Boilerplate License proposed changes

[David Lawyer <dave@lafn.org>]

Heres the existing license with two proposed changes which will be
discussed later.  + means add line; - means delete line

BOILERPLATE LICENSE

Here is a sample copyright notice and``boilerplate'' license you may 
want to use for your work:

Copyright (c) 2000 by John Doe (change to your name)

Please freely copy and distribute (sell or give away) this document
in any format.
- Forward any corrections and comments to the document maintainer.
+ It's requested that corrections and/or comments be fowarded to 
+ the document maintainer.
  You may create a derivative work and distribute it provided that you:

1. Send your derivative work (in the most suitable format such as
  sgml) to the LDP (Linux Documentation Project) or the like for posting
  on the Internet.  If not the LDP, then let the LDP know where it is
  available.
- Except for translations, send a copy to the previous
- maintainer's url as shown in the latest version.
2. License the derivative work with this same license or use
  GPL.  Include a copyright notice and at least a pointer to the 
  license used.
3. Give due credit to previous authors and major contributors.

If you're considering making a derived work other than a
translation, it's requested that you discuss your plans with the
current maintainer.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Both of these changes (although not the exact wording of the first
change) was suggested by Richard Stallman.  I fully agree with the
first change and am neutral on the second change but I expect that
LDP people will approve of it.  Please comment on them.

The first proposed change is to make it clear that one is not required
to forward any comments and/or suggestestions to the maintainer.  A
reason for the original wording was that one doesn't want someone to
create a fork in a document just for the purpose of minor changes and
corrections.  The word "any" implied that if you write any corrections
and/or suggestions then you are supposed to forward these to the
maintainer.  But someone might write this info in an email without
CCing the maintainer.  I think that people should have the freedom to
do this even though the maintainer is the one that needs to get this
information.

The second proposed change has already been discussed some on this
list.  According to Richard Stallman's (and GNU's) definition of free
documentation, one can't require any notification of the previous
maintainer, etc.
-- 
			David Lawyer


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