On 1/23/06, Anthony DiPierro <wikilegal(a)inbox.org> wrote:
On 1/22/06, Matt Brown <morven(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Are you sure this is the correct reading of the
GFDL? I see it as
meaning that you cannot take a GFDL'd document and relicense it. NOT
that the original author cannot release their own original work under
multiple licenses.
I don't see any other way to read it. It doesn't say you can't
relicense the document. It says you can't "copy, modify, sublicense,
or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this
License" and that doing so (actually, according to the language,
merely "attempt"ing to do so) will "automatically terminate your
rights under this License."
Technically speaking, though, "the Document" is only the GFDL-licensed
version. If you work on an original, non-GFDL version and then
relicense a version as GFDL which you release, then the wording cannot
affect the parent document.
Also, if you are the original author, you are not relying on any
rights granted by the GFDL. The GFDL grants people who are not the
copyright holder the right to distribute. If you are yourself the
copyright holder, you do not require the GFDL in order to distribute
the work - you are using your natural rights as a copyright holder,
not any additional rights the GFDL grants you.
I suspect at the very least that my reading is the reading the FSF
intended, and that the ambiguity is thanks to rather poor legal
wording of the license, rather than original intention.
-Matt