Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

Hi,

in the past, when giving people advice about Emacs on Emacs-related
mailing lists, I have frequently quoted passages of the Emacs manual (in
formatted form).  I have just now bothered to check its license again,
and clearly I violated pretty much all provisions of the GFDL while
doing so.

Since giving advice in mail or Usenet groups is a frequent occurence,
could we have a ready-built function that inserts all relevant copyright
notices, lists of invariant sections and other things required by the
GFDL around quotes of manual text?

It would be counterproductive if one could not both easily and legally
quote manual sections to people asking for advice.

Thanks

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[PJ Weisberg]

On Sun, Dec 19, 2010 at 12:33 AM, David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> in the past, when giving people advice about Emacs on Emacs-related
> mailing lists, I have frequently quoted passages of the Emacs manual (in
> formatted form).  I have just now bothered to check its license again,
> and clearly I violated pretty much all provisions of the GFDL while
> doing so.
>
> Since giving advice in mail or Usenet groups is a frequent occurence,
> could we have a ready-built function that inserts all relevant copyright
> notices, lists of invariant sections and other things required by the
> GFDL around quotes of manual text?
>
> It would be counterproductive if one could not both easily and legally
> quote manual sections to people asking for advice.
>
> Thanks

Given that this concerns giving advice over the internet, wouldn't it
be simpler to provide a hyperlink to the relevant section (which
itself will have hyperlinks to other related sections)?

-PJ

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

PJ Weisberg <pj@irregularexpressions.net> writes:

> On Sun, Dec 19, 2010 at 12:33 AM, David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> wrote:
>>
>> in the past, when giving people advice about Emacs on Emacs-related
>> mailing lists, I have frequently quoted passages of the Emacs manual (in
>> formatted form).  I have just now bothered to check its license again,
>> and clearly I violated pretty much all provisions of the GFDL while
>> doing so.
>>
>> Since giving advice in mail or Usenet groups is a frequent occurence,
>> could we have a ready-built function that inserts all relevant copyright
>> notices, lists of invariant sections and other things required by the
>> GFDL around quotes of manual text?
>>
>> It would be counterproductive if one could not both easily and legally
>> quote manual sections to people asking for advice.
>
> Given that this concerns giving advice over the internet, wouldn't it
> be simpler to provide a hyperlink to the relevant section (which
> itself will have hyperlinks to other related sections)?

There is no guarantee that the hyperlink will point to the same content
(or any at all) for the lifetime of the advice in archives.

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Richard Stallman]

It's better to include the text in your message, rather than send a
link, if the text is rather short -- around 20 lines or so.  In that
case, the copyright issue can be ignored.

If it is bigger than that, you might as well send the URL.

    There is no guarantee that the hyperlink will point to the same content
    (or any at all) for the lifetime of the advice in archives.

Any link can break, but these links don't break very often.
So I don't think it is a tremendously vital issue.
After all. Emacs changes too, and the advice might not apply
to the future version in which the manual is structured differently.

Anyway, you can state the section name in case the links change.


-- 
Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org, www.gnu.org

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>
> Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2010 09:33:31 +0100
> 
> in the past, when giving people advice about Emacs on Emacs-related
> mailing lists, I have frequently quoted passages of the Emacs manual (in
> formatted form).  I have just now bothered to check its license again,
> and clearly I violated pretty much all provisions of the GFDL while
> doing so.
> 
> Since giving advice in mail or Usenet groups is a frequent occurence,
> could we have a ready-built function that inserts all relevant copyright
> notices, lists of invariant sections and other things required by the
> GFDL around quotes of manual text?

Richard, is it indeed required for short quotations from the manual to
have all this stuff included?  That sounds excessive.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
specifically about such email quotations.

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> From: David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>
>> Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2010 09:33:31 +0100
>> 
>> in the past, when giving people advice about Emacs on Emacs-related
>> mailing lists, I have frequently quoted passages of the Emacs manual (in
>> formatted form).  I have just now bothered to check its license again,
>> and clearly I violated pretty much all provisions of the GFDL while
>> doing so.
>> 
>> Since giving advice in mail or Usenet groups is a frequent occurence,
>> could we have a ready-built function that inserts all relevant copyright
>> notices, lists of invariant sections and other things required by the
>> GFDL around quotes of manual text?
>
> Richard, is it indeed required for short quotations from the manual to
> have all this stuff included?  That sounds excessive.
>
> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
> specifically about such email quotations.

There is lots in the GFDL, but absent of "specific" instructions, of
course the generic instructions hold.  Posting only an excerpt amounts
to

  4. MODIFICATIONS

     You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document
     under the conditions of sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you
     release the Modified Version under precisely this License, with
     the Modified Version filling the role of the Document, thus
     licensing distribution and modification of the Modified Version to
     whoever possesses a copy of it.  In addition, you must do these
     things in the Modified Version:

       A. Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title
          distinct from that of the Document, and from those of
          previous versions (which should, if there were any, be listed
          in the History section of the Document).  You may use the
          same title as a previous version if the original publisher of
          that version gives permission.

       B. List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or
          entities responsible for authorship of the modifications in
          the Modified Version, together with at least five of the
          principal authors of the Document (all of its principal
          authors, if it has fewer than five), unless they release you
          from this requirement.

       C. State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the
          Modified Version, as the publisher.

       D. Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document.

       E. Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications
          adjacent to the other copyright notices.

       F. Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license
          notice giving the public permission to use the Modified
          Version under the terms of this License, in the form shown in
          the Addendum below.

       G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant
          Sections and required Cover Texts given in the Document's
          license notice.

       H. Include an unaltered copy of this License.

       I. Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title,
          and add to it an item stating at least the title, year, new
          authors, and publisher of the Modified Version as given on
          the Title Page.  If there is no section Entitled "History" in
          the Document, create one stating the title, year, authors,
          and publisher of the Document as given on its Title Page,
          then add an item describing the Modified Version as stated in
          the previous sentence.

       J. Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document
          for public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and
          likewise the network locations given in the Document for
          previous versions it was based on.  These may be placed in
          the "History" section.  You may omit a network location for a
          work that was published at least four years before the
          Document itself, or if the original publisher of the version
          it refers to gives permission.

       K. For any section Entitled "Acknowledgements" or "Dedications",
          Preserve the Title of the section, and preserve in the
          section all the substance and tone of each of the contributor
          acknowledgements and/or dedications given therein.

       L. Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document,
          unaltered in their text and in their titles.  Section numbers
          or the equivalent are not considered part of the section
          titles.

       M. Delete any section Entitled "Endorsements".  Such a section
          may not be included in the Modified Version.

       N. Do not retitle any existing section to be Entitled
          "Endorsements" or to conflict in title with any Invariant
          Section.

       O. Preserve any Warranty Disclaimers.


There is no provision for using the manual other than under those
conditions.  Short of an automated procedure that will take care of
meeting all those contraints, I don't see how anybody can practically
use the Emacs manual for helping users on public mailing lists.

It is conceivable to do a deep link to an online copy.  However,
navigating in info is _easy_ and _fast_.  Digging through HTML pages
isn't.  So short of an automated procedure that will provide a
corresponding publicly accessible http link when I am positioned inside
of my local Emacs info manual, the consequence will again be that I will
stop using the Emacs or Elisp manual for the purpose of helping other
users: it is just too cumbersome.

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Stefan Monnier]

>> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
>> specifically about such email quotations.

Isn't that covered by the copyright law already?


        Stefan

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

>>> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
>>> specifically about such email quotations.
>
> Isn't that covered by the copyright law already?

Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
content that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
permitted to provide.

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Yoni Rabkin]

David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> writes:

> Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:
>
>>>> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
>>>> specifically about such email quotations.
>>
>> Isn't that covered by the copyright law already?
>
> Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
> content that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
> Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
> permitted to provide.

(I'm not a lawyer and I don't represent the FSF but I have been
volunteering at the GPL Compliance Lab for the past 5 years, so I have a
bit of experience with these things)

We can't answer the general question of "what is considered a derivative
work" because it is too vague. Someone who really wants an answer takes
a specific case to a copyright lawyer and continues from there.

But in these cases we don't need a specific answer. Emacs' documentation
is the copyright of the FSF (and therefore only they are legally
empowered to enforce the terms of the license for the work) and I
seriously doubt that they will decide to act against David, or anyone
else, who quotes their manuals in a good faith effort to teach people
about free software. If the community recognizes a bad actor somewhere
taking advantage of this then that issue should be taken care of
individually.

So David may be right, and his attitude toward taking the license
seriously is commendable, but in this case I can't see it as a problem.

That said: the fact that there is this uncertainty, enough to make David
doubt his good work in the first place, shouldn't be ignored. We can ask
for a clarification.

One way to do this would be to open a ticket with licensing@gnu.org and
let Brett Smith and the volunteers deal with it (warning: it may take an
unlimited amount of time to get around to).

David can open this ticket by emailing the GPL Compliance Lab, but I
would be happy to do it myself.

-- 
   "Cut your own wood and it will warm you twice"

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Stefan Monnier]

>>>> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
>>>> specifically about such email quotations.
>> Isn't that covered by the copyright law already?
> Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
> content that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
> Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
> permitted to provide.

Hmm... that's not my understanding of the "reasonable quoting"
exceptions, tho of course these vary from country to country.


        Stefan

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:

>>>>> Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
>>>>> specifically about such email quotations.
>>> Isn't that covered by the copyright law already?
>> Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
>> content that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
>> Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
>> permitted to provide.
>
> Hmm... that's not my understanding of the "reasonable quoting"
> exceptions, tho of course these vary from country to country.

When written tersely, most recipes in a recipe book would fall under the
20 line limit.  That does not mean that you can post all (or any of) the
recipes online without asking the copyright owner.

A relevant Emacs manual extract may be similar to a self-sufficient
recipe.  DOC strings are mostly harmless in that regard since they
usually are purely descriptive.  A manual extract with an imaginative
useful example is a different level.

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Andy Wingo]

On Mon 20 Dec 2010 10:28, David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> writes:

> DOC strings are mostly harmless in that regard since they usually are
> purely descriptive.

Docstrings are GPL also, as they are in the source code.

Andy
-- 
http://wingolog.org/

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Richard Stallman]

    Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
    content

Please don't call works "content" -- that term disparages the works
themselves.  See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html.

	    that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
    Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
    permitted to provide.

I think you are talking about the standards of fair use,
and I think you have interpreted them in a manner that is
overly limited.


-- 
Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org, www.gnu.org

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[David Kastrup]

Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> writes:

>     Sure.  Namely it is forbidden by default.  You can't quote any creative
>     content
>
> Please don't call works "content" -- that term disparages the works
> themselves.  See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html.
>
> 	    that would suffice for not needing to get access the original.
>     Because then you are providing value only the copyright holder is
>     permitted to provide.
>
> I think you are talking about the standards of fair use,
> and I think you have interpreted them in a manner that is
> overly limited.

There is little point for me in interpreting them any saner than the
courts do since nobody is going to ask for my opinion when things go
wrong.

-- 
David Kastrup

Re: Function for quoting Emacs manual sections?

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>
> Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2010 14:27:13 +0100
> 
> > Maybe I'm missing something, but I see no part in GFDL that speaks
> > specifically about such email quotations.
> 
> There is lots in the GFDL, but absent of "specific" instructions, of
> course the generic instructions hold.  Posting only an excerpt amounts
> to
> [...]
> There is no provision for using the manual other than under those
> conditions.

Yes, I saw that, I'm just wondering if that's the intent.  I can
hardly see as reasonable treating a short email citation as
"modification" of a manual, but then IANAL.