Re: nnagtfind 0.1 -- Find articles by message ID from the Gnus agent

Re: nnagtfind 0.1 -- Find articles by message ID from the Gnus agent

[Michael Schierl]

Xavier Maillard <zedek@gnu-rox.org> writes:

> On 13 Apr 2004, Michael Schierl wrote:
>
>> (Automatically generated with ges-post.el, version 0.6)
>> 
>> Feedback appreciated.
>
> Really nice and really useful for me (I travel a lot by train so...).
>
> Maybe you should request on the Ding list to add this to Gnus ?

No, sorry. I won't *request* that.

I'd do a s/Ro/Su/ on your Organization line ;)

Since when I *request* that myself, I'll have to have a conversation
with the FSF... strangely enough i could not find any online
(i. e. discussable with someone who does not live near me but who
knows something about the German "property right" law and
Copyrights[1]) version of that contracts - you find very often that
you have to "sign a contract" but not which one. And usually I don't
like buying "a cat in a sack" (a German proverb - dict.leo.org
suggests that English speakers rather buy "a pig in a
poke"...). People I've asked by mail told me they could send me a copy
by snail mail, but that does not really help since I either had to
scan it myself then or to send it further by snail mail).

So, this is not an option for me until these contracts are available
online. The other option of putting my code into public domain and
either send that to the FSF or to ask those who wanted to put it into
Gnus to tell the FSF that I *really* put it into public domain (argl,
someone is *very* paranoid here...) is not better either, I think.

So I'd let the one who wants to have that in Gnus find a better way
for that (btw aint there such thing as a contrib dir where everyone
can contribute to (who accepts a "free" license) but it won't end up
in Emacs?).

Michael

[1] AFAIK it is "illegal" in Germany (i.e. it has no legal effect) to
give up your property rights completely and assign them to someone
else. OTOH, you can of course sign a contract to allow $SOMEONE to do
whatever you may do with your property rights and will compensate for
any damage $SOMEONE gets for things you do with the software (or sth
like that). Together with international law this is just too risky for
me. (I'm a poor student and don't want to end up in court just for
sharing some of my self-written software with others). Even if I'm
right, that does, unfortunately, not always mean I'll win the
lawsuit...

FSF's copyright bureaucracy (was: nnagtfind 0.1 -- Find articles by message ID from the Gnus agent)

[Michael Schierl]

Reiner Steib <4.uce.03.r.s@nurfuerspam.de> writes:

> On Fri, Apr 16 2004, Kai Grossjohann wrote:
>
>> Michael Schierl <schierlm-usenet@gmx.de> writes:
>>
>>> Since when I *request* that myself, I'll have to have a conversation
>>> with the FSF... 
>
> It doesn't play a role weather you suggest to include it to Gnus or if
> I ask you if we can include it in Gnus.  I can only be included in
> Gnus after the paperwork has been done.

Yep. sure. 

But if I *request* it myself, there is a 100% chance that it gets
into Gnus. If I don't do si, it can still happen that someone says
"that code is ugly anyway, I'll code it again from scratch faster
than fixing it" (and yes, I won't say the code for nnagtfind is
beautiful) - in that case I had spent (lots of) time for something
which does not help anybody.

So, generally, I inform people/users about patches I make (i. e. for
Gnus/Emacs, I'll post them to g.e.s, for other things, I'll send them
to the mailing list), but I don't ever suggest my own work for
inclusion. Maybe a bad habit...

If it is *really* good, someone else will. (Okay, you could say that
Xavier is that someone...)

> To make it maybe more clear: The maintainer (or some other person)
> sends you the form (< 10 simple questions [1]) by email.  You fill it
> and send it to the email address mentioned there.  Then the FSF sends
> you the assignment (two pages) by snail mail.  You can study it
> without ruffle or excitement.  If you come to the conclusion that you
> don't want to sign it, you don't have to do anything. 

Am I free to scan the assignment (as png/ps/pdf/whatever) and post it
to a (semi-closed) forum or to an (open) usenet group for asking
people there what the *real* culprits of that assignment are? (Okay,
after some google searches I'd say posting to the newgroup I intended
is useless anyway. Every few years someone asks (btw. without posting
the text) and there is no answer that is not basically based on
presumptions.

And paying a lawyer for checking the contract is no option for me
either (paying money to allow others to use your work without paying
money seems strange to me).

Personally, I don't have problems signing contracts written in German
that refer to German law - if I see a sense in signing them -,
because I know quite well what implications are there and which parts
will be void anyway. But when the contract is in English and some
foreign law is concerned, then I usually say "no thanks". (Even if it
is something seen as "harmless" by you like a copyright assignment).

> ACK.  It's more complicated to explain the procedure than actually
> doing it. :-)

It's more complicated to explain how to get and take drugs than
actually doing it :->

(Informing about the implications it has can be quite complicated as
well...).

> It should be mentioned that when contributing to Gnus, you can also
> write "Emacs" as the name of the package instead of "Gnus".  If you
> only write "Gnus", another assignment would be necessary if you'd
> later contribute to Emacs other Emacs packages.

I thought that was clear. But I guess, setting a wildcard (any GNU
project) is not possible?

Hmm, we desperately need a subject change. Maybe a Followup-To as
well? Done.

Michael

Crosspost & Followup-To: gnu.misc.discuss

Re: FSF's copyright bureaucracy (was: nnagtfind 0.1 -- Find articles by message ID from the Gnus agent)

[Xavier Maillard]

On 17 Apr 2004, Michael Schierl wrote:

> If it is *really* good, someone else will. (Okay, you could say that
> Xavier is that someone...)

It is just good :p 

As I told  you, I travel a lot  (i.e everyday) to go to my  job place in
Paris and this is the kind of thing I was missing :p

So even  if you don't want  it included, I just  have to tell  you a big
thank you :p

-- 
  "GNU is my religion"

.O.  Xavier Maillard 
..O   Reims - France 
OOO  +33 6 68 04 64 37