"DA" == Donald Arseneau <[log in to unmask]> DA> I've tried to come up with a good general-purpose way to DA> express the "proof of disappearance", and have not come up DA> with anything robust. If it were just for myself, I could DA> say "not posting to the usenet newsgroup comp.text.tex for DA> six months", but that's not good for most people. The DA> condition of "reachable by email" makes the most sense, if DA> there is an email address in the package source, but email DA> addresses change, and perhaps the return address doesn't DA> get updated. Do we really need to have a time limit built into the license? If what we're concerned about here is someone ``hijacking'' a particular package, then it might make more sense to define some restrictions on uploading to CTAN and leaving the license such that anyone can modify the package and make it available somewhere else. CTAN could be (and is, I thought) regarded as the ``official repository'' of TeX/LaTeX packages, and might require a higher standard of proof before allowing someone other than the original author to upload a changed version of a package. Perhaps such an upload would only be allowed with one or more of the following: * An e-mail message (possibly digitally signed) stating that the new author has permission to ``take over the package'' * An e-mail message (possibly digitally signed) stating that the new author has permission to upload this particular version of a package * Evidence that the original author is unreachable, and that the uploading author has tried multiple methods * Verifiably minor bug fixes or feature additions (the package remains backwards-compatible with older documents written using the older version of the package) That way the LPPL could be a very free license while still preserving an official TeX source tree with a significant level of sanity checking. If the changes were too great to allow complete backwards compatibility, the CTAN maintainers could enforce a name change on the package (while at the same time recommending the newer package with a note in the CTAN Catalogue or similar). We might want something that says that if the original author returns, she can accept or reject any changes made to the package in future updates, although that could be dicey should the modified version of the package become popular. I don't think that the license has to assume that anyone making changes is up to no good and restrict people's ability to make those changes or to make those changes available in some form. At the moment, the LPPL doesn't prevent an original author from making significant changes to their package that break backwards compatibility or even completely change its functionality. IMHO, the gatekeeper function shouldn't be encoded in the license, but in the rules for the archive. If the main TeX distributions (notably teTeX and TeX Live) stick with the official sources, then you're going to be able to extend the purity of distribution to something like 98% of the installed user base, because most people running TeX just install a complete distribution. On a related note, if CTAN, the LaTeX Project, TUG, or one of the European user groups could provide the resources for a centralized bug-tracking system that all CTAN authors could use, such a system could be a very valuable way to keep track of problems, fixes, and even the activity and availability of authors. (I'm thinking, of course, of Debian's BTS (bugs.debian.org), which tracks an enormous amount of information without being especially complicated.) Claire +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ Man cannot be civilised, or be kept civilised by what he does in his spare time; only by what he does as his work. W.R. Lethaby +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ C.M. Connelly [log in to unmask] SHC, DS +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+