Re: Should we really translate legal notices?

[Kenneth Nielsen <k nielsen81 gmail com>]

Hallo All

In the Danish team we have translated legal notices under the
assumption that if it came to legal disputes the legal system would
automatically default to the original text. If that is not the case,
then we need another solution.

My opinion on the matter is this:

I think these legal texts should be translated, because the licenses
are so incredibly important for the nature of free software I think
non-english speaking people should be able to read them. I think
someone already mentioned in the other thread, that FSF already has a
little piece of text that we should add to the legal text that
explains that translations are for informative purposes only and that
in legal matters only the original text apply.

So in my mind we should simply add that extra bit of text in all the
appropriate strings (off course no more than once per application)*
and that would be it. If some localization teams don't want to
translate them, they are free to, and that ones that want to can do it
right.

Concerning Johannes comment about the availability of the original
text to the users, I will remind you that the GPL legals notices
already have information that explains to you how you can get your
hands on the original text.:

"You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with "
"this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple "
"Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA."

So if you really NEED to get the original text, then you should be
able to find it in the source package, and if that is not the case
simply send a letter to the FSF (it is off course way easier to look
up on the internet, but the point is that if you really NEED it, i.e.
because you are considering suing someone, you should be able to find
it.)

Regards Kenneth Nielsen

* On a more technical note: That will automatically make the strings
fuzzy and hence alleviate the situation of possible doing something
wrong immediately. After asking module maintainers to do this on their
own, we should quite easily be able to make a script that can locate
modules where this has not been updated and clean up the remaining
strings.