Jean-Philippe Ouellet Wrote:If you don't mind my asking (out of pure curiosity) what is it that aggravates you about derivative work? Are there instances where you feel that you are not being given proper attribution for your efforts?
I hope this doesn't come across the wrong way, I am not "trolling" or whatever it may seem, I am genuinely curious as to what usage could aggravate an author to the point of wishing he did not make his work available under an open/free license, so that I can ensure that I would not cause anything like it in the future.
In many cases, I think I even get more attribution than I "deserve". Take 3626bp01.dat for example. Yes, it is true that I made the first official version of it. But since then it has been renamed, BFC'd, improved and corrected many times, subfiled and CA certified. All these changes are totally ok with me, in this case I don't complain. But it seems a bit flattering to still give me credit as the author of that file, since probably only two lines actually are originally "mine", and they are both Type 0 lines.
And even those those may well in some occation have been re-typed by one of the guys modifying the file through these years.But yet, even with some more attribution than deserved, and with these unavoidable changes mentioned above in mind, I still feel there's way too much tampering with my works. And not only my works. When J.J. just passed away, there was an almost religious respect for his works; some of his files should be included in every updated, treated as shrines. That's one extreme position. Now we're at the opposite extreme IMO. He probably has more parts with the 3626bp01.dat Syndrome, where his name occurs on the Author line, but not one single line remains of is his work. On top of that, the LSC has set standards to make his original works "illegal". For example, JJ has no username. I do have a username, but I don't want to have it on the same line - or even in the same file - as my real name for reasons I don't feel like explaining here. That makes it impossible for me to submit any parts to the PT, as this is a reason to Hold a part. The usage of a single 0 in a line, which in Original LDraw was a mandatory way to finish an LDraw file, is today "illegal, but not reason to Hold"(!) ("That does not compute!" - some early sci-fi series...) That too makes all JJ's parts and hundreds of other part files illegal according to the current LDraw standard.
Yes, I'm aware that I signed the CA. But as some may recall, I did it quite reluctantly. And when I eventually signed it, I was unaware of what was to become of LDraw. Like I said, some changes like BFC and the CA Licence had to be made. Improvements that effects the visual output are course 100% ok, too. But the other tampering with the original works has gone way too far, one by one everything can be justified but together it's just too much, and the respect for people's work is lost and can neither be upheld by a meaningless "Author" line nor the CA Agreement.
/Tore