I'm still mostly out of action but thought you'd appreciate this<http://www.w3.org/QA/2010/03/update_on_html_5_document_lice.html> : Update on HTML 5 Document License Today at the W3C Advisory Committee meeting, we discussed the document license for HTML 5. We discussed use cases from the HTML Working Group<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2009Feb/0388.html> that call for a more open license than the current W3C Document License<http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/2002/copyright-documents-20021231.html> . The result of discussion among the Membership is that there is strong support for: - a license that allows the reuse of excerpts in software, software documentation, test suites, and other scenarios; - a license (or licenses) that are familiar to the open source community; - processes that encourage innovation and experimentation about Web technology, so that work can be easily brought to W3C for standardization; - making the HTML Working Group a forum that is conducive to participation by the community at large; - ensuring that the HTML 5 specification remains valuable to the entire Web community (see an update from Philippe Le Hégaret on HTML</2010/Talks/0323-html-plh/> that he presented to the Membership). In short, there is strong support in the Membership (but not unanimity) for all of the use cases cited by the HTML Working Group *except* forking the specification. Several W3C Members do feel strongly that the document license should allow forking, however. People at the meeting agreed that, in any case, copyright is not likely to prevent fragmentation. Several points were made: - people do not expect copyright to be instrumental to the successful deployment of HTML 5. Quality and market relevance will determine whether the W3C specification is successful. - innovation and experimentation are valued at W3C. Jeff Jaffe, W3C's new CEO, has already blogged<http://www.w3.org/QA/2010/03/first_impressions.html> about the fact that W3C should encourage participation from more developers as they are significant drivers of innovation. - W3C needs to continue to listen closely to the community's views on technical direction, including strongobjections<http://www.w3.org/2005/10/Process-20051014/policies.html#FormalObjection>. Although it may not always be possible to bridge certain cultural divides, W3C must continue to encourage the expression of opposing views and treat them with respect. For instance, Tim Berners-Lee's blog on reinventing HTML <http://dig.csail.mit.edu/breadcrumbs/node/166> discusses how W3C needed to adjust its course around HTML based on community input. We have work to do to find the right license to meet the stated goals: to make it easy for people to reuse W3C specifications in almost all of the scenarios people have expressed are important to them. We plan to work with the community on the details as we move forward. More information can be found in my slides<http://www.w3.org/2010/Talks/doclicense-20100323/> from the meeting. We welcome your feedback. On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 4:56 PM, Andre Merzky <andre@merzky.net> wrote:
Hi Sam, all,
ready to discuss licensing again? :-)
here is an update from OGF28: first, we heard rumours that you may show up here - this would be great, not in the least so that we can discuss the licensing thingie F2F. Usually that is way more productive than endless mailing threads like this one, isn't it :)
Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that we have been discussing the issues from the recent email exchanges (and I hope sincerely that these are the issues you are in fact concerned about) within the GFSG.
So, there was some discussion to review the current IPR text, and to clarify those passages which seem, in your reading, to hide the fact/intent that using any amount of text from a GFD for documentation and any other purpose is legally perfectly fine:
"...derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind..."
We will be cross-checking with similar texts of other standards bodies, in particular including IETF, which seem to recently have updated their IPR texts as well, to remove some ambiguities. The OGF IPR was originally modeled after IETF's, and, IIRC, was basically reproducing the OGF IPR word by word.
Further we have been discussing the point you raised that the state of OGF documents would be frozen in the case of OGF's disappearance. If this turns out to be a concern for the community, we will consider adding a clause which would release the documents into the public domain in the case of OGF's demise - we certainly don't want to hold anybody back in continuing to work with OGF documents in that case.
Both of the above changes however need to be evaluated, and need to be approved by the OGF board. While we don't think this is a problem per se, this will need time to be changed.
The OGF IPR is designed as it is to fulfil three goals: (a) support the production and consumption of standards, (b) ensure that OGF documents (i.e. documents released under OGF copyright) went through the OGF document process, and (c) secure OGF against legal litigations. The board will need to make sure that in particular (b) and (c) are not affected by the proposed changes. If this sounds overly bureaucratic to you: well, that is the way we work ;-)
Please let us know if changes along those lines would make you sleep better :-D
FWIW: for the same reasons as above (a-c), we do actually require that OGF documents are under full OGF copyright, and it does not seem likely that a proposal for dual licensing would find much support, if any.
Looking forward to see you in Munich!
Best, Andre.
-- Nothing is ever easy.