[cc-community] [cc-licenses] Simplifying Licenses

mp m.pedersen at lancaster.ac.uk
Thu Mar 5 07:35:58 EST 2009


hello,

I have not followed this discussion closely this time around, but I did
years ago and have recently, in connection with an embryonic project,
been in touch with Diane Peters, CC' General Counsel, about similar
issues and she noted that it has been recognised that the NC clause
requires what we can call an analytical "breakdown" based on empirical
evidence (and that is apparently part of the current NC review process):

The non-commercial clause is misleading/ambiguous/virtually useless
because it is presumably intended for use by independent creators who
want to prevent big players from using their creation to make money, but
the very same people who want to prevent, say, Rupert Murdoch from
cashing in on their work, might very well want the local social centre,
NGO or community group to be able to generate a little but of income by
selling copies of that work.

What is needed is a clause that prevents corporations with only profit
motivations, but allow community building initiatives.

Such community building actions as performed by social centres, activist
groups etc. are clearly commercial and they are also clearly for profit
(that's the whole point: to generate cash), but they are very, very
different from AOL/Time Warner's ideas of commercial, profit oriented
activities.

CC does not provide a solution for that.

Maybe it will soon.

-martin



drew Roberts wrote:
> On Thursday 05 March 2009 01:07:02 jonathon wrote:
>> On Wed, Mar 4, 2009 at 05:35, Ben Finney  wrote:
>>>>>        CC-BY-NC-SA is the necessary evil.  We should discourage it but
>>>>> allow
>>> Putting an NC clause on a work is restricting the freedom of these
>>> people, with no real benefit to the copyright holder since they're never
>>> going to see money for those uses anyway.
>> a)  Some people use the NC license, with the hope/expectation that
>> re-distribution of the work will be gratis to the recipient.    (And
>> yes, I am aware of how a company can sell NC material to generate a
>> net profit to that company, and remain within the letter of the
>> license.)
> 
> There are better ways to ensure this if this is what they wish. Thank you for 
> this insight though as I often wonder why people who are not in the game for 
> the money use NC anyway.
> 
> So far I have:
> 
> 1. Confused (As in "I am not doing this for commercial purposes so NC must be 
> what I want)
> 2. Dog in the manger attitude.
> 3. Art is not pure if money is involved.
> 
> Now I have another to add.
>>
>> b) The NC license is the only one that enables as copyright holder to
>> collect royalty payments made to a collection society on their (the
>> copyright holder's) behalf. Depending upon jurisdiction, the copyright
>> holder might not have the right to prohibit the local collection
>> society from collecting royalties on their behalf;
> 
> This does not have to be this way.  It the CS societies would get their heads 
> on straight, I could offer a BY-SA license myself and a standard license 
> through the CS and the end user could choose which license they wanted to 
> avail themselves of. The CS could even ensure that those choosing BY-SA met 
> its terms or paid for the other license for me.
> 
> As it stands now, from all I gather, none have yet had this insight.
>> jonathon
> 
> all the best,
> 
> drew
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