Re: [DNSOP] draft-hsyu-message-fragments replacement status updated by Cindy Morgan

[Michael StJohns <[e-mail]>]

In line:

On 5/1/2022 1:41 PM, John Levine wrote:
> It appears that Mukund Sivaraman  <[e-mail]> said:
>>    Copyright (c) 2022 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
>>    document authors.  All rights reserved.
>>
>> By way of this, by removing the names of authors, isn't the copyright
>> notice attributed to the (original) document authors also being removed?
>>
>> Clearly the text is not copyright of the new authors in this document: ...

Actually, a derivative work (term of art) has a copyright that is 
distinct from the work from which it is derived.  In this case, the 
authors of the document are the authors for the purposes of copyright 
for the text in the document - regardless of where the text originates, 
and with the caveat for derivative works, that there is an appropriate 
license associated with the original work that allows for derivative 
works.  I could take the original document, change one word and the 
authors, publish it as an ID and, as long as I follow the license terms 
for derivative works, would be considered the author for copyright 
purposes of the new document.

> Hi, trustee of the IETF Trust here. With rare exceptions that don't apply here,
> when anyone submits an I-D or publishes an RFC, they grant a permanent license
> to let anyone use the material in later drafts or RFCs in the IETF process.
> There is no requirement for attribution or notice. We made that decision
> deliberately, so that new drafts and RFCs can build on old ones. It also happens
> that due to a treaty called the Berne Convention, the copyright notice on a
> document no longer has any legal meaning at all.

And that's where the license comes in.  For the referenced documents, 
unless the boilerplate explicitly disclaims the right to produce 
derivative works, anyone who wants can do so - as part of the IETF 
process.  So while I could publish an ID as above, I couldn't file off 
the serial numbers completely (i.e., submit this an original work in 
some space other than the IETF).

>
> While taking someone else's draft and putting your name on it as another draft
> is legal, that's not the question here. It's whether it's ethical and something
> we want to encourage. My impression is that in this case it was a
> misunderstanding and I hope it will be sorted out shortly.

The language of the license reads in part "Copyright (c) 2015 IETF Trust 
and persons identified as the document authors." There may be good - 
legal related - reasons to take off authors who didn't participate in 
the current document and remove them to an Acknowledgement section.  
IANAL, but I wonder not only about rights conferred by a copyright, but 
whether there are also responsibilities that someone may want to 
disclaim or at least explicitly agree to upon publication?

I expect that the IETF is going to have to make a "policy" to cover this.

Later, Mike

>
> R's,
> John
>
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