Toby wrote:
What!? how could this possibly be? Why would the GNU FDL be stricter than ordinary copyright law? If I quote a line from a biography of Winston Churchill in my own FDL biography, why must that be invariant? This doesn't make any sense to me.
Speaking only for text, you'd have an ethical (and, quite possibly, a legal) obligation to leave the quotation as-is; otherwise you're saying someone said something they did not.
That's distinct from coypright, though, which allows for fair use *but* each person has to determine whether they have the right to fair use; it's not a blanket license. E.g. I as an educator in school may pass the "fair use" test to show a film in class for free, whereas Joe Moneybags, who wants to show the same film for $10 in a theater without working out a deal with Paramount, would not.
IANAL,
kq
koyaanisqatsi wrote:
Toby wrote:
What!? how could this possibly be? Why would the GNU FDL be stricter than ordinary copyright law? If I quote a line from a biography of Winston Churchill in my own FDL biography, why must that be invariant? This doesn't make any sense to me.
Speaking only for text, you'd have an ethical (and, quite possibly, a legal) obligation to leave the quotation as-is; otherwise you're saying someone said something they did not.
As-is to an extent that avoids lying, yes, but not to the extent that fixes an invariant section. For example, if an original (by Dr. X) said "Churchill was a pompous windbag that everybody hated.", then I might write "Dr. X wrote "Churchill was a pompous windbag".", which is fair use in the context of an encyclopaedia article, and release that under the FDL. Then a derivative FDL encyclopaedia should be able to shorten it to "Dr. X called Churchill "a pompous windbag".", but that wouldn't be possible if my FDL release classified the quotation as an invariant section.
And I'd be surprised if writing "Dr. X said that Churchill was *not* "a pompous windbag"." would be a violation of any ordinary copyright law, although it would still be *intellectually* dishonest and unethical, and possibly even illegal as a matter of *libel* (if Dr. X felt that being cast as a supporter of Churchill's was a defamation of character).
-- Toby
On Wed, 30 Oct 2002, Toby Bartels wrote:
Speaking only for text, you'd have an ethical (and, quite possibly, a legal) obligation to leave the quotation as-is; otherwise you're saying someone said something they did not.
As-is to an extent that avoids lying, yes, but not to the extent that fixes an invariant section. For example, if an original (by Dr. X) said "Churchill was a pompous windbag that everybody hated.", then I might write "Dr. X wrote "Churchill was a pompous windbag".", which is fair use in the context of an encyclopaedia article, and release that under the FDL. Then a derivative FDL encyclopaedia should be able to shorten it to "Dr. X called Churchill "a pompous windbag".", but that wouldn't be possible if my FDL release classified the quotation as an invariant section.
Yes it would be, as Invariance only make a specific section non-modifiable, it does not stop you from deleting the invariant section and replacing with an equivalent statement.
Imran
Imran Ghory wrote:
Toby Bartels wrote:
For example, if an original (by Dr. X) said "Churchill was a pompous windbag that everybody hated.", then I might write "Dr. X wrote "Churchill was a pompous windbag".", which is fair use in the context of an encyclopaedia article, and release that under the FDL. Then a derivative FDL encyclopaedia should be able to shorten it to "Dr. X called Churchill "a pompous windbag".", but that wouldn't be possible if my FDL release classified the quotation as an invariant section.
Yes it would be, as Invariance only make a specific section non-modifiable, it does not stop you from deleting the invariant section and replacing with an equivalent statement.
What is the derivative author's justification for using the phrase "a pompous windbag"? Is that fair use of Dr. X? No, the derivative author never read Dr. X. Is that fair use of my article (that is, mostly they're making a derivative work of my article under the GFDL, but at one point they're separately making fair use of my article instead)? No, because they're not attributing anything to me or commenting on me; they're attributing things to Dr. X and commenting on Dr. X.
Ultimately, what the heck is the difference between changing an invariant section and replacing an invariant section with something very similar, when the similar replacement is, in actual fact, based on the invariant section? If I release something under the GFDL with an invariant section, I won't take to kindly to it if you alter my invariant section and then claim that you were really *replacing* my invariant section!
-- Toby
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