[steering-discuss] screen-shots Documentation Team

There are more than 50 EULAs for Microsoft Windows 7. Throw in the other
versions of Microsoft Windows, and you are looking at more than a
thousand different EULAs.

jonathon

While caution is certainly important, until there's a concrete example of any one of those EULAs posing a concrete problem I'd suggest we don't have one.

S.

Hi all,

just to keep your eye on one of the phrases Alex wrote, I remove most of this mail:

Alexander Thurgood schrieb:

[...]
I make part of my living out of representing IP rights holders in legal
actions against those who do not respect those rights, but also
defending those who happen to be on receiving end when the boot is on
the other foot.

So I would take this position as an expert's view.

Perhaps it would be possible for Alex to attend the SC call when this topic is discussed.

[...]

It is a no-brainer : either ask in MS writing, consult an attorney for
each territory of interest (expensive no doubt, and possibly
unsatisfactory, with fairly heterogeneous answers), or just plain don't
use MS's stuff.

Best regards

Bernhard

PS: If Microsoft considers the icons to close or minimize a window as belonging to their product icons (they are icons of their product Windows XP/Vista/7), it's hard to avoid them.

As someone who also has worked in this field for the best part of a decade, and given the advice Alex has already provided appears extreme, I would suggest also seeking counsel from another specialist if TDF wishes to pursue this path, perhaps from SFLC.

S.

Simon Phipps schrieb:

As someone who also has worked in this field for the best part of a
decade, and given the advice Alex has already provided appears
extreme, I would suggest also seeking counsel from another specialist
if TDF wishes to pursue this path, perhaps from SFLC.

+1

Bernhard

An excellent suggestion.

Alex

Hi all,

Someone suggested I sling in some caselaw or other references on whether
copyright protection is available for UIs :

US
Just one caselaw review :
http://www.legalserviceindia.com/articles/crind.htm

Europe
In European Union Court of Justice Case C-393/09 :
http://kluwercopyrightblog.com/2011/03/24/protection-of-guis-graphical-user-interfaces-some-comments-about-the-ecj-‘s-preliminary-ruling-in-bsa-v-ministervo-kultury/

involving the BSA against the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic
relating tp television broadcasting of user interface.

What the latter ruling states is that copyright is not available under
the Computer Program Copyright Directive 91/250/EEC, as that is intended
to protect code per se. However, copyright is available for UIs under
the more general Copyright Directive 2001/29/EC, providing that they
meet the criteria for awarding copyright, i.e. originality, author's own
work, etc.

So to all those naysayers who think that no-one sues anyone else over UI
elements - wake up, and take stock. Am I paranoid ? No, but people do
get sued. Do I represent the BSA ? No, but I know "peers" that do, and
believe me, love it or hate it, the BSA do sue people.

Please, by all means, get an opinion, hell, get several opinions, most
likely they will all be as different as there are different states in
the world.

Alex

Thanks, Alex. The fact there may be the scope to make a case is different from a calculation of whether this specific instance is likely to result in one. I do not doubt that it's possible to make a case; I'm saying there is no reason to believe in this specific instance that the risk of litigation is any greater than the risk of litigation on any other grounds, and thus it's not reasonable to restrict the effectiveness of the LibreOffice documentation in order to mitigate this risk. If you have any /specific/ cases that contradict this view I'd love to see them.

Regards

S.

Hi all,

Someone suggested I sling in some caselaw or other references on whether
copyright protection is available for UIs :

US
Just one caselaw review :
http://www.legalserviceindia.com/articles/crind.htm

Europe
In European Union Court of Justice Case C-393/09 :
http://kluwercopyrightblog.com/2011/03/24/protection-of-guis-graphical-user-interfaces-some-comments-about-the-ecj-‘s-preliminary-ruling-in-bsa-v-ministervo-kultury/

involving the BSA against the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic
relating tp television broadcasting of user interface.

What the latter ruling states is that copyright is not available under
the Computer Program Copyright Directive 91/250/EEC, as that is intended
to protect code per se. However, copyright is available for UIs under
the more general Copyright Directive 2001/29/EC, providing that they
meet the criteria for awarding copyright, i.e. originality, author's own
work, etc.

What the ruling also say is:
"In a second question, the ECJ was asked whether television
broadcasting of a GUI “constitutes communication to the public of a
work protected by copyright within the meaning of Article 3(1) of
Directive 2001/29”. The ECJ answers that if a GUI is displayed in the
context of television broadcasting of a programme, television viewers
receive a communication of that GUI in a passive manner, without
having the possibility to interact with the program. According to the
ECJ, as individuals do not have access to the essential element
characterising the interface, that is to say, interaction with the
user, “there is no communication to the public of the graphic user
interface within the meaning of Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29”."

That same rational apply to screen shoot in a documentation.
iow common sens still prevail despite BSA's effort.

So to all those naysayers who think that no-one sues anyone else over UI
elements - wake up, and take stock. Am I paranoid ? No, but people do
get sued. Do I represent the BSA ? No, but I know "peers" that do, and
believe me, love it or hate it, the BSA do sue people.

I'm sure that people sue, and some jurisdiction are indeed very prone
to frivolous law suit... but does that means that we have to abdicate
basic freedom and right ?

If you are that concerned about liabilities, make sure that TDF itself
does not author nor 'publish' any documentation... and have a
money-less French loi-1901 association to do the publishing... The
fact that TDF 'endorse' the content of a book does not make it liable
for real or imaginary infringements in that book.

Norbert

Simon Phipps wrote:

Thanks, Alex. The fact there may be the scope to make a case is different from a calculation of whether this specific instance is likely to result in one. I do not doubt that it's possible to make a case; I'm saying there is no reason to believe in this specific instance that the risk of litigation is any greater than the risk of litigation on any other grounds, and thus it's not reasonable to restrict the effectiveness of the LibreOffice documentation in order to mitigate this risk. If you have any /specific/ cases that contradict this view I'd love to see them.

I have been handling marketing for high-tech companies for 30 years, and I have never heard of a litigation for a screenshot taken on a Windows system.

Of course, we must carefully avoid to show portions of the screen which are not relevant to LibreOffice, but it is now very important to show that LibreOffice runs on Windows.

IBM people are trying to spread the concept that LibreOffice is mainly a Linux product, and we must therefore avoid using Linux screenshots as much as we can because they endorse this completely faulty concept.

> extreme, I would suggest also seeking counsel from another specialist
> if TDF wishes to pursue this path, perhaps from SFLC.

  We are not (as a project) a client of the SFLC. Furthermore, the SFLC
have a very large number of topics on their plate. The "just ask a
lawyer" motif is often just a stalling tactic - the advice a lawyer can
give will often be a nuanced one, and that advice inevitably cannot be
published. So, ultimately, I guess the SC would need to make a call on
this in a private session if it was asked to.

While caution is certainly important, until there's a concrete
example of any one of those EULAs posing a concrete problem
I'd suggest we don't have one.

  Here I agree; clearly respecting the EULA is mandatory, and obviously
fair-use and other considerations give very broad rights; pragmatically
it seems that this is a non-problem, and that the whole software
industry (including openoffice.org) routinely publishes screenshots from
windows machines. OpenOffice.org gets even more risque like this:

http://www.openoffice.org/dev_docs/features/1.1/images/ms_office_compatibility.jpg

  which I don't recommend :wink: so IMHO the existing practise seems to
suggest that this is un-controversial & non-problematic.

  Personally, I would prefer all our screenshots to be taken on Linux
because I love to support free platforms, but Italo is right - we need
to make clear that we work well on Windows too, one convincing way to do
that is clearly with screenshots.

  At least that's my 2 cents,

  ATB,

    Michael.

Hi,

published. So, ultimately, I guess the SC would need to make a call on
this in a private session if it was asked to.

I didn't get time to bring this subject up at the last SC meeting, but
I would indeed like to submit a request to the SC to take a decision
on this issue in a private session.

IMHO, it would be good to put the subject to rest once and for all.

Hi David,

I didn't get time to bring this subject up at the last SC meeting, but
I would indeed like to submit a request to the SC to take a decision
on this issue in a private session.

feel free to add the topic to the agenda in the wiki. It would be good,
however, if someone would attend the call who has insight on the topic.
I, for example, didn't follow the thread closely.

Florian

Hi Florian,

feel free to add the topic to the agenda in the wiki. It would be good,
however, if someone would attend the call who has insight on the topic.
I, for example, didn't follow the thread closely.

OK, I'll add it to the next agenda and would be there to listen, and
to present both sides of the issue, if invited. But if it's going to
be a private session then maybe non-SC members won't be party to the
discussions?

Hi,

OK, I'll add it to the next agenda and would be there to listen, and
to present both sides of the issue, if invited. But if it's going to
be a private session then maybe non-SC members won't be party to the
discussions?

we have a public session every week.

Florian

Hi Florian,

we have a public session every week.

Oh, sure, but Michael seemed to feel that this might be better
discussed in a private session? Would that be the intention? I can
sort-of understand that, given the kind of debate that might ensue?

In any case, I'll add it to the next agenda and thank you for your
permission for that.

David Nelson wrote:

Oh, sure, but Michael seemed to feel that this might be better
discussed in a private session? Would that be the intention? I can
sort-of understand that, given the kind of debate that might ensue?

I don't see why this should be a private discussion.

Screenshots usually have two main objectives:

1. Show the process for getting to a result through a combination of different features (inside manuals and how to documents)

2. Show the appearance of a new feature (for announcements of new releases)

In these two cases, screenshots are platform agnostic, provided that a feature is available on all platforms.

For a limited (I hope) amount of time, we need to have Windows screenshots in order to show to the external world that LibreOffice runs on Windows (something that should not be necessary, if the outside world was made of normal people, but we have some extraordinary people who hint that LibreOffice is mainly a Linux product, because of the relationship between SUSE and Microsoft, which is a total nonsense, and are actively promoting this insane concept).

Hi :slight_smile:
+1
to the idea of this being voted on by the SC/BoD without re-arguing the points.

I had hoped the discussion would just congratulate the Documentation Team on
neatly avoiding potential pitfalls that would take months to fix if MS used it
as a side-issue in a any future dealings with them. It makes sense to use
primarily Windows screen-shots in marketing, for the reasons Italo stated, but
Documentation takes a LOT longer to fix.

Inevitably there will be specific sections that focus on individual OSes but the
bulk of the documentation tries to stay consistent with itself rather than look
randomly thrown together. A flippant vote taken in under 5 mins to change
documentation to use Windows screen-shots would result in many months of
hard-work for the tiny documentation team and would result in no documentation
being out-there until that work gets re-done. Right now there are questions
about whether to bother continuing to work at the documentation at all until
after the SC/BoD has decided to tell the team how to do their work.

If the SC/BoD wants official documentation to be done in a way that demands
using Windows screen-shots and also relinquishes any responsibility for the
completed work so that individuals might be left facing the full wrath of MS as
individuals then i think we can forget about any documentation ever getting
done!

The question is really about whether to support the Documentation Team or to
tell them to re-do everything in Windows and then not support them at all! Have
they really wasted their time and effort doing a bad job?
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Tom Davies wrote:

I had hoped the discussion would just congratulate the Documentation Team on
neatly avoiding potential pitfalls that would take months to fix if MS used it
as a side-issue in a any future dealings with them. It makes sense to use
primarily Windows screen-shots in marketing, for the reasons Italo stated, but
Documentation takes a LOT longer to fix.

Sorry, but I don't see why we should mix two completely different issues. The documentation team sets the rules for documentation, and I don't see why the SC should change these rules if they are - and they are - well thought.

On the other hand, marketing has different - short term - needs, which are important for the project but should not be taken as a rule for the entire project. Marketing, sometimes, is very tactical, because of the changing situation of the outside environment.

Documentation, on the other hand, is totally strategical, and has long term objectives and rules. So, the two projects should follow two paths according to their short or long term objectives.

In my opinion, documentation screenshots can be entirely Linux (unless there is a specific feature on a different OS).

At the same time, screenshots that we provide to the media can be entirely Windows (while on the web we can post both Linux and Windows in order to give a choice).

Hi :slight_smile:
+1
I totally agree with all of that :)) It's a relief even if it's not the
finalised vote. Thanks Italo :slight_smile:
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile: