Re: [aspell-devel] Problems with aspell-en license

[Peter Makholm]

Branden Robinson <address@hidden> writes:

> Under my analysis, it doesn't matter, because you can't copyright that
> which is not copyrightable.

Wether you call it copyright or not it doesn't change the fact that
wordlists might fall under the IP-protection described by the European
Union's Database Directive.

So to distribute wordlists in the EU we have to be allowed to do so
from the holder of the IP-rights (whatever you would call this specifc
rights).

No license - No distribution!


One more time I would like to refere you to the debian-legal august
thread about licensing of aspell-nl:

<http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/debian-legal-200208/msg00268.html>

Or directly to the text J.H.M Dassen refered to in the August thread:

<http://www.bitlaw.com/copyright/database.html#directive>

  The second right, however, provides for a sui generis right that
  prohibits the extraction or reutilization of any database in which
  there has been a substantial investment in either obtaining,
  verification, or presentation of the data contents. Under this
  second right, there is no requirement for creativity or
  originality. In effect, this right gives databases in Europe the
  type of "sweat of the brow" protection that was explicitly rejected
  by the Supreme Court in Feist. The sui generis right lasts for
  fifteen years from the date of the database's creation.

The making of usable wordlists is a substantial investment in
verification. The work on the danish dictionary is one of the most
boring tasks I've ever been involved with in relation to open
source. I don't want to know how many man month we have spend and how
many we have to spend before we're comparable to the commercial
dictionaries.

-- 
 Peter Makholm     |    Yes, you can fight it, but in the end the ultimate
 address@hidden |                           goal of life is to have fun
 http://hacking.dk |                                     -- Linus Torvalds