Copyleft - All Wrongs Reserved
Sociologyindex, Sociology Books 2011
Dr. Dobbs Journal (May 1976) carried Li-Chen Wang's Palo Alto Tiny BASIC for the
Intel 8080 microprocessor. There was the title, author's name and date with
"@COPYLEFT ALL WRONGS RESERVED".
Roger Rauskolb, modified and improved Li-Chen Wang's program and this was
published in the December 1976 issue of Interface Age magazine. Roger added his name and
preserved the COPYLEFT Notice.
The Emacs General Public License of Richard Stallman ws the first copyleft license which
later evolved into the GNU General Public License. The copyleft label was not yet there.
The term "kopyleft" with the notation "All Rites Reversed" was also in
use in the early 1970s.
The copyleft symbol which is the “reversed c in a full circle” is copyright
symbol mirrored but has no legal meaning.
Copyleft could be defined as a copyright licensing scheme in which an author surrenders
some but not all rights under copyright law. Copyleft allows an author to impose some of
the copyright restrictions on those who want to engage in activities that would otherwise
be considered copyright infringement.
Copyleft expresses the practice of using copyright law to remove restrictions on
distributing copies and modified versions of a work for others and stipulates or makes a
precondition/proviso that the same freedoms be preserved in modified versions.
Copyleft is a form of licensing and may be used to modify copyrights particularly for
works such as computer software.
Copyleft protects the freedom of others to use copyrighted works as if there were
no copyright law at all.
Copyleft licenses are also known as viral or reciprocal licenses because under copyleft,
copyright infringement may be avoided if the potential infringer perpetuates the same
copyleft scheme.
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An author may, through a copyleft licensing scheme, give permission to reproduce, adapt
or distribute the work as long as any resulting copies or adaptations are also bound by
the same copyleft licensing scheme. A widely used and originating copyleft license is the
GNU General Public License. Other examples are licenses available through Creative
Commons.
The term "copyleft" was originally a noun, meaning the copyright license terms
of the GNU General Public License originated by Richard Stallman as part of the Free
Software Foundation's work.
Copyleft gives each person possessing a copy of the work the same freedoms as the author:
to use and study the work,
to copy and share the work with others,
to modify the work, and
to distribute modified and therefore derivative works.
But these freedoms do not ensure that a derivative work will be distributed under the same
liberal terms. In order for the work to be truly copyleft, the license has to ensure that
the author of a derived work can only distribute such works under the same or equivalent
license.
Copyleft licenses make creative use of relevant rules and laws. By submitting the
copyright of their contributions under a copyleft license, they deliberately give up some
of the rights that normally follow from copyright, including the right to be the unique
distributor of copies of the work.
Copyleft licenses vary from one country to another, and may also be granted in terms that
vary from country to country. In some countries it is acceptable to sell a software
product without warranty, in standard GNU GPL style, while in most European countries it
is not permitted for a software distributor to waive all warranties regarding a sold
product. The extent of such warranties are specified in most European copyleft licenses.
Copyleft is a feature of most free software licenses. Many free software licenses are not
copyleft licenses because they do not require the licensee to distribute derivative works
under the same license.
GNU's Free Documentation License allows authors to apply limitations to certain sections
of their work, exempting some parts of their creation from the full copyleft mechanism. In
the case of the GFDL, these limitations include the use of invariant sections, which may
not be altered by future editors. The initial intention of the GFDL was as a device for
supporting the documentation of copylefted software. It can be used for any kind of
document.
Copyleft licenses are sometimes referred to as viral copyright licenses, because any works
derived from a copyleft work must themselves be copyleft when distributed.
Copyleft:
Word play, Copyright, License, Computer software, Music, Art, Derivative work, GNU General
Public License, Creative Commons, Public domain, Gratis versus Libre, Open source, Source
code