[OpenISO] Document licensing policy (was Re: Core Guidelines)

[Norbert Bollow]

Michael Rasmussen <michael at rasmussen.cc> wrote:

> I sincerely miss a part stating the license for documentation.

Yes, we definitely need a clear policy on that.


I would suggest the following:

"""
## Document Licensing Policy ##

OpenISO.org publishes only documents for which all copyright holders
have granted permissions allowing everyone to redistribute the document
in original or modified form, under the terms of at least one of the
following licenses:
1. Creative Commons Attribution License,
2. Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike License,
3. GNU Free Documentation License.

In the following, the term "acceptable license" shall mean any version
of any of the above-listed three licenses which has been published by
Creative Commons Corporation or by the Free Software Foundation,
respectively.

>From a licensing policy perspective, there are two distinct types of
documents:

1. Documents which are written from scratch within an OpenISO.org
  Working-Group.

2. Documents which an OpenISO.org develops my modifying a previously-
  existing document that is available to OpenISO.org under an
  acceptable license.

In the first case, OpenISO.org publishes the document with the
following legal notice:

> Permission is granted to copy, modify and redistribute this document
> under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.  In
> addition, permission is granted to copy, modify and redistribute this
> document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License,
> version 1.2.
> 
> THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED BY OpenISO.org AND ALL AUTHORS AND
> CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING,
> BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND
> FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL
> OpenISO.org OR ANY AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTOR BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT,
> INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES
> (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR
> SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
> HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT,
> STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING
> IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE
> POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

In the second case, OpenISO.org publishes the document with a copy
of the notice, granting permission to copy, modify and redistribute
under the terms of an acceptable license, by means of which
OpenISO.org has received these rights.

In addition to this permissions notice, the following disclaimer
will be added:

> THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED BY OpenISO.org AND ALL CONTRIBUTING
> OpenISO.org WORKING-GROUP MEMBERS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED
> WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
> MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED.
> IN NO EVENT SHALL OpenISO.org OR ANY CONTRIBUTING OpenISO.org
> WORKING-GROUP MEMBER BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL,
> SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT
> LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE,
> DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY
> THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT
> (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE
> OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

In either case, the legal notice is placed at the end of the document.
"""

Greetings,
Norbert.


-- 
Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch>                      http://Norbert.ch
President of the Swiss Internet User Group SIUG    http://SIUG.ch
Working on establishing a non-corrupt and
truly /open/ international standards organization  http://OpenISO.org