[PGCanada] Licensing for PG-Canada content

[Michael Hart]

As per the King James Bible example below. . . .

I just found the following King James Versions:

The Bible, King James Version                                            10900
Apr 2005 The Bible, King James, Revelation     Book 66[#86][bib66xxx.xxx] 8066
...
Apr 2005 The Bible, King James, Genesis        Book  1[#21][bib01xxx.xxx] 8001
The Bible, King James version, Complete, Books 1-66                       7999
Apr 1992 New eBook of Bible [KJV] [From many editions]     [biblexxx.xxx]   30
Aug 1989 The Bible, Both Testaments, King James Version    [kjvxxxxx.xxx]   10

Simply by searching for "King James" and "KJV"

Is there something wrong with our catalog or search engine that would not
allow the casual reader to find and use these, including the whole Bible
in one file, as requested below?

Should we do something to make finding these simpler or more obvious?

BTW, we also have several other English editions of the Bible,
in one large file or broken down by book, and also several in
other languages, all found with my search of "Bible."

Thanks!

Michael



On Sat, 29 Jan 2005, Andrew Sly wrote:

>
> Two thoughts here.
>
> 1) I believe that providing raw text files as an output format is
> a given. I personally would be very disappointed if this were not so.
> Some people will say "get rid of those old, obselete ascii texts",
> but they have proven to be the most portable, long-lasting texts
> for many purposes.
>
> A brief story here:
>
> As a Project Gutenberg volunteer who deals with catalog correction
> emails, I had a message to reply to not long ago, from someone
> who wanted to find all of the King James bible in one text file.
> Somehow, he had ended up viewing the catalog record for a PG
> release which contained the text of the King James bible split
> up into multiple html files instead. So we received from him a
> long message about how he comes to PG expecting to find plain
> text files, and what business have we got doing anything else....
>
> 2) What you mention below seems to me to have to do with the
> eternally recurring argument of "sweat-of-the-brow" copyright
> vs. "intellectual contribution" copyright.
>
> I do not know how this issue stands under Canadaian law,
> however, here is a quote which may be applicable from
> "Canadian Copyright Law, 3rd Ed."
>
>  Editions _per se_ are not protected by copyright. That is, the
>  way a work is typographically arranged (format, type fonts and
>  layout) is not currently protected by the law.
>
>
> Andrew
>
>
> On Fri, 28 Jan 2005, Darryl Moore wrote:
>
>> I think that maybe we could/should have an option on the web site to
>> provide the books is a raw ASCII form. In that form I think we could
>> even have a non-licence which clearly states that the text is in the
>> public domain and is provided with absolutely no restrictions.
>>
>> My thoughts around licencing of other forms are two fold:
>>
>> 1) I am assuming there is a reasonable amount of work which goes into
>> marking up the texts as James is planning. (This unfortunately may be
>> where my ignorance shows as I have not yet done any of this sort of
>> stuff.) Copyright law unfortunately does not provide any guidelines for
>> how much work constitutes a new derived work. By placing a licence here,
>> even if it is somehow determined that what we are providing are new
>> derived works, we will have ensured that they are treated like public
>> domain.
>>
>> 2) We need to ensure that a future malcontented DP volunteer does not
>> make everybodies' lives difficult by claiming his own more restrictive
>> rights on the works for the same reasons stated in (1). By ensuring that
>> the works submitters are consenting to the same licence they will not be
>> able to force us to remove works from the archives at a later date.
>>
>> Basically any licence would be to cover our asses. We could even state
>> that in other words, in the licence itself. Put in a preamble which says
>> that we don't think you should need this but...
>>
>> The only reason for the attribution is to acknowledge the work that DP
>> volunteers have done and to spread the word about the public domain and
>> Project Gutenberg. If we disavow the licence then perhaps we could just
>> make this a polite request.
>>
>>
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