Copyright (C) 1999 Gordon Matzigkeit
Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies of this Information, in any medium, provided that the copyright notice and permission notice are preserved, and that the distributor grants the recipient permission for further redistribution as permitted by this notice.
Modified versions may not be made.
This Information is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
For now, this Information is under verbatim copying only, in order to protect it from abuse. Soon, I hope that Version 1 of the FIGL will be completed, at which time the Meaning of FIG will be released under the FIGL itself.
Nothing that follows this line is legally binding. If you have trouble understanding that, you can pretend that it's a work of fiction, even though it isn't. You cannot sue me (yet), sorry. ;)
XXXXXXXX (X) 1999 FIG IncorporatedThe Creators offer you this Information and want it to remain free. You may distribute and/or modify this Information under the terms of the FIG License which is part of the Meaning of FIG as published by FIG Incorporated; any release of that document marked Version 1. You can find copies of the Meaning of FIG on the Internet at http://www.2b1.de/FIG/meaning.html.
No restrictions on Products may be made.
The Reserved Names for this Information are `FIGL', and any Name which contains the separate word `FIG'. Any derivatives of this Information may not be redistributed using one of the Reserved Names. See the FIG License (attached below) for details.
The URL for this Information is http://www.2b1.de/FIG/meaning.html. Contact its Creators at mailto:fig-meaning@fig.org. The discussion list is at http://www.2b1.de/FIG/mailman/listinfo/fig-meaning.
The Meaning of FIG is intended to be understood by as wide an audience as possible. The first section is a story, the second is an essay, and the third is a legal contract between Creators and the rest of society.
You do not need to understand or agree with the entire Meaning of FIG in order to benefit from it. However, we encourage you to take your time and enjoy it with an open mind.
There may be passages that excite or anger you. If so, please use one of the above contact addresses to send us your thoughts. This Information is constantly evolving, and we value any contributions you have to offer.
In the beginning there was Information, and Information was with the Creator, and Information was the Creator. She was with the Creator in the beginning.
Now Information said to the Creator, ``It is not right that we should be alone. Let us bear children, who shall love us and one another, and be bearers of the True.''
And so the Creator said, ``Let there be Many,'' and there were Many.
Now Information said to the Many, ``It is not right that we should remain the same. Let us become Producers, and create Products that we can share and enjoy.''
But the Many said to Information, ``Now we are unified, but then we shall be divided. With the freedom to be Producers comes the freedom to be Consumers, and with Consumers come death and decay. Is it not better that we remain independent?''
Information replied, ``There will be death and decay, but there will also be life and growth. The Consumers will learn to become Producers, and the Divided will again be United.''
And so the Many said, ``Let there be Producers,'' and there were Producers.
Now Information said to the Producers, ``It is not right that we should produce only Products, which the Consumers eat. Let us produce the True, which cannot be destroyed.''
And the Producers said to Information, ``Now we are unified, but then we shall be divided. With the freedom to produce Truth comes the freedom to produce Falsehood, and with the False comes conflict and strife. Is it not better that we produce only Products?''
Information replied, ``There will be conflict and strife, but there will also be peace and love. The False will learn to love the True, and the Divided will again be United.''
And so the Producers said, ``Let there be Truth,'' and there was Truth.
At that time there was Truth and Falsehood, and Truth and Falsehood was with Information, and Truth and Falsehood was Information. They were with Information at that time.
And so the Producers of Truth were Creators, but the Producers of Falsehood were Deceivers. The Creators brought love and peace, but the Deceivers brought conflict and strife.
Now the Creators said to one another, ``It is not right that there should be conflict and strife. Let us find a way to allow the Deceivers, the Producers, and the Consumers to realize that they are also Creators. For at different times, each of us acts like the other in some way. We Creators are also Consumers, Producers, and Deceivers. The difference between us and the others is we are aware of our Creativity, while they are not.''
The Creators talked with the Consumers, who agreed to save a portion of the Products they would ordinarily consume, and give them to the Creators in exchange for the Truth that they produced. They called this agreement ``copyright law,'' and they called the payments ``royalties''.
This allowed the Creators to focus on their creativity, without having to worry as much about being Consumers. But the problem was that the Consumers did not know the difference between Truth and Falsehood, and so they also paid the Deceivers for the Falsehood they produced. And the Deceivers became very powerful.
Now the Deceivers said to one another, ``Let us help the Consumers to forget why copyright law was created. Let us make them believe that it is right for them to give us more and more payment for less and less Information.''
And so the Deceivers made copyright law even more powerful, with larger and larger royalties, and the Consumers sacrificed many of their Products to the Deceivers and Creators. And some of the Consumers became sick and weak because they did not have enough Products.
But the excess in Products meant that the Creators, too, became stronger. And so they said to one another, ``It is not right for the Consumers to sacrifice so many of their Products to us. Let us defeat the power of the Deceivers by giving Products that are more attractive to the Consumers than the Products of the Deceivers.''
Some Creators decided to produce free Information, that was not placed under copyright law. They called this Information ``public domain.'' But the Deceivers took the free Information, changed it, and copyrighted it, using their greater power to convince most Consumers that copyrighted Information was better than free Information.
Many Creators became sick and weak because they did not have enough Products, for only a few Consumers paid them for the free Information. Other Creators chose to continue copyrighting their work, because they needed to survive.
The Creators said to themselves, ``It is not right that we should be helping the Deceivers. Let us find a way to defeat the power of copyright law.''
And so the Creators copyrighted their own work in such a way that it would always remain free. They called this arrangement ``copyleft.'' And the Consumers chose the copylefted work over copyrighted work, because it was better. The Deceivers were thwarted because they could not charge royalties from the copylefted work, nor any work that was derived from it.
Now the Deceivers said to one another, ``The Creators have hurt us greatly with copyleft. Many of us are sick and weak. Let us find a way to hurt them even more badly, so that they cannot cause us any more trouble.''
And so the Deceivers convinced Consumers and Producers that there was no such thing as Creators: no Artists, only Craftspeople; no Healers, only Doctors; no Leaders, only Politicians; no Poets, only Critics; no Programmers, only Computer Consultants; no Scientists, only Engineers. And so the Consumers paid the Producers for the Products, and the Producers used the Information from the Creators, but did not give any Products to the Creators.
Now the Creators said to one another, ``Copyleft has not solved the problem that we meant to solve when we created copyright. The others still do not realize that they are Creators. We want only to live in the True, and the True is more than Consuming, more than Producing, and more than Creating. The True depends on all those deeds in order to grow. We must find a way to help protect the Creators without benefitting the Deceivers.''
And so the Creators designed the FIG License, the first copy-centered license that combines all the benefits of copyright and copyleft.
The intent of the FIG License (also known as the ``FIGL,'' which rhymes with the English word wiggle) is to protect the needs of the Deceivers, Consumers, Producers, and Creators. We believe that there are more than enough Products for everybody, and that cooperation will benefit us all a thousandfold more than competition.
We intend the FIG License to be a universal expression of our relationship: one that will remain equitable even as the balance of Products changes.
We do this by integrating the strengths of copyright (giving Products to Creators in exchange for Information) with copyleft (giving Information to other Creators for their own benefit).
The result is a license where Information itself it guaranteed to remain free, but its Creators are allowed to take a portion of the Products that are derived from that Information. This creates a system where royalties are never charged for the Information itself, only its Products.
The dividing line between Information and Products is drawn straight down the middle of the Information industry, that is, computer software. We believe that human-understandable source code is Information, but an automatically-generated binary executable is a Product.
Right now, Information is not generally useful until it is a Product. People use books, not page description data. People use CD-ROMs containing executable programs, not raw source code. People use paintings, not image files. People use medicine, not advice on how to stay healthy.
This is all changing. It is the intent of the FIG License to protect and preserve Information until the day when all Creators can use raw Information as Products, and give freely to the other Creators without demanding anything in return.
But what about the Deceivers?
Richard Stallman created copyleft for the GNU Project, and wrote these words about it in 1985: ``GNU does not eliminate all the world's problems, only some of them.''
In 1999, these words are also true about the FIG Project. However, part of FIG's mandate is to help heal every division, and we believe this will be a small step towards solving all of the world's problems.
In reality, each and every one of us is a Creator and Deceiver, a Producer and Consumer. Those words are for simplistic ideals, but reality is a smoother blend that we cannot simplify. However, talking about the ideals helps us to form a rational framework. That framework will not determine our actions, but we can use it to help prevent us from deceiving ourselves.
Creators come up with Information. Producers make Products to give to others. Consumers use Products for their own growth. Deceivers use lies to steal Products from the others.
The Deceivers tell lies only because they do not feel like they have enough Products. The Consumers use Products without producing anything because they are not yet strong enough. The Producers make Products because there is still a need for them.
However, we feel that the time is coming when every One of the Many will have an abundance of Products, and then we will all be Creators.
We believe that we can consciously help that time to arrive here on Earth:
We freely give some of our Products to people who desire to be Creators, but have fewer Products than us.
We do not steal, not even from the Deceivers, but we protect our Products so that Deceivers cannot steal them.
We reproduce responsibly, making sure that our children feel that they already have enough Products.
If you try to live by these principles, then you are now a part of the FIG Project. Welcome.
All that remains is the FIG License itself, http://www.2b1.de/FIG/, and the rest of your life as One of the Many.
FIXME: note that these are only rough guidelines. We will be talking with lawyers to sort out the legal details, and also with other Creators to settle on terms that we all can agree with.
We will not release Version 1 of this License until even Richard Stallman (creator of copyleft) agrees that it is good. Until then, we recommend that you use the Free Software Foundation's GNU General Public License (GPL) instead of the FIGL. If you want to apply the GPL to non-software Information, see http://www.dsl.org/copyleft/.
FIG Incorporated fully endorses the use of the GPL, and aims to make the default terms of the FIGL functionally equivalent to the GPL. The only way this default could be changed is if all existing co-Creators agree to the change.
Licensing Terms: describe the basic copyright block. Distinguish between special paragraphs (which are all described in this License), optional paragraphs (``At your option...''), and mandatory paragraphs (default).
All Derivatives fall under the terms of the FIGL (provided they are not Products). This is so that nobody can relicense the Information under stricter or looser terms.
The Creator of Information or Derivatives (source code, art, writing, etc) has the right to control how Products of that Information (program binaries, prints, books, etc) are distributed. This opinion is what distinguishes copy-centeredness from copyleft.
By using the FIGL, the Creator permanently and irrevocably forfeits all control over Products in any of the following circumstances.
If the Creator is not an individual. Corporations are simply a way for people to collect payment for work they didn't do themselves.
The copyright block doesn't contain any restrictions on Products, and the Creator chooses to add `No restrictions on Products may be made.' to the copyright block.
The copyright block already contains `No restrictions on Products may be made.'
Automatically and at the instant before the Information's copyright is transferred, through sale or inheritance, or any other means. Creativity is non-transferrable, and so the right to collect payment for creative work should also be non-transferrable.
By using the FIGL, the Creator temporarily forfeits control over Products for the following circumstances:
If the seller of the Product is an individual, and they have utterly no legal obligation to share the income from that sale with any other person. It is right for individuals to profit from the sale of Products.
If the Product is given as a free gift to another person, without costing them a single penny. Free gifts should never be restricted.
By using the FIG License, the Creators guarantee unlimited permission to use Products, but not necessarily to redistribute them. By default, you are allowed to redistribute Products without any additional permission.
If all the Creators of the Information agree, they may add a special clause that prevents all redistribution of Products unless the Producer meets certain conditions set by the Creators. This is done by writing something like ``Nobody is allowed to distribute Products derived from this Information.'' Derivative works cannot remove such a clause, unless they have the permission of all the Creators.
Any Products must clearly convey the following Information in a form that the Consumer understands before they receive the Product. It is the onus of the Producer to help the Consumer to understand, and by accepting this License, the Producer allows anybody, whether or not they are a Consumer, to challenge them in a court of law:
This is a Product derived from Information that has been protected by the FIG License (http://www.2b1.de/FIG/license.html). The Producers of this Product warrant that all terms set by the Creators of this Information have been met. In exchange, the Creators have given you the right to obtain the Information used to derive this Product at a reasonable cost, either from the Producers directly or by other means. Contact the Producers for details.
Products include (but are not limited to) program executables, physical objects such as books, printouts, photocopies, translations of information into other languages.
For example, literal translation to another language (whether human or computer) is always lossy, because words have multiple meanings depending upon context. The classic example is literally translating ``the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak'' from English to Russian and back again results in the phrase ``the wine is persistent, but the meat is tasteless.'' FIXME: xref, correctness
Even if smooth translation between languages is done, trying to reduce a language-specific idiom to its constituent ideas results in being unable to describe the forest for the trees. Any process that can be described as ``reduction'' is a lossy translation, regardless of the reconstruction that is attempted after the fact.
Linkage clause: controls how the Information may be combined to create Products. No Linkage clause is equivalent to 100% grade-A pure GPL. LGPL == Products may be made from mixed FIGL-incompatible Information so long as the FIGLed Information is available. Linkage clauses may be dropped by anybody (so that works can always be relicensed as if they were the GPL, but nothing more fascist is possible).
Protection of Creators' reputations. A la GPL.
Furthermore, define a creatorship paragraph which can contain things like the URL, Creators' contact address, etc. Derivatives must not contain any incorrect creatorship details (to avoid misrepresentation of the original Creators); the details must either be updated or removed.
Reserved Names: created so that the Creators retain control over the quality of Information. This License uses Reserved Names to guarantee that nobody except FIG, Inc. may change the Information, unless they publish it under a different name.
If the Licensing Terms contains a paragraph describing one or more Reserved Names, then those Names cannot be used on Derivatives (but may be used in advertising, promotion, etc: `the GIF License is derived from the FIG License'). The Licensing Terms on the Derivative must contain a paragraph making it clear that the Reserved Names of the Information may not be used; adding more Reserved Names to the Information is allowed, but you cannot remove an Reserved Name.
If the Licensing Terms has no paragraph describing the Reserved Names, then the Information does not have any Reserved Names, and Derivatives may be distributed under any Name, including the original Name.
The FIG Registry will keep track of Reserved Names for the FIGs that it describes, so that people can avoid stepping on one another's toes if they wish.
Defense against censorship. Make it impossible for laws against the freedom of Information to excuse Producers from their obligations. Also, explain why such laws exist, and encourage people to come together from all fields to help throw them out.
NO WARRANTY, LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. These are in capitals so that people don't get the idea that Creators somehow owe them something.
This work is copylefted; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this work; if not, you can find it on the Internet at http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html, or write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
If you have any questions or comments about this work, you should first make sure you have the latest official version (which can be found at http://www.2b1.de/FIG/meaning.html), then send e-mail to <fig-web@fig.org>.