OSL 2.1 for textbooks

[Brendan Scott]

Wilson, Andrew wrote:
>  
> Sanjoy Mahajan wrote:
> 
> 
>>I've been looking for freebook license for my physics textbook that
> 
> will
> 
>>be published by a regular publisher.  An old draft is at
>><http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/sanjoy/book/>.  I had planned to

>>those features.  Document licensing is complex.
> 
> 
> Indeed it is, and I'm not sure you're looking in the right place if
> you're contemplating using the OSL for your textbook.  Have you
> evaluated the Creative Commons license?
> http://creativecommons.org/license/

I think much more thought needs to go into licences for non-software.  The creative commons licences are a little egregious in that they permit purpose based restrictions (ie the non commercial characteristic).  This ability to have purpose based restrictions means that the concept of a CC licence is definitely *not* analogous to that of an open source licence (where such restrictions are prohibited by definition).

Brendan