License Change... Publican

[Richard Fontana]

On Mon, 3 Aug 2009 15:04:20 -0400
Eric Christensen <eric at christensenplace.us> wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 15:01, Richard Fontana<rfontana at redhat.com>
> wrote:
> > On Mon, 3 Aug 2009 14:46:44 -0400
> > Eric Christensen <eric at christensenplace.us> wrote:
> >
> >> So I'm concentrating on that first paragraph, second sentence only.
> >> So we should make it:
> >>
> >> Copyright © 2008 Red Hat, Inc. This material may only be
> >> distributed subject to the terms and conditions set forth in a
> >> Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license, (the
> >> latest version is presently available at
> >> http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/).
> >
> > That's the sentence I was recommending should be changed, because
> > the existing language is derived from the now-disfavored OPL --
> > since you're going to be changing the sentence anyway to change the
> > license reference.
> >
> >  - RF
> 
> So you like how I changed it?

No, sorry, I'm being unclear. :)  This is a small point but one I feel
is worth making:

The OPL text contains a "proper" form of an OPL license notice.
Someone, presumably Red Hat Legal, decided to use this license notice
language in OPL-licensed Red Hat and Fedora documentation. Since we're
no longer using the OPL, no need to use that OPL-specific license
notice language anymore either.  

If we were starting from scratch without ever having used the OPL, I do
not think we would have come up with that actual wording, although
there's nothing wrong with it in principle.  I'm therefore recommending
a more matter-of-fact license notice which I believe is more in
keeping with the CC universe and doesn't have the "you are forbidden
from doing this" emphasis I detect in the OPL language:
 
  This document is licensed under a Creative Commons
  Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.


This is not a recommendation with any legal basis; it's aesthetics.  

- RF