[cc-community] Germany - NC/CC violation - request for help
Robert Atwood (lists)
lists at atwood.org.uk
Mon May 26 21:26:29 EDT 2008
Yuval Levy wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I am a photographer currently based in Canada and I publish some of my
> art work under (CC)-BY-NC-SA and some under (CC)-BY-NC-ND.
>
> It has come to my attention that at least one such work has been used by
> a large exhibit
...
I am not a lawyer either .. however it seems worth putting my 2p worth ,
as far as I know CC of either type you mentioned is not in any way a
replacement of copyright. It is a license granted by the copyright
holder. So copyright laws apply, It just seems like people are imagining
that (cc) is some other thing but although plenty of people on this list
probably think copyright laws need to be changed and work toward that
goal, the licenses themselves are intended to work within the existing
laws in attempt to make it easy to do what we want despite those laws .
I'm sure you know that really but it seems usage of (cc) then (c) in the
original post , where of course the (cc) material is in fact (c) . If
they don't nicely agree to do what you want when asked, you need to use
(c) law which involves lawyers, courts, etc.
I guess it might be dead easy to get the (a.r.r) material ordered off,
I am not too sure if this venue can offer much help with that ;-0 but a
lawyer sure can for the correct fee :-)
the other stuff mabye more complicated because you have granted them
(everyone) a license so you need to argue whether they obey the terms of
the license, no doubt it's different enough from any other previous
dispute to require some examination of the exact situation ..
. but they may have a case that NC is ok despite money changing hands,
if the English licnese I have looked at is any guide. because it says:
(from UK version , sorry I don't read German though )
"""""""""""
Non-Commercial" means "not primarily intended for or directed towards
commercial advantage or private monetary compensation".
""""""""""""
I might argue, that mounting a public exhibit takes money to pay for
things, like if I take one of your NC works and buy a frame and place
your work in the frame, and hang it on the street, do I violate the
license because the frame maker makes money? What if the maker's name
is on the frame? What if the maker gave me the frame? What if I am also
the maker?
See where I'm going, if they claim that the sponsorship just covers
costs and does not give them profit, even if some of those costs are
their own time ( contracting their time as framers, or curators , or
janitors, to the exhibit ) it could be a valid argument that the use of
the art is not "primarily intended" for that. Then you might argue that
the sponsoring bodies gain commercial advantage by having their name on
it ... but that seems a bit tenuous to me, can they not sponsor
non-profit agencies?
In fact it leads me to wonder just what sort of use you imagine people
using your cc-by-nc-* works for? To be honest, that sounds a bit like
the kind of thing i would EXPECT at least the cc-by-nc-sa works to be
used for.
But those that are not -sa- should not be modified, that is pretty clear.
I am not a lawyer.
This is not legal advice.
It's my opinion.
More information about the cc-community
mailing list