development of an education license or license option for Creative Commons

[David Wiley <david AT wiley.ed.usu.edu>]

George Siemens wrote:

> Hi, I’ve been following this debate between edu.cc bad...edu.cc good since
> Wouter posted his well thought out response on the potential limiting impact
> of an educational CC license. Stephen responded by enlarging Wouter's
> arguments to include the negative impact of excluding informal
> learning...and driving learners to more expensive forms of learning (i.e.
> the marketplace would be favorably slanted to formal learning content
> creators - an issue of discrimination against fields of endeavor). 
Actually, I think the "market" would be slanted toward formal 
educational institutions, not publishers and content creators. But 
thanks for this summary. I'm beginning to understand the criticism 
better thanks to your summary!

<snip>

> The difficulty with both arguments is that they are both true in certain
> contexts, but neither is absolutely always true. For example, an educator
> that is comfortable releasing content ONLY if restrictions are in place to
> prevent military use, may find comfort in edu.cc (in contrast to copyright).
> By the same account, this same educator may be giving consideration to
> releasing her/his content into the commons, but then comes across the edu.cc
> license, and chooses to release it under more restrictive license. Both
> scenarios will occur depending on the instructor...and both can be good/bad.
True. This is the escalation issue: we prefer licensing in this order: 
public domain, cc, cc.edu. The question is whether or not the potential 
benefit to homeschoolers, inner city kids, university students, etc., is 
worth providing this final level of escalation. There are some very real 
risks: perhaps someone that *could* have been swayed to use cc will see 
cc.edu and opt for the more restrictive license, for example. So the 
question is whether or not the potential benefits outweigh the potential 
risks, and I'm afraid this is strictly an opinion question. My gut tells 
me they are. SD's gut tells him it's not.

> I'm not convinced that writing off edu.cc is a good idea. I think that
> having a CC license "branded" as educational will make it an easier sell to
> decision makers in education circles. I think educators are too good at
> following copyright laws (they are probably the most copyright compliant
> sector of society - which is why RIAA is trying to place responsibility for
> monitoring music trading on colleges/universities). I have seen very little
> embracing of the CC by educators (which was the reason for my earlier
> question on the success of CC adoption). I'm concerned that educators may
> perceive CC as not applicable - too fringe.
Yes, putting the word "educational" on it is a key strategy to reach out 
to non-techie (don't know the OSS culture) K-16 people. I believe many 
educators will license their materials this way once they hear about it.

> While my interest is more on creating an environment that accepts and
> encourages sharing of materials, I realize that discussion on technical
> requirements of a license is needed...so I hope that this debate continues
> according to the process David outlined several emails ago - "talk, talk,
> keep talking, ask questions, hopefully get answers, make suggestions,
> incorporate suggestions, talk some more." 
It's up to people to keep talking... I'm certainly committed to the 
conversation.

> We may disagree on many points of the license (I personally am not
> completely comfortable with it in its present form), but I think it is
> important to focus on the fact that there is only a very small segment of
> the education field that is discussing open content. From what I know of
> those discussing it, the "leaders" are represented in this forum. We need to
> realize that we are on the same side of the fence. We all have the same goal
> - open content, shared freely, for the benefit of learners (and as a result,
> society). As an emerging community, these discussions are good practice for
> when we have to advocate for the value of open education...:).
Amen to the last. What about the current license specifically make you 
uncomfortable?

D