[sword-devel] Copyrights and cash

[Troy A. Griffitts]

Thanks for all the comments.  A few of my own...

We have module making docs available and DESIRE others to make modules
We have command line utilities available and DESIRE others to make modules.
Chris would really LOVE for others to make modules.
Enough said about that.


Legit issue:  Although we can't prevent others from distributing 
unorthodox content, I wish they wouldn't.  I don't believe anyone thinks 
they can control this problem, and we would never think of limiting 
module creation to a few individuals to try.  We do, however, have say 
over what gets distributed on CrossWire's website, and I am not 
personally qualified to make all these decision.  I would love for a few 
trusted experts to own this.

Chris has started a GUI import/export tool.
The API is really catered toward making such tools.  I believe most all 
f our module drivers support our Writable interface now, which allows 
easy adding, deleting, linking content in a module.

Our module security offers true 128 bit encryption of texts.  Once a 
user has an unlock key, there is nothing that prevents that user from 
sharing this key with other people.  But this is the same will every 
software package I own, as well as all versions of Microsoft Windows up 
until XP-- and I don't think we wish to venture down that path.  To sum 
up: I belive our security is as good-- and mostly better-- than other 
software packages on the market.

In our distribution request letters, we offer, as a final alternative, 
for the copyright holder to distribute their module, themselves, for a 
fee, if they wish.

I am not against offering texts for a fee, if this is the only way we 
can make these texts available.  I WOULD like the fee to be as low as 
possible, and NOT from a 'for profit' company.  I don't offer my time so 
others can make a profit from selling my work.  If it came down to a 
'for profit' company offering sword modules, that might be enough to 
push me over the edge to spend the time to offer the texts myself on 
CrossWire at just the royalty cost of the modules.  As stated before: I 
don't feel that is where my time is best spent.


My hope to resolve this issue:  OSIS is becoming a widely accepted 
markup (at least conceptually) in many of these organization.  I hope a 
widespread library of OSIS texts will be available, and I feel we will 
be the first software package to support these texts.

As we continue to build relationships with organizations and our Windows 
frontend continues to develop, we have had continued interested in using 
sword to offer their texts to their target people groups-- this is 
especially true for non-english Bible societies.