[tex-live] Political showstopper

Fabrice Popineau Fabrice.Popineau at supelec.fr
Sat Sep 13 13:14:38 CEST 2003


Second problem is the copyright problem.

As far as I understand there are a couple of books that are waiting to
include texlive 2003. 

I have seen a copy of 'Digital Typography Using LaTeX' which includes a
TeXLive cd-rom (special edition prepared for the book).

The copyright text inside the book states that you are not
permitted to copy or distribute the cdrom. Neither the text in the book
or the copyright says that the cdrom is a free product. There is no mention of
TUG or LUGs existence and the fact this product is the result of the
work of many people and that it would be welcome for the reader of the
book to join one of the user groups. Worse, people buying the book are
even complaining that they have bought the cdrom and that we should help
them using it. Some of them thought they had to buy the book  to get the
cdrom.

[ By the way, Apostolos Syropoulos is one of the book authors and is in
charge of organising TUG2004. I wonder what are his interests in
organising such a conference when he is even not ready to advertise TUG
when he is publishing a book about TeX but that's another story.]

I have been told there are at least 3 other books (Addison-Wesley, MIT Press)
which have been published with the TL cdrom and such copyright notices.

I find it _unacceptable_. So my opinion is that:

- I'm writing a message to RMS explaining what the problem is and asking
if the FSF can help us (or at least me and the ones willing to be
involved in it) in dealing with this past situation (suing editors ? or
at least threatening them).

- I don't want to put any Windows version of the programs on TL2003 if
nothing is done to _prevent people to steal the copyright this way_.

You can expect me to make as much noise as possible about this
situation.

-- 
Fabrice



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