I have been a gkrellm fan for a number of years. While gkrellm is distributed as part of Fedora, gkrellm-themes is not being distributed starting with F8 (although the package is still available as part of the F7 distribution).
The reason gkrellm-themes is no longer distributed is that there is no specific licensing indicated for almost all of the themes: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=385131
While themes are not necessary for gkrellm operation, they are nice "eye candy" and some produce more readable displays than others ... it is a personal preference.
I am volunteering to be a "limited time" upstream package "assembler" to create a new base tarball (gkrellm-themes instead of gkrellm-skins) which will have only themes with acceptable licensing starting with the two in the current package. But, before diving head first into an empty swimming pool, I wanted to determine if there is enough interest to warrent my efforts.
Using my friend google, I located: http://themes.freshmeat.net/browse/969/ all of which are marked in freshmeat as having GPL, OSI Artistic, freely distributable, or freeware "licenses". While freshmeat marks these packages as having licenses, examining a couple of the theme tarballs indicates that no license is part of the theme tarball itself. [see (9) below]
First of all, I need guidance as to what licensing would be acceptable (e.g., GPL, OSI Artistic, freely distributable, freeware, BSD, etc.). I need comments by (and perhaps some contact with) IP lawyers such as those working for Red Hat.
If I proceed with this packaging, my plan is:
1. Use the two GPL'ed themes in the F7 package as the base.
2. Add any other themes which have licensing embedded in a theme tarball.
3. Go through the themes in the F7 package and the freshmeat list to identify author(s) for each theme ... if there is no author (e.g., anonymous), drop that theme.
4. Send each theme author an email asking them for appropriate licensing. If I get a "NO" answer, drop that theme. If the email bounces (or I have not heard from the author after a month), drop that theme. For themes which have multiple authors (the "last" author hacked a theme of another author), lack of response or a negative response for anyone in the chain results in the theme being dropped.
5. My preferred response is for the theme's author to send me (or provide me access to) an updated tarball with appropriate licensing embedded ... add this theme tarball to gkrellm-themes.
6. If I get a response that indicates to use "xxx" acceptable licensing and provides me with a copy of that license, add the theme tarball and then add the email message and the license info to the gkrellm-themes but do not modify the theme tarball itself ... the rpm package will need to put the info in the appropriate place ... maybe make them doc files distributed in /usr/share/doc/gkrellm-themes.../ as license.<themename>
7. If I get a response that indicates to use "xxx" acceptable licensing but does not provide a copy of the license but I can locate a copy, proceed as (6) above.
8. If I get a response of "whatever ... do what you want" (or words to that effect), my action is ??? [add the theme, the email message, and a "GPL license??] ... what to do ... what to do?? Guidance please.
9. With respect to the packages listed on freshmeat, how do I handle packages where freshmeat indicates a license but none is embedded? I found one a theme with a README embedded in the tarball which says:
"If you wish to alter this theme or redistribute it, please give me credit or I'll hunt you down and rip your eyes out with my teeth. Ok? good. :)"
How do I handle this? There is an implication that the theme is under some sort of "freely available" license.
There may be other responses which is why I am interest in IP lawyer contacts. This may be need where a theme has multiple (chained) authors which have different ideas as to what the licensing should be.
As I said, I Am Not A Lawyer and I intend to take all claims of authorship at face value ... if an author says he created the theme and puts it under an acceptable license, then that is it.
Similarly, I will be making no artistic judgments on what is bundled into gkrellm-themes. Naturally, if anything is truly offensive, then that theme may be rejected similar to what was done with screensavers a number of years ago. In any case, turning gkrellm-themes into a Fedora rpm package will involve the usual review process which should kick out anything really tasteless.
I am not currently a Maintainer on any other package so I would prefer to turn the result over to a "regular" Maintainer. That is, if I can pull enough themes together to be worth the effort ... right now, two themes does not seem to be worth the effort. If nobody raises their hand, then I guess I will have to learn how to be a Fedora Package Maintainer.
Questions, comments, guidance, etc. are solicited.
On Tue, 2008-05-20 at 13:41 -0400, Gene Czarcinski wrote:
First of all, I need guidance as to what licensing would be acceptable (e.g., GPL, OSI Artistic, freely distributable, freeware, BSD, etc.). I need comments by (and perhaps some contact with) IP lawyers such as those working for Red Hat.
We have a list of acceptable licenses here:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing
Short answers:
GPL: yes Artistic 1.0: no Artistic 2.0: yes BSD: yes "Freely Distributable": maybe, I'd need to look. "freeware": maybe, I'd need to look.
I'd be happy to audit anything that you're unsure about.
~spot, with my Fedora Legal cap on
On Tuesday 20 May 2008 14:29:06 Tom "spot" Callaway wrote:
We have a list of acceptable licenses here:
OK, I took a look at the list ... wow that is a long list! I guess a lot of folks like spending time crafting unique licenses.
I assume all licenses in the "good" list are OK and all in the "bad" list are not.
Do you have a suggestion as to a "preferred" license for this kind of stuff ... graphics and configuration files mostly. I would really like to get most folks to all use the same license (see below).
Also, do you have any suggestions on how to handle cases where multiple individuals have had their hand in things: A creates a theme. B then modifies A's theme to create a new theme. C comes along and modifies B's theme plus add some stuff from a theme created by D to create yet another theme. That may sound convoluted but it appears to be the case for some of these themes.
I also assume that any theme citing Carsten Haitzler's (Rasterman's) enlightenment window manager as a source is OK (I do not need that author's blessing too).
I am not sure what will be needed in the SPEC file with respect to licensing (since you are reviewing spec files). I sure do not want to see a bunch of theme packages ... one for every license type. That is too much over-achieving.
Gene
Gene,
Apologies for the delayed reply. Please keep in mind that IANAL, I just play one on TV.
On Fri, 2008-05-23 at 17:36 -0400, Gene Czarcinski wrote:
I assume all licenses in the "good" list are OK and all in the "bad" list are not.
Yes, this is correct.
Do you have a suggestion as to a "preferred" license for this kind of stuff ... graphics and configuration files mostly. I would really like to get most folks to all use the same license (see below).
For graphics, you can safely use the licenses here:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing#Good_Licenses_3
I would specifically recommend CC-BY or CC-BY-SA, as those provide the most flexibility and the opportunity for derived art.
For configuration files, generally any permissive license should work. You might avoid any license that is too software specific, but MIT (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing/MIT#Old_Style) might not be a bad fit.
Also, do you have any suggestions on how to handle cases where multiple individuals have had their hand in things: A creates a theme. B then modifies A's theme to create a new theme. C comes along and modifies B's theme plus add some stuff from a theme created by D to create yet another theme. That may sound convoluted but it appears to be the case for some of these themes.
Well, in such a scenario, A, B, C, and D probably have made copyrightable contributions to the work (the ABCD theme). Unless B, C, and D have agreed to assign copyright to A (or some other single party), they would all need to agree on the license for the work. This is a big reason why it is important for anyone generating copyrightable content to license that content. If A had put it under the CC-BY license, then when B, C, and D made changes, their changes would be automatically available under that license (note, this is not always true, but it is in this specific scenario).
I also assume that any theme citing Carsten Haitzler's (Rasterman's) enlightenment window manager as a source is OK (I do not need that author's blessing too).
You should see what license that Carsten's source content is under. Assuming that the derived works do not have a license which conflicts with Carsten's license, there should not be a need to get his blessing. In the event where no license is defined on the new derived work, you can safely assume the derived work inherits Carsten's license (but it never hurts to ask the copyright holder who made the modifications for his intention).
I am not sure what will be needed in the SPEC file with respect to licensing (since you are reviewing spec files). I sure do not want to see a bunch of theme packages ... one for every license type. That is too much over-achieving.
No, this should not be necessary. When you get to that point, I can help you through it.
~spot