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Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

diveintomark.org

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Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#11

Post by btilly »

patio11 wrote: post #5

I don’t know where that leaves you as a business. I suspect this leaves Apress at the "Require all further authors to contractually promise us, in writing, that they are assigning Apress the exclusive right to publish/distribute the content and have not written any legal landmines which contradict this clause into the sections we routinely don't read".

That is a likely response. But that will push authors who disagree with that to other publishers.

I've noticed a number of technical books developed in an open manner (though usually not under the GPL) that then sold well. There are also a lot of good people around software these days who strongly believe in the ideals of free and/or open source software. Therefore I suspect that insisting on strict copyright control will lose more sales than it gains. But people will make mistakes as they learn this.

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#13

Post by mikedouglas »

zck wrote: post #10
timf wrote: post #2

I was curious if the printed book included mention of the GNU license so I "searched inside" on Amazon. These two paragraphs are pretty odd sitting next to each other: http://timfreeman.org/copyright_dip.png

I'm not sure this is the case here, but it might be the difference between the actual text itself and the representation, arrangement, and style of the text as exhibited in the book. This happens in music, where a given Mozart concerto, for example, is in the public domain, but that doesn't mean you can photocopy a given sheet music of the concerto and hand it out; the notes themselves are in the public domain, but t…

This was an issue recently with the Google Book Search deal. Even though the books were out of copyright or orphaned, Google owned the copyright to the scans, and would only give a non-transferable license back to the universities.

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#15

Post by tjogin »

patio11 wrote: post #5

I don’t know where that leaves you as a business. I suspect this leaves Apress at the "Require all further authors to contractually promise us, in writing, that they are assigning Apress the exclusive right to publish/distribute the content and have not written any legal landmines which contradict this clause into the sections we routinely don't read".

Save for time-travel, they can't really do that when they decide to pick up and "publish" a book that's been freely available in electronic form for eight years.

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#17

Post by fauigerzigerk »

buugs wrote: post #3

This is what free software / free licenses needs, people who parade and exemplify it rather than compare it to non-free licenses or even hate on and fight against non-free software, by force.

I don't entirely understand his explanation though. All I understand is that Mark approves of what happened. I do not understand why it is a good thing and why he wants the world to work like this. He didn't explain that.

The whole logic of what and how you are allowed to charge for in the free software/content world seems completely arbitrary to me, even though I have read so much about it.

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#18

Post by thristian »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #17
buugs wrote: post #3

This is what free software / free licenses needs, people who parade and exemplify it rather than compare it to non-free licenses or even hate on and fight against non-free software, by force.

I don't entirely understand his explanation though. All I understand is that Mark approves of what happened. I do not understand why it is a good thing and why he wants the world to work like this. He didn't explain that. The whole logic of what and how you are allowed to charge for in the free software/content world seems completely arbitrary to me, even though I have read so much about it.

I'm not a lawyer, but my layman's understanding is something like this:

* If you wrote/created/designed it, you get to pick the license. You can give it to some people under the GPL, you can give it to other people under the BSD license, you can negotiate all kinds of crazy licenses for arbitrary recompense you dream up - it's up to you. * If you received a copy of some GPL'd code, freely or in exchange for money, you have the right to give copies to other people - freely, or in exchange for money. If you paid $1000 for some GPL'd code, you're allowed to burn it to a stack of CD-Rs and hand them out on the street corner. If you got it for free off the Internet, you can copy it to your own website and charge people $29.95 per download (whether these actions are moral is another question, but they're legal). * If you give somebody some binary executables whose source was under the GPL, whether you gave them in exchange for money or for free, you must give them the source too, or give them the right to ask for the source later. If they ask for a copy of the source later on, you're only allowed to charge the cost of blank media - regardless of what you charged for the binary executables in the first place.

I think that about covers it. How's that?

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#19

Post by fauigerzigerk »

thristian wrote: post #18
fauigerzigerk wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't entirely understand his explanation though. All I understand is that Mark approves of what happened. I do not understand why it is a good thing and why he wants the world to work like this. He didn't explain that. The whole logic of what and how you are allowed to charge for in the free software/content world seems completely arbitrary to me, even though I have read so much about it.

I'm not a lawyer, but my layman's understanding is something like this: * If you wrote/created/designed it, you get to pick the license. You can give it to some people under the GPL, you can give it to other people under the BSD license, you can negotiate all kinds of crazy licenses for arbitrary recompense you dream up - it's up to you. * If you received a copy of some GPL'd code, freely or in exchange for money, yo…

If you wrote/created/designed it, you get to pick the license

I do get that part. But it doesn't help me understand the merits of any particular license.

Thanks for your attempt to explain the GPL to me. I already knew what the GPL says, I just don't see how it achieves its goals of increasing my freedoms.

For instance, I'm not allowed to use the source code of some of the software google has linked to GPL code. Even when I pay for using it (like when I run my code on google's servers), I lose all freedoms related to some of the code covered by the GPL.

If they let me download their code, they would have to let me use the source and sell it as well. But they can simply not let me download it and force me to run the code on their servers exclusively.

So, in this scenario using the GPL means that I can not view or modify the source code of the software I build on. I have to pay for using it, and I have to abide by further arbitrary rules included in their terms of service, taking away even more fundamental freedoms.

Re: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain this to you

#20

Post by buro9 »

You know, I love this.

Simply because I like when I purchase classics (not covered by copyright any longer) that I have the ability to choose the book based on criteria I cannot usually factor in.

I can opt for quality paper, for a nice and well-spaced font, for good-binding, for a nicer jacket, for a specific translation.

I like that there is the potential that I could purchase this book and be able to choose such things, that I could say "I'll pay this guy over here a little more as he's invested in the quality of the medium.".

I was very happy with the contents of Coders at Work for example, but disappointed with the paper selection and choice of font. I would have happily paid more to have a nicer package, so I love authors who would permit multiple companies to do this.

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