add discussion of fsf/dfsg conflict over gfdl.

git-svn-id: svn://tug.org/texlive/trunk@1636 c570f23f-e606-0410-a88d-b1316a301751

1 files changed, 37 insertions, 13 deletions

diff --git a/Master/LICENSE.TL b/Master/LICENSE.TL
index a7f43a862ed..a36e0000fc6 100644
--- a/Master/LICENSE.TL
+++ b/Master/LICENSE.TL
@@ -2,11 +2,12 @@ $Id$
 
 COPYING CONDITIONS FOR TeX Live:
 
-To the best of our knowledge, all software in this distribution is
-freely redistributable (libre, that is, not necessarily gratis), within
-the Free Software Foundation's definition and Debian Free Software
-Guidelines.  If you find any non-free files included, please contact us
-(references given below).
+To the best of our knowledge, all software in the TeX Live distribution
+is freely redistributable (libre, that is, not necessarily gratis),
+within the Free Software Foundation's definition and the Debian Free
+Software Guidelines.  Where the two conflict, we generally follow the
+FSF (see [*] below).  If you find any non-free files included, please
+contact us (references given at the end).
 
 That said, TeX Live has neither a single copyright holder nor a single
 license covering its entire contents, since it is a collection of many
@@ -42,9 +43,9 @@ not us, in case of questions or problems.  A new top-level
 README.<yourwork> file is a good place to describe the general situation.
 
 - Especially (but not necessarily) if changes or additions are made, we
-recommend a clearly different title, such as "<your work> demo CD",
-based on TeX Live YYYY demo (with updates)", where YYYY is the year of
-TeX Live you are publishing.  This credits both our work and yours.
+recommend a clearly different title, such as "<your work> DVD", based on
+TeX Live YYYY (with updates)", where YYYY is the year of TeX Live you
+are publishing.  This credits both our work and yours.
 
 - You absolutely may *not* place your own copyright on the entire
 distribution, since it is not your work (as stated above, TeX Live is
@@ -95,16 +96,39 @@ LICENSING FOR NEW PACKAGES:
 
 Finally, we are often asked what license to use for new work.  To be
 considered for inclusion on TeX Live, a package must use a free software
-license, such as the LaTeX Project Public License, the GNU Public
-License, the X Window System license, the modified BSD license, etc., or
-be put into the public domain.  Please see the url's below for more
-discussion of this.
+license, such as the LaTeX Project Public License, the GNU General
+Public License, the X Window System license, the modified BSD license,
+etc., or be put into the public domain.  Please see the url's below for
+more discussion of this.
 
 Thanks for your interest in TeX.
 
-- Sebastian Rahtz, editor, for the TeX Live team
+- Karl Berry, editor, for the TeX Live team
 
+------------------------------------------------------------
+[*] Conflicts between FSF and Debian.
 
+The most notable instance of legal conflict between the FSF definition
+of "free software" and the Debian Free Software Guidelines is in regard
+to the GNU Free Documentation License when "invariant sections" (e.g.,
+Front-Cover Texts, Back-Cover Texts, or Invariant Sections) are
+included.  (FSF considers it free, of course, and Debian doesn't.) 
+
+The most common instance of such a license is in documentation for
+official GNU packages -- such as GNU Texinfo, which is included in TeX
+Live.  There may be other GFDL'd files with invariant sections as well;
+we have not exhaustively checked.
+
+For TeX Live, we decided to follow the FSF, rather than Debian.  So such
+documentation *is* included in the original TeX Live distribution.  (In
+repackagings of TL according to Debian rules, it is removed.)  We surely
+wish these two major organizations in the free software world could
+cooperate on a documentation license acceptable to both.
+
+If other specific conflicts are brought to our attention, we will note
+them here.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------
 TeX Live mailing list: texlive@tug.org
 TeX Live home page: http://www.tug.org/tex-live/