[Wikipedia-l] GPL Photos

[Brion VIBBER]

Stephen Gilbert wrote:
> --- Brion VIBBER <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
(http://gnuart.net/)
>>Hmm, the images at that site are licensed under the GPL. Is that 
>>sufficiently compatible with GFDL for our purposes?
> 
> I've wondered about that myself. Look at the FSF
> license list
> (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html), and
> find the "Licenses For Works Besides Software and
> Documentation" near the bottom. It mentioned that the
> GPL can be used for non-software works, but nothing
> aout FDL compatibility.
> 
> Maybe Jimmy could contact the FSF and ask about it.

Not a bad idea...

Doing some googling, I notice that the folks working on 'WorldForge' 
explicitly dual-licence artwork under both GFDL and GPL for use in both 
documentation and software...

And, I found in a message from RMS on a Gnome development mailing list
(http://mail.gnome.org/archives/foundation-list/2002-January/msg00004.html):

 > > Hum, I see. Did you try to compile such a list of
 > > GFDL-compatible for merging Licences ? And of course this raises
 > > the important point: Are the GPL and LGPL themselves
 > > GFDL-compatible license ?
 >
 > They are not compatible with the GFDL.  That is why it is important
 > to release the documentation extracted from the source code doc
 > strings explicitly under the GFDL.

Straight from the horse's mouth; sounds grim.

I've sent an e-mail to the GNUArt folks asking if they have an opinion 
on the matter... in the worst case, of course, we can contact the 
individual photographers and negotiate a separate GFDL license if 
they're willing. (Many of them have a contact e-mail address listed in 
the gallery.)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)