Development of Creative Commons licenses

[Evan Prodromou <evan AT wikitravel.org>]

>>>>> "DD" == David Dixon <ddixon AT wi.rr.com> writes:

    Me> As far as I can tell, pretty much no. You have to clear your
    Me> rights to publish anything, Creative Commons license or
    Me> no. There may be some exception for parody under the fair use
    Me> clause of US copyright law, but it's shaky ground to stand on.

    DD> I don't understand why the ground is shaky.

Let me instead say "considerably shakier than if you've cleared the
rights". If I can quote from fairuse.stanford.edu,

    "Unfortunately, the only way to get a definitive answer on whether
    a particular use is a fair use is to have it resolved in federal
    court. [...] A judge has a great deal of freedom when making a
    fair use determination and the outcome in any given case can be
    hard to predict."

    DD> The Beatallica tracks are obviously parodies. So what's the
    DD> problem?

AIUI, "obvious parody" is an oxymoron in copyright law.

    DD> Also, since the band is giving away the music for free, it
    DD> satisfies at least one of the "fair use" doctrines.

Errr... IANAL, TINLA, IDNSFCC. OK, now: not making money yourself
doesn't actually clear the hurdle for fair use. The metric is actually
if the use deprives the owner of income.

Good luck,

~ESP

-- 
Evan Prodromou <evan AT wikitravel.org>
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