Re: How to make a non-GPL Org-mode exporter?

[Richard Lawrence <richard.lawrence@berkeley.edu>]

Hi Marcin and all,

Marcin Borkowski <mbork@mbork.pl> writes:

> after a short discussion in a recent thread, I have a serious technical
> question.
>
> Assume that (for some reason) I want to write an Org-mode exporter which
> won't be GPL'd.  (Use-case: having written a few custom exporters, I'm
> writing a tutorial on them, and I consider publishing a *tutorial* with
> GPL'd code a Bad Thing™.  (The idea of a programming tutorial is that
> other people can or even should reuse the code in the tutorial, right?
> And I see no reason to impose GPL on them.))

I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice, etc., but for what it's
worth, here's my opinion:

It sounds to me like you are not creating a program derived from GPL'ed
code, but rather *quoting* GPL'ed code (and introducing some
modifications to those quotes) in a document whose purpose is to educate
its readers.

I don't know about your jurisdiction, but in the U.S., that sounds to me
like it would fall well within the bounds of fair use:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use

(There is also a brief section there about fair use in Poland; maybe
that will help you?)

Only a court can say, but if you are only publishing this source code as
part of a tutorial, so that it
  - has an educational purpose
  - serves to discuss ideas that can be gleaned from reading the original
  - does not substantially copy the original
  - does not devalue the original 
then I would guess the GPL does not apply to the code, as it is quoted/derived
in your tutorial, due to a fair use limitation.

So my advice would be: (1) treat the code in your tutorial along
whatever lines are appropriate for quotation of copyrighted works in
your jurisdiction; and (2) maybe include a notice in your tutorial to
your readers, that if they create *and distribute* a working exporter
based on the code in your tutorial and/or code in the Org distribution,
the GPL may apply.

If you are actually distributing the complete exporter as a working
program, that seems a little murkier to me; the issue there, as you are
aware, is whether that working program counts as a derived work.  I have
no idea how to answer that question.

Hope that helps!

Best,
Richard