[sword-devel] Platform for the distribution of non-free Sword Modules

[Troy A. Griffitts]

To piggy-back on what Peter is saying...  from the last few emails, I am
not sure everyone is on the same page...

Michael Paul Johnson already converts the free DBL texts to SWORD
modules automatically and makes them available for all of our software
(the ebible.org remote installation source).  As Peter says, I don't
believe an automated conversion of USX to OSIS is ideal, but it works
well enough to mostly read the text.  I think Michael has done the best
job he can do with an automated conversion of USX to OSIS to SWORD module.

My previous encouragement to proceed to pursue one Bible of interest
with a publisher was not an encouragement to do this with the intent to
start a 3rd party company to sell content for CrossWire software for
that publisher.  My encouragement was to follow our policy and negotiate
as a volunteer of CrossWire and explain CrossWire's policy to the
publisher and offer to do the work and let the publisher sell their
unlock key.  To be clear, I would discourage anyone from pursuing an
effort to start another organization to become a middleman selling
publisher data for CrossWire software.  There are very good reasons we
are a non-income organization and it has served us well.  It removes
jealousy from any individual making money from the collaboration of so
many.  I would make very clear to any publisher we speak with that we
discourage and do not endorse any organization who wishes to sell that
publishers content for CrossWire software, other than the publisher
themselves.  To repeat, I am not against modern content being sold for
CrossWire software.  We have spent much effort into facilitating this
for publishers and have a plan for them which they have been happy to
follow.  Summarily, in my experience over the past 5 years, any
publisher I have pursued has been willing to take advantage of our
current policy, as I have explained.  They are happy to sell their own
content.  They are surprised we don't want a cut.  They appreciate our
ministry.  Please do not try to solve a problem which you have not yet
run up against.  The issue is motivated volunteers.  We have had people
take this up in the past.  Here is our last effort:

http://crosswire.org/sword/copyright/

It has been so long ago, I can't remember who was leading that effort. 
It has long been defunct, but the goals were all aligned with our
community.  Reach out to publishers, explain what we offer them, keep
track of contacts and history of communication, encourage other
volunteers to understand our policies and get involved to push a pet
text forward.

Please feel free to do the hard work of following our policy to
negotiate, obtain data, convert, encipher, and give the key back to the
publisher to sell... the ultimate end would be for them to even manage
their own remote install source, which we are happy to add to our
autodiscovery registry.

Please also be specific here as to which text you are pursuing.  We may
already have a relationship.  For example, I am personally involved with
the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft (the German Bible Society which Tobias
mentions) and those who make the online distribution decisions for
copyrighted material.  It would be strange for someone else to email
them cold and say, "Hey, I represent CrossWire."  If you want to pursue
a text which I've not yet spoken to them about, I am happy to introduce you.

Regarding other modern material in digital libraries from Logos, et al.,
Tyndale House attempts to fill this void of producing freely available
modern scholarship.  As David Haslam has mentioned, much of their
material is in SWORD format.  I believe their intent is to ultimate make
their remote install repository fully SWORD compatible and for us to add
it to our autodiscovery registry so our other frontends can use their
great materials.  Currently, only their JSword-based STEP application
accesses their materials now and it uses some material which is not in
our module storage format.  David Instone-Brewer is the contact there
and we should touch base with them again to see where things stand.

Some of these digital publishers, e.g., Logos, also secure exclusive
digital rights from content creators to distribute their work
digitally.  They justify this by saying that they partially fund the
research by paying for exclusive rights.  Anyway, that's a completely
different topic...

Which reminds me...

Is anyone going to BibleTech this year?  I haven't been for a really
long time.  The last time I believe is when I met Karl there!

https://faithlife.com/bibletech

In Him,

Troy


On 3/13/19 3:01 PM, refdoc at gmx.net wrote:
> I think it is simply inappropriate for an external organisation
> to.negotiate on behalf of or instead of CrossWire
>
> Further I am really upset about the confusing of the "problem" with
> popular but expensive and hence unavailable texts and the other stuff
> in DBL. We have excellent relationships with many Bible societies and
> now you setting up something which confuses this is simply wrong.
>
> If you must, concentrate on NIV etc, but please do not create an
> alternative path for publication of CrossWire modules for the bulk of
> this world's languages
>
> Wrt bulk conversion. Does not work and those who think it does have
> not worked long enough with texts to the standard we want to see in
> CrissWire
>
> Peter
>
> Sent from my mobile. Please forgive shortness, typos and weird
> autocorrects.
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Re: [sword-devel] Platform for the distribution of non-free
> Sword Modules
> From: Tobias Klein
> To: Dominique Corbex ,SWORD Developers' Collaboration Forum
> CC:
>
>
>     On 13.03.19 13:14, Dominique Corbex wrote:
>     > In France, people use modern (non-free) translation too, but
>     *printed*
>     > Bibles.
>     > Some people I know have installed Bible apps on their phones but
>     are not willing to pay for a non-free version.
>     > And for good reason, popular modern translation have their own
>     free apps on Play Store:
>     > https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=air.com.SBG.s21)
>     > https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.book.bible.bds
>     > https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bible.jang.frpdv
>     > https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=bible.parole.de.vie
>
>     Apps are often times available with non-free translations for
>     free, but
>     that's not the case for decent desktop bible study software.
>     Even if the market is reduced to desktop bible study programs, that's
>     still a rather large market where Sword-based software could increase
>     its share.
>     Desktop bible study software is often times used by people in
>     ministries
>     (teaching/preaching/bible study preparation). And these kind of users
>     are usually also ready to pay.
>
>     Best regards,
>     Tobias
>
>
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