[Tango-artists] CC-SA & GPL Compatibility

[Josselin Mouette]

Le lundi 14 novembre 2005 à 20:15 +0100, Jakub Steiner a écrit :
> Hi Josselin,
> like I said I shouldn't be getting into legal discussions before I can
> show the reply from Novell legal dept. The reason why we chose CC-BY-SA
> was on a recommendation of Novell legal dept. In future we intend to
> ship Tango icon theme and have GPLed software use the set.

I hope they can come up with a good solution, meaning the icons being
available under a free software license.

> Also I should point out gnome icon theme is not LGPL, but GPL. But I was
> always puzzled by the language though. What is a "program" in an icon
> theme? The GPL almost always talks about a program. 

The GPL defines it itself:
        0. This License applies to any program or other work which
        contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may
        be distributed under the terms of this General Public License.
        The "Program", below, refers to any such program or work,
Here, the Program is only a denomination. It can clearly refer to a
document or some work of art.

> What is a source code for a bitmap icon? 

There have already been numerous discussions about it. The GPL defines
the source code like this:
        The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work
        for
        making modifications to it.
A widely accepted (although not by everyone) interpretation is that the
icon itself, in PNG format, is in a format perfectly suitable for
edition by the Gimp, and therefore can be considered in source form.

> How does linking relate to an icon? 

The GPL doesn't mention linking, it only mentions derivative works. And
a program using an icon is surely a derivative work of the icon, just
like a program using a library.

> Does
> everyone using the gnome icon theme icons on the web violate the GPL?

For icons not licensed under the LGPL, I think so.

> For me, the same or even bigger cloud of confusion surrounds the GPL
> applied on artwork. That's why I leave the legal decisions on people who
> deal with this as their job.

This is a wise decision, but, being external to Novell, I'm wondering
whether the Novell legal department's decisions are in the best interest
of the Free software community. From the distributor's point of view,
choosing the Creative commons license isn't a good sign on this matter.

Thanks for taking the time to read. I know legal stuff is mostly
annoying, but I believe it is important in the long term.

Regards,
-- 
 .''`.           Josselin Mouette        /\./\
: :' :           josselin.mouette at ens-lyon.org
`. `'                        joss at debian.org
  `-  Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom
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