Re: Improvements to section 5.{1,2} in outbound-rights

[Simon Josefsson <simon at josefsson.org>]

Frank Ellermann <nobody at xyzzy.claranet.de> writes:

> Simon Josefsson wrote:
>
>> How about the following?
>
>>  5.1.  Rights Granted for Reproduction of RFCs
>>    It has long been IETF policy to encourage copying and distribution
                                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>    of RFCs in full.  This permits wide dissemination of the material,
>>    without risking loss of context or meaning.  The IETF wishes to
>>    continue to permit anyone to make full copies and translations of
>>    RFCs, and to distribute them to anyone.
>            ^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^
> Diff mark by me, please correct me if I missed another diff.

You missed one diff here.

> It's okay, maybe a bit verbose, but less chances to get it wrong and
> split hairs.

Yup.  As instructions to lawyers, adding the word "distribute" is
probably not being verbose, but clear.  I'd even prefer if we'd more
of the terms that Ted mentioned as well:

  "copy, extract, distribute, and translate all text; copy, extract,
  distribute, run, derive any information content needed to perform
  the operations above, and modify (both to accomplish the rights
  preceding and to ensure broad distribution".

>> 5.2.  Rights Granted for Quoting from IETF Contributions
>>    There is rough consensus that it is useful to permit the quoting
>>    without modification of excerpts from IETF Contributions and
                                                               ^^^
>>    distributing the quotes.  Such excerpts may be of any length and in
      ^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>    any context.  Translation of quotations is also to be permitted.
>                    ^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^^ ^^^^^^^^^
> At some point it will be too verbose, when folks desperately look for a
> "trap", and there is none.  You could also say that any "quotation of
> translations" are permitted, translating pieces of text outside of their
> complete context can be difficult.

Here you got the diff wrong.  The text you marked is already in the
document.  I was merely adding "and distributing" here.  I marked the
real diff.

>> What remain is the current last sentence of 5.2:
>>    All such quotations SHOULD be attributed properly to the IETF and
>>    the IETF document from which they are taken.
>
>> I wonder whether lawyers will understand the fine precision intended
>> by that SHOULD?
>
> Lawyers not understanding a 2119-SHOULD probably can't help with this
> job.

Still, I think it helps to provide examples and clarification of what
you intend.  I believe too much of the intended meaning depends on the
interpretation of the word SHOULD here.

> The SHOULD IMO only means that there can be compelling reasons to
> violate it, e.g. you can post grep- or diff-results without
> annotations, you can write "be liberal" without a link RFC 1123, and
> you can talk about "features with a high astonishment factor"
> without a link to REXX and Mike Cowlishaw - IIRC in an IAB document
> Harald wrote "traditional".
>
>>  How about:
>>    All such quotations SHOULD be attributed properly to the IETF and
>>    the IETF document from which they are taken.  That means that there
>>    should be a strong recommendation that all such quotations be
>>    attributed, but it should not be a legal requirement for being able
>>    to quote a document.
>
> Actually "cannot be".  Otherwise the lawyers could send us back an essay
> about "fair use" that nobody (excl. lawyers) can decode.

Makes sense.  How about this:

    All such quotations SHOULD be attributed properly to the IETF and
    the IETF document from which they are taken.  That means that there
    should be a strong recommendation that all such quotations be
    attributed, but it cannot be a legal requirement for being able
    to quote a document.

/Simon

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