development of an education license or license option for Creative Commons

["Downes, Stephen" <Stephen.Downes AT nrc-cnrc.gc.ca>]

Hiya,

We can agree, but you put a pretty big BUT right in the middle...

> BUT, I don't think the existence of the Education License would 
> necessarily prevent work on a separate, more restrictive 
> license. What 
> happens next will just depend on what real, normal users want.

There may be a separate, more restrictive license, but I would
vigorously oppose their being branded as Creative Commons licenses.

There are alternative approaches to the creation of more restrictive
licenses. We are working with ODRL here at NRC and have developed
a wizard system (which will be released one day really soon) that
allows developers and publishers to create what we call licensing
'models' that can incorporate any number of licensing options. 

In my view, Creative Commons licensing should be reserved for 
content that can be freely used by everyone; that was its purpose
and intent, and that's what it is widely understood to be. We
can work together, even, toward creating a system that supports
a variety of licensing options. But let's not dilute what Creative
Commons stands for.

As for "what real, normal users want," this is why I have harped
on open decision-making processes. I don't think anyone, not even
me ;) can claim to be representative of the General Will without
some means of determining what that Will may happen to be.

-- Stephen




> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Wiley [mailto:david.wiley AT usu.edu] 
> Sent: October 7, 2003 6:30 PM
> To: development of an education license or license option for 
> Creative Commons
> Subject: Re: [cc-education] A radical alternative proposal
> 
> 
> Downes, Stephen wrote:
> 
> >What we are calling the 'Educational License' is equivalent to the 
> >'Attribution non-commercial share-alike' license, as described at 
> >http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/1.0/
> >  
> >
> Yep
> 
> >That the 'Educational License' is a difference of name and branding 
> >only, not a difference of terms and conditions, of the By-NC-SA 
> >license.
> >  
> >
> Yep
> 
> >And that this will *continue* to be the case (in other 
> words, there is 
> >a committment on the part of Creative Commons not to 
> introduce further 
> >conditions or restrictions after a user base has been established).
> >  
> >
> Yep. We couldn't bait and switch legally. "Oh, that license 
> you chose? 
> We've changed it's conditions now. Just FYI." We're not long distance 
> providers.  =)
> 
> BUT, I don't think the existence of the Education License would 
> necessarily prevent work on a separate, more restrictive 
> license. What 
> happens next will just depend on what real, normal users want.
> 
> >And that the 'Educational License' is offered as a handy-dandy 
> >short-cut through the license-creation wizard, again, not creating a 
> >new type of licensing, but rather, offering a convenient, 
> easy-to-find 
> >option for educators.
> >  
> >
> Yep
> 
> >If this is the proposal, I endorse the proposal.
> >  
> >
> Glad to hear it! See, we can agree! ; )
> 
> D
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> cc-education mailing list
> cc-education AT lists.ibiblio.org 
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/cc-> education
> 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-
Stephen Downes ~ Senior Researcher ~ National Research Council Canada
Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada
http://www.downes.ca stephen AT downes.ca 
stephen.downes AT nrc.ca http://www.iit.nrc.ca/e-learning.html
Subscribe to my free daily newsletter featuring news and articles 
about online knowledge, learning, community
http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/website/subscribe.cgi 
or read it at http://www.downes.ca/news/OLDaily.htm
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-