With discussions going on at the maillist mostly, instead at the forum here, it might be important to at least mention the outcone of the debate we had on licenses:

This is what we'll do.

We'll adopt 2 licenses for now, being:

OCL: by default, for all content including texts, gfx, etc
BAL: in exceptional cases, when an author insists on that

The key difference between OCL and BAL is that the latter includes a clear original copyright statement, mentioning also that a third party can contact the original artist to obtain additional rights.
The OCL allows third parties to distribute OpenContent freely, and charge a fee for the copies as well. Both licenses are 'copylefted'.
OpenContent was designed to be compatible with the philosophy at gnu.org and opensource.org. I will establish communication with OpenContent.org to verify it.

All (old) content from NaN - and that's a huge database - will be available as OCL. Including website demos, articles, FAQs, tutorials, etc. I am also now discussing the rights with the Manual 2.0 publisher, and it is likely that we have the right to publish a downloadable version. In that case, I will make a complete downloadable version available for sale, and allow the DocBoard to use the text and images (not the design) for integration in the open manual project.

About the FDL discussion: here are the reasons not to accept it now:
1. It is too complex, most people don't understand it easily
2. It's not an accepted standard (yet)
3. It was designed for books only. It doesn't include other 'content', like artistic contributions, .blend files, movies, pictures, articles.

However, I will continue researching this and discuss it with some people to get the full insight on the topic. This will be communicated with the docboard. If, during the next months, a better understanding and insight has been reached on going for FDL for the 'book' project, I can contact all contributors to the manual project and ask them for permission to change the license. Being a representative from NaN, I can do that for the NaN content myself.

This might sound like a weak work-around, but I can't make a motivated decision for FDL now. If it can't be changed in the future, bad luck!

Regards,

-Ton-

And to answer the questions that will pop up immediately:

Yes, the OCL is in my opinion a license that applies to the definition of free (libre) software.
It defines a proper genereal license for content (creative products) that accompany free software. Including textbooks, tutorials, movies, and .blend files or games.

The fact that the FSF doesn't agree with this is something I will solve with both opencontent.org and gnu.org

-Ton-

ton wrote:

In that case, I will make a complete downloadable version available for sale, and allow the DocBoard to use the text and images (not the design) for integration in the open manual project....

What do you mean by "not the design"? Can the open manual project use smaller margins, 3 columns per page and an attractive font, like the original manual does? (Or would that be copying the design?) Can it use a similar colour scheme?
Also, can anyone use the text and images from the original manual as well as the new manual and make their own manual? (If they're not happy with the appearance of the new manual)