RE: Thoughts on Licences

MJ Ray wrote:
> On 2004-08-25 09:08:49 +0100 Noel Welsh <noelwelsh-/[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > Basically, we want to say that no commercial entity can
> > compete against our chosen publisher [...]
>
> This anti-commercialism really stinks. It's bad for programs and it's
> bad for books. It really is distressing to see what I thought was a
> free software group take this line.

Actually, I think the way Noel stated that is a bit too general.  I'd say we
want to be able to provide a publisher with some copyright protection
against people producing exact copies, or very similar but lower quality
knockoffs, of the book as produced by us.  That kind of protection is common
commercial practice, which is the reason we're pursuing it.

> We know that there are commercial
> publishers who have published more liberally licensed books (Network
> Theory and O'Reilly to name two - do you think GNU Press do?) so why
> is it necessary to do this?

Because we don't yet have a publisher.  We also have some reason to believe
O'Reilly might not be interested in this particular book.  Restricting our
potential publishers to a very short list is what we're trying to avoid.

> Even with an anti-commercial clause, this group is still not going to
> be able to engage in a standard publishing contract. Standard
> contracts have terms like: "The Author hereby grants to the publishers
> the sole and exclusive right and licence throughout the world for the
> legal term of copyright: (a) to produce print publish and sell the
> Work or any abridgement of the Work or any part of the Work in volume
> form (b) To grant licences sell or otherwise exploit (i) Anthology
> digest and quotation rights (ii) Serial rights (iii) Broadcasting
> rights (iv) Television rights (v) Film rights (vi) Recording rights
> (vii) Translation rights (viii) All other rights not specifically
> referred to otherwise in this Agreement but which may now or hereafter
> be capable of exploitation by an owner of copyright in the Work."

Regarding the suggestion I made (as opposed to Noel's which I haven't yet
internalized), the "work" would be the compilation, and the above rights in
that work can all be granted, as the publisher expects.

> That's copied from a real book contract that I have lying around the
> office. The publisher published a range of paperback internet
> tutorials. It's not particularly unusual when it comes to copyright,
> as far as I can tell. Has anyone else here actually checked the
> copyright terms of a publisher's book contract? I didn't spot it in
> the archives.

I have some experience, having been involved with two book contracts, with
John Wiley and IDG Books respectively (before the latter was acquired by
Wiley).  I've also had software publishing contracts, been a partner in a
software publishing company, and worked with lawyers related to software
licenses and other intellectual property issues.

Anton



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