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cc-licenses - Rationale for CC's GFDL recommendation

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Subject: Development of Creative Commons licenses

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  • From: Henri Sivonen <hsivonen AT iki.fi>
  • To: cc-licenses AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Rationale for CC's GFDL recommendation
  • Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2005 01:28:26 +0200

The CC FAQ recommends the GFDL for software documentation, but gives no rationale for the recommendation. http://creativecommons.org/faq#faq_entry_3647

The issue was raised on this list in December 2003. At that time, the rationale given was
- The GFDL is specifically tailored for software documentation
- It already has a substantial following in that domain
- CC doesn't want to compete with the FSF
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/cc-licenses/2003-December/000211.html

I think the rationale given is not particularly good.
- The GFDL seems to be tailored for book-length works--not for typical Web page-length docs.
- The following enjoyed by the GFDL is questionable. The GFDL has less chance becoming free in the DFSG sense than CC-by and CC-by-sa. Also, OpenOffice.org and the Mozilla Foundation have chosen the CC camp over the GFDL camp.
- It seems to me that non-competition is the real reason.

I think the FAQ readers would benefit if the issue was discussed more profoundly without non-competition considerations.

--
Henri Sivonen
hsivonen AT iki.fi
http://hsivonen.iki.fi/





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