[svlug] Fedora or Ubuntu for novis

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Don Marti (dmarti at zgp.org):
> begin Rick Moen quotation of Sat, Sep 20, 2008 at 08:56:24AM -0700:
> 
> > Patent encumbrances aside, the closest you're going to get is either
> > a genuinely and unambiguously public domain work -- which is rarer than 
> > most people assume -- or one with a "Copyright (C) 2008 Owner Name. Do
> > whatever you want with this work" licence attached.
> 
> So why the Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication?
>   http://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/

As the text itself says:  to make the owner's _desire_ that his/her work
be considered to have entered the public domain be as clear as possible
to any judge ruling on that question, to maximise the likelihood of that
intention being honoured.

You'll see on my "public domain" licensing page a copy of my
correspondence with Prof. Larry Lessig, a couple of years back, about
CC's public domain dedication statement:  He admitted that the concept
was problematic, and uncertain to achieve its intended effect, e.g.,
depending on the judge and/or jurisdiction.  At the time, he said (IIRC)
that he recommended to the webmaster that the page be considered for
removal (or rewrite or something), next time the site got revised -- but
then nothing happened.

Separately, I saw somewhere where the CC people also acknowledged that
the dedication text is tuned to the characteristic concerns of USA
copyright law, and might be even more unlikely to have the intended
effect in various other countries' legal systems.

You might wonder why they continue to publish and (mildly) promote the
page, given those known problems.  Sorry to say, I really have no idea.
Personally, I think it's a bad idea, especially as "Copyright (C) 2008
Owner Name. Do whatever you want with this work" is a whole lot shorter
and avoids all of those problems.  (Me, I'd also want a disclaimer of
warranty coverage, but the "I hate licences and want to put my work in
the public domain" people aren't going to get that protection with their
approach, either.)