[cc-community] [cc-licenses] Most important feature: GPL-compatibility

drew Roberts zotz at 100jamz.com
Fri Jan 27 07:49:58 EST 2012


On Thursday 26 January 2012 22:56:42 Ben Finney wrote:
> drew Roberts <zotz at 100jamz.com> writes:
> > On Thursday 26 January 2012 20:00:21 Anthony wrote:
> > > On Thu, Jan 26, 2012 at 8:08 AM, drew Roberts <zotz at 100jamz.com> wrote:
> > > > The original poem on paper is clearly marked BY-SA.
>
> What is the preferred form of the poem for making modifications to it?
>
> I think the answer is clearly “the poem itself”, i.e. the specific
> characters that form the poem.

Again, perhaps I need to pick slightly better examples but are you guys trying 
to miss the point?

So, the original paper version was in fancy calligraphy with an ornamented 
border of hand drawn leaves.

Each copy is degraded from the copy before it or from the original in the 
first instance. All done with old fashioned photo copiers. No one has access 
to equipment to digitize the thing at any point.

So you either pass on "the original/copy you got" and keep the degraded copy 
for yourself or you keep "the original/copy you got" and pass on the degraded 
copy but one cannot leave oneself and the one passed on to in an equal 
position to further work with the work.
>
> > > > What is the source for these pieces of paper?
>
> There is no “source for the pieces of paper” in the sense we're talking
> about here. A physical object – a piece of paper, a stone sculpture –
> does not have a preferred form for making modifications to it, other
> than the specific object itself.

But isn't that the whole point? That source cannot be given and a license 
requiring that it be given would not work.
>
> But copyright doesn't apply to a physical object, it applies to whatever
> expression is embodied in that object. So why do you keep asking about
> source for physical objects?

Because people seem to think that putting a source requirement into the next 
by-sa will work just fine and I see big problems if we try that. In cases 
like I am trying to explain in a clearer and clearer way.
>
> > Of course, but what is the source that you have to give when you pass
> > on the piece of paper with the poem on it?
>
> The source for the original poem – the preferred form of the poem for
> making modifications to it – is as I described above.
>
> > Perhaps, but I am speaking with passing on copies or derivatives where
> > a machine readable instance has never existed.
>
> If a machine-readable instance has never existed and yet the copyright
> holder grants CC-BY-SA license in the work, then the copyright holder
> either expects that recipients will have no trouble getting such a
> machine-readable instance, or is being disingenuous in their choice of
> license.

Why? He made a statue (in one example) and does not want his copyrights in the 
statue to restrict what people do so he puts a by-sa license on his copyright 
in the statue. He doesn't see how it is going to be easy to get a machine 
readable instance but he is not being disingenuous either.
>
> > In the spirit of Freedom, I am always wanting to pass on the most
> > "source" I can
>
> I am not sure how you mean this. I will assume you mean “I want
> recipients to have the best form of the work for making modifications to
> it as I can give them”.

Sounds ok.

And just to be clear to everyone tracking this discussion, I have been 
thinking about the objection of sources being too large. Could this part of 
the problem be solved by the old GPL idea of reasonable payment for providing 
the source on physical media? (Cost of media and copying?)
>
> > but with the penalties for copyright violations being what they are
> > and seemingly always getting worse, why put a general source
> > requirement into by-sa unless the language / concept can be carefully
> > and simply pinned down?
>
> For a poem, you (as someone who wants to pass on to recipients the best
> form of the work for making modifications to it) should then pass on the
> character sequence that forms your poem, in a known encoding such as
> UTF-8.

And I might do that, but perhaps this license and idea may get to some who are 
not in a position to do so with theiroriginal works.

And further consider the idea of a poem in fancy calligraphy with handdraw 
illustrations and a hand drawn border. All on one piece of paper. One "whole 
work" possibly made up of various sub works all existing only on this one 
piece of paper.

While I don't think that it is safe to assume that no one can digitize your 
works, I don't think it is safe to assume that everyone can easily digitize 
everything they create / receive that is copyrighted.

all the best,

drew


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