Apparently the license of freesounds.org prevents inclusion into linux distributions as linux can be packaged and sold.

Dear Free Software Foundation:

Hello, my name is Greg Wolfe. I am a longtime member of the Spring Project, which is a Real-Time Strategy game engine developed and licensed under the GPL. Due to the engine's almost unique status, we are all very aware of the wrinkles of various license formats, and the subject of whether something may be distributed in XYZ manner is often a matter of discussion.

One issue that continually comes up with the GPL is that it does not explicitly require crediting the previous authors before redistributing. This is a factor that weighs fairly heavily with artists choosing a license to release under, as they strongly desire credit, as this is an important component of their career path.

Therefore, most "libre" art that is distributed digitally, whether visual or auditory, is being distributed under the Creative Commons series of licenses, which are in turn incompatible with the terms of the GPL, and therefore are generally seen as violating the terms of a Linux distribution.

This may in fact be an incorrect reading of the terms of both Licenses; a CC-NC image shipped with a package of GPL source is "mere data" after all, and does not impinge upon the License terms of the source itself, and unless the source performs a substantial modification of said data, it cannot be said to be making a derivative work (at least, that's how I'd judge that). However, the perception persists that this is not legal, and it is cause of a lot of stress and fuss in the Linux community in particular.

As I sincerely doubt that the GPL and Creative Commons licenses can be reconciled, given their disparate goals, but they both serve the cause of "libre" and an Open Source philosophical approach to distribution, if not modification (in my opinion, at least, although I am quite aware that the Free Software Foundation doesn't entirely agree with that position), please produce a legal analysis of inclusion of CC materials in GPL source distributions and provide a layman's Q&A on your website about this topic to dispel the existing confusion.

At the very least, give the Linux distributors some straightforward rules for inclusion of CC materials and release a Slashdot, so that the true position of the FSF on this issue is understood, because my impression is that all Linux distributors believe that if their entire archive isn't 100% GPL or Public Domain material, they may not distribute it at all. If the Free Software Foundation believes that these "libre" materials cannot be included in a Linux distribution even if they are "mere data", this is something worth clarifying and providing information the public, and the obverse would obviously have practical effects on policy.

I fully support the goals of the Free Software Foundation, and the Open Source movement; my goal here is to provide you folks with a chance to clarify your position to the public. I understand that the FSF cannot wave a magic wand and reconcile all possible "libre" licenses; what I am hoping will happen here is that the FSF will provide some clear guidance on this subject.

Hi Greg,

Unfortunately I cannot address the general issue you raise. I hope
others here will be able to do so, but given our backlog, it may not
happen any time soon.

I only wanted to reply on two specific points. First:

One issue that continually comes up with the GPL is that it does not
explicitly require crediting the previous authors before
redistributing.

It requires preserving copyright notices when redistributing. Generally
the copyright holder is the author. Therefore the original author is
credited.
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#IWantCredit

Second:

a CC-NC image shipped with a package of GPL source is "mere data"

I agree that images are usually mere data, though of course an image may
itself have copyright restrictions. But the bigger question is not the
icons, but the material licensed.

Thus, I found your choice of example somewhat worrisome. CC-NC is a
nonfree license; -NC forbids selling, but it is widespread for GNU/Linux
distributions to be sold on CD, etc. So I doubt any -NC license would
be appropriate for something intended to go into a free distro.


As I said, I hope others will be able to respond to the more substantive
parts of your request. I just wanted to answer what I could.

Best regards,
karl@gnu.org

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, and this is not official legal advice.

P.S. If you like, you can read more about "Linux" vs. "GNU/Linux", and
why we feel the latter is more appropriate to use for the whole system,
at http://www.gnu.org/gnu/why-gnu-linux.html.

Karl:

I do apologize for the specific example of CC-NC; it would have been more appropriate to cite the CC licenses specifically requiring credit, but not forbidding commercial use, such as freesound.org's use of CC sampling+.

At any rate, the comment about copyright notices is probably fairly helpful, in the context of understanding this issue. Perhaps that is enough to clarify certain aspects of this.