug 11 14:40:31 UTC 2004

Andre Engels wrote:
> I think this is a self-destructive interpretation of the license. Because 
> if I can include a picture in this way, then why not text?

If you put some text in a sidebar box, and the text were loaded from a
different file on disk, then it would be the same thing, and it would
be completely approved by the license.

With images, the separate authorship and the independence of the work
is transparently obvious.  The text is not derived from the image, nor
is the image derived from the text.  No one modifies GNU FDL text and
turns it into an image, or vice-versa.  (Barring hypothetical edge
cases that are beyond the scope of this discussion.)

With text, there could be borderline cases.  But it seems clear to me
that so long as the two documents are kept separate in some fashion,
and are not derived from each other, there would be no problem.

Suppose someone takes a GNU FDL article and includes it as a chapter
in an otherwise proprietary book?  The license says this is fine, and
I think we all agree about that.  Suppose the GNU FDL text and the
proprietary text are placed side-by-side on a page, with clear
delineation via a "sidebar box".  Would you say that *this* is a
license violation?  That it's o.k. to put the text on two separate
poages, but not o.k. to put it on the same page?

That seems a very strained interpretation of the license.

--Jimbo