FDL University-courses II

[Wouter Vanden Hove]

I guess there's little doubt about the doc-format being opaque.
Converting to OpenOffice seems to solve the transparancy-problem.
Thanks. 

The real point of discussion: asking a professor to switch to the FDL is
causing him (or his staff) extra work.


I somewhere read that the original author isn't bound by the terms of
the license. What exactly does that mean?

Can it mean that the professor himself is not obliged to create an
online copy, but only those who copies the course? 
That would be nice: the professor doesn't have extra work, just needs to
put the FDL-notice in front and a copy of the license at the end. No
extra work involved. 

Maybe there are other ways to circumvent extra workload for the
professor or his staff:
Most university courses are copied with a photocopier, a work often done
by student-organisations. Instead of releasing it himself as an
FDL-text, the professor could give the student organisation a choice:
release it with traditional notices, or under the FDL.  Some students
can then voluntarily work towards an online FDL-copy during the year,
while releasing in the mean time, traditional onces, and next year
switching to everything to FDL.

Or is something like this possible:
"This document is itself not under the FDL, but you have the right to 
distribute it under the FDL."
Thus giving all students the right to make copies in copy-centers for
friends and relatives, which is now not the case. Only in large volumes
like a publishing company trying to parasite (can i use that word?) on
the work by not giving royalties to the author on the printed books, it
would be obliged to create an online copy. In that way, those companies
are giving something useful back where a online-community can build on
further.



Wouter Vanden Hove
www.worldhistory-poster.com