[cc-community] What does NC means?
drew Roberts
zotz at 100jamz.com
Wed Sep 19 08:45:50 EDT 2007
On Wednesday 19 September 2007 01:14 am, Fred Benenson wrote:
> Arguing by analogy is dangerous, and I see a couple of problems with it.
>
> First: while "Shared Source" is directly competing with the GPL and perhaps
> causing confusion, CC had no real corollary at it's inception. The GFDL is
> not totally free (read: invariant sections are confusing and non-free, just
> as some would argue NC clauses are confusing and non-free), and did not
> apply to non-textual work. Furthermore, releasing work into the public
> domain was difficult, if not impossible.
Fine. (Unless I get further info obviously.)
>
> On top of that, Microsoft has a particular specific financial interest in
> confusing the notion of shared source and open source and free software.
> Creative Commons, does not have an analogue interest -- they're a
> non-profit organization with little to gain financially with the confusion
> of "free culture."
Again fine with perhaps a caveat... People in non-profits can sometimes
(often?) do quite well for themselves as a result of their involvenemt with
said non-profit. Right?
>
> There's this stubborn insistence by some members of this community to
> assume that CC is constantly broadcasting that all of their licenses are
> equivalent to free culture. I do not think this is the case nor their
> intention. Creative Commons calls its suite of licenses creative commons
> licenses, not free culture licenses.
This is what CC does do:
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/History
I don't know about others, but what I say is that there is a lumping together
of things CC "out there" and that that lumping together causes confusion and
that I believe that it harms the interests of those of us interested in CC
for the Free aspects it does have.
What CC has done to my mind is to ignore my requests (I don't care at all that
they are mine) to create a Free CC brand and allow us to use that to try and
offset some of these negative aspects of that lumping together. I have heard
no official, yes, no, maybe. I have heard no suggestions as to a better way
to combat the problems.
I would like to see the issue acknowledged and some effort made to make things
better.
>
> RMS was able to define a term -- free software in a particular way, so why
> can't Creative Commons come to mean something in its own right? To assume
> that the general public is incapable of understanding the differences
> between licenses, and free culture in general, is a condescending and
> patronizing perspective. I've found that many people I know have come to
> discover the various meanings of the licenses independent of my explaining
> them.
>
> What does Creative Commons mean? Some rights reserved -- it depends on the
> license and the work, and now it's a bit easier to figure out what those
> are.
A problem is that this is too broad of a meaning to hold a community together.
On the Free Software side of things, the GPL and BSD camps seem to have
enough problems feeling like that are a part of the same community due to one
license being copyleft and the other not. It is expecting too much to think
that CC BY-NC-ND and CC BY-SA people consider themselves to be working to the
same ends.
> Creative Commons needs to do a better job at signaling these things,
Bingo!
> but I think it's headed in the direction.
Can you point me to some hope?
> It's also a shame that the
> signaling isn't as binary as it is with the GPL, but that is a reality we
> must accept as a consequence of the ambitiousness of the CC mission.
> Instead of offering one license for one very specific niche of work, CC
> offers many licenses for many different kinds of works.
Oh, no doubt the job is not an easy one.
>
> Take photography for example. What does it mean for me, as a photographer
> to publish a work freely? Besides its particular license (believe it or
> not) and subsequent copyright status, there are a lot of considerations to
> take into account in deciding whether or not a photograph is free.
Indeed. We do need a lot of education to go along with the licenses. I think
the guys over at ourmedia.org had some desires to create such educational
resources. Does CC want to get in this or cooperate with those who do?
>
> First, was I able to take the photograph freely? If it was in public, that
> should be the case, but suppose I wasn't in public. When should I be free
> to take that photograph?
>
> Moreover, the subjects of my photograph can greatly influence whether or
> not I can use it freely. I cannot, for example, use a photograph of my
> neighbor in an advertisement for a product he doesn't endorse. This has
> nothing to do with copyright, but is an obvious, though arguably needed,
> constraint on my freedom on my photos and my work as a photographer.
Truly, copyright and the realted areas need some serious simplification. That
is a different though perhaps related fight.
>
> What if I publish my photograph without metadata? Many budding
> photographers learn from each other's techniques by discovering the
> metadata from a particular photo. If I withhold this information am I
> making my photograph less free?
>
> Do I need to publish my negatives? RAW Files? They're the rough equivalent
> to source code in photography, and are certainly the "preferred working
> format" of photography, but are certainly not required to share and learn
> from a piece.
Well, I for one, still think we should have ongoing efforts to create workable
required source language for BY-SA.
>
> These are all questions that photographers have struggled with since the
> inception of the photograph, and have yet to come to total consensus on.
>
> Anyway, I raise them as examples of the complications inherent to finding
> "free culture" in media outside of software. Many creators in many other
> mediums haven't come to terms with what it means for their work to be free,
> and a copyright license may only be part of the solution.
I willingly grant that it is difficult. I think there are some willing to slog
through though.
>
>
> F
all the best,
drew
>
> On 9/19/07, Terry Hancock < hancock at anansispaceworks.com> wrote:
> > Giorgos Cheliotis wrote:
> > >>On Monday 17 September 2007 02:37 pm, Giorgos Cheliotis wrote:
> > >>>Thanks to all who contributed something to this discussion so far,
> > >>>it's been interesting to follow. I understand the points
> > >>
> > >>about "libre"
> > >>
> > >>>and "gratis", but personally do not have much understanding
> > >>
> > >>for fears
> > >>
> > >>>of "contaminating" the libre movement so to say with
> > >>
> > >>non-libre content
> > >>
> > >>>and/or ideas. CC's strength in my view lies in the fact that it is
> > >>>inclusive, and offers a menu of options, some of which are close to
> > >>>FSF licenses, and some of which are not (but are still more liberal
> > >>>than the usual copyright restrictions).
> > >>
> > >>I think many do not agree.
> > >
> > > That is ok by me, they do not have to :)
> > >
> > >>>A movement that is more inclusive has greater power, but will also
> > >>>have to make compromises to include different needs and different
> > >>>points of view.
> > >>
> > >>A house divided and all that???
> > >>
> > >>One major problem is that having this wide of a variety and
> > >>not easy way to distinguish causes confusion. Perhaps you
> > >>have not been exposed enough to have noticed this yet, or
> > >>perhaps you do not care enough about it to have noticed it,
> > >>but it is out there.
> > >
> > > If you are referring to the confusion that the definitions of some
> > > licenses can cause I understand this as a practical matter that one may
> > > be able to improve upon in future versions of the licenses. If on the
> > > other hand this is about ideological purity, this can be dangerous.
> > > Yes, a house divided against itself cannot stand.
> >
> > The problem is that the Creative Commons quite obviously has ridden on
> > the coattails of the free software movement -- aping their style,
> > language, and ideological messages. Yet, when it comes down to the
> > details, they aren't following through on those ideals.
> >
> > But while some of the licenses are (IMHO, at least) "Free" in the same
> > kind of meaningful way as the flagship free software licenses, the most
> > widely-used CC licenses are something else entirely -- something which
> > those of us who are concerned about the rise of "Free" culture don't
> > like to see muddying up the ideological landscape.
> >
> > No one, for example, would kid themselves about what Microsoft was
> > trying to do with their "Shared Source" licenses: Obviously, they were
> > trying to take advantage of the goodwill of "Open Source" license --
> > WITHOUT actually making their software open source.
> >
> > Most "open source" advocates would defend Microsoft's right to use just
> > about any licensing deal they want to. So it's not the *terms* of
> > "Shared Source" that are viewed as offensive.
> >
> > The problem is that Microsoft is deliberately trying to confuse you into
> > thinking that "Shared Source" either "IS" or "IS JUST AS GOOD AS" "Open
> > Source". As if it were an off-brand version of the same product,
> > competing for consumers' interest (but which contains poisonous or
> > environmentally hazardous chemicals which the original doesn't, say).
> >
> > The Creative Commons is regrettably behaving in much the same way as
> > Microsoft -- making "not quite free" or perhaps "not free at all"
> > licenses which are branded in such a way as to make them seem as if they
> > are all part of the same broad movement.
> >
> > Microsoft's "Shared Source" and CC's "NC" and "ND" licenses are merely
> > more friendly adjuncts to existing market practices. They do not
> > represent revolutionary change. They're still "non-free" licenses.
> >
> > On the other hand, truly "free" licenses, like the By, By-SA, GPL, etc,
> > are revolutionary. They create a wholly-different kind of marketplace
> > and community. This distinction is REAL and SHARP.
> >
> > Hiding it by lumping the elements together into the CC modular licenses
> > doesn't remove that real boundary. It just hides the reality from
> > licensors and licensees, which makes it that much harder to talk about
> > the revolutionary ideas of free culture.
> >
> > The situation is no different from commercial suppliers who try to
> > co-opt and dilute the "Green" or "Organic" labels on food products by
> > provided conventional "factory farm" products with misleading labelling.
> > Conscientious consumers, who are making decision they hope are socially
> > beneficial get duped. And that's unethical.
> >
> > The "Free" label is the same: people who want to participate in "free
> > culture", want it to stand up to some kind of verifiable standard. Sure,
> > you can read the fine print and find out for any particular product
> > whether it really is "Green" or "Organic" or "Free" by your own
> > particular standards -- but the whole point of labels is to eliminate
> > the need for such caveats, by providing a mark that people can recognize
> > and trust.
> >
> > CC has subverted that by using the same mark to mean a whole lot of
> > conflicting things. This isn't the same as saying that those things
> > shouldn't exist -- I can personally think of practical things I might
> > want to use the NC licenses for. But CC has long sense established a
> > practice of advertising "Creative Commons Licensing" rather than
> > particular, functuonally-related licenses.
> >
> > I think this was ultimately accidental. I think that the writers of the
> > CC license modules really didn't think they would create so many
> > incompatibilities. They ignored the real boundary because they didn't
> > see it, or didn't know exactly where it lay, not because they wanted to
> > dupe people.
> >
> > But after the fact, it's still a problem.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Terry
> >
> > --
> > Terry Hancock (hancock at AnansiSpaceworks.com)
> > Anansi Spaceworks http://www.AnansiSpaceworks.com
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > cc-community at lists.ibiblio.org
> > http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/cc-community
>
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