[cc-community] Norm-enforced attribution (was Re: SA but no BY?)
Gavin Baker
gavin at gavinbaker.com
Tue Nov 20 12:45:25 EST 2007
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B. Rad wrote:
> Thanks to everyone that replied. I guess should explain why I would
> like a license like this. I currently do a lot of work with SVGs
> (Scalable Vector Graphics) and because of the open source
> human-readable format, there's lots of potential for collaboration or
> "community generated" content, à la Wikipedia. Images can be edited by
> anyone. This can result any many many authors. These images are meant
> to be used by anyone for anything. All that attribution can get in the
> way. Let's say someone makes a collage of 20 some images all with 20
> some authors. Then someone displays the collage in a movie about
> collages... Yes, I know that's extreme, but it illustrates my point.
> Sure it's nice to get credit where credit is due, but sometimes you
> may not want that. Some modification or derivative of your work may be
> something you'd rather not be associated with. Or maybe your work is
> used in some way you really don't want anything to do with.
>
> As for enforcing the SA part, I don't think that'll be an issue. For
> example, one project I'm currently involved with is Wikimedia Commons
> (http://commons.wikimedia.org). With all the records kept (file
> history, upload logs, etc.) I truly doubt people we run off with it
> and stop sharing. In the slight chance they do, it's still not a huge
> loss. Public Domain (the next reasonable choice) can potentially lead
> to much worse.
>
> Using pseudonyms works, I guess, as long as people don't have to
> include twenty bogus names when they use your work :) The real issue
> though is just making it optional. As observed (especially in the FOSS
> community), people in general attribute the author(s) without being
> required to. I just want to give them an option not to if it's
> impractical or not feasible or would degrade the derivative. I like
> drew's idea too, about having an option to forbid attribution. I can
> see certain situations where this would be ideal, however, it's not
> really what I'm looking for right now. Still it would be nice to know
> it's an option.
Coincidentally: There is a similar view among some in the scientific
community that attribution ought properly be enforced by norm rather
than by law. See, e.g. the Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing:
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/bethesda.htm
"Community standards, rather than copyright law, will continue to
provide the mechanism for enforcement of proper attribution and
responsible use of the published work, as they do now."
Interestingly, though, the most liberal widely-adopted license for works
seeking to meet that definition (e.g. by PLoS, BioMed Central, Hindawi)
is CC BY, where the *only* right (give or take) reserved by the author
under copyright is the right to attribution.
I suppose you could argue that they don't intend to enforce that right
(i.e. in court), but why reserve a right you won't use?
I don't have much of an opinion here, I just find it interesting that
the view perpetuated by the CC licenses is that attribution is a right
almost universally desired, when there appear to be a number of examples
where
(1) the author doesn't want attribution,
(2) the author doesn't want to require attribution, or
(3) the author doesn't want to use copyright law to compel attribution.
(There is a difference between 2 and 3: roughly the difference between
"You may attribute me if it's not inconvenient" and "Please attribute
me, but I won't sue if you don't".)
Maybe this reflects the tension between CC licenses as an intellectual
tool to encourage people to think critically about copyright, and as a
practical tool designed to grow a commons (optimizing license adoption
and ability to re-use licensed content).
- --
Gavin Baker
http://www.gavinbaker.com/
gavin at gavinbaker.com
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