Development of Creative Commons licenses

["Takemoto" <tim AT yamaguchi-u.ac.jp>]

Dear Mike

> > Hence if someone opensources their software then people will keep
> > coming back to their site to download later versions, and hopefully
> > make donations, and contributions, or order work (especially if the
> > name of the software is copyright).
> 
> But software projects fork, meaning that the original project won't  
> get those advantages. "Copyrighting" (trademarking?)

Sorry, yes, trademarking (not just holding copyright) on the the name. 

> the project's   name won't affect this.

Let us say that someone builds some software called "Doodah,"
and it achieves a certain amount of reputation, then in my experience
it is difficult for other to fork the software, because they have to start
from scratch with the reputation, unless they can obtain faciliate
considerable improvement and regain the lost reputation. In my 
experience holding a trademark over the name, and the URL, puts
a considerable amount of power in the creators' hands. 

This is as it should be. 

I liken holding possession over the name/URL (the primary means
of distributing software) to holding possession of the binding (the
primary means of distributing the printed word).

The analogy is not that good. But something is wrong with open
sourcing the printed word. It does not give enough power to the author.
And this is why authors do not do it. 

The punters don't come back to your site, even if your name is 
Steven King, *if* they can get books from their local shop. 

> Software is text. 

That can be distributed in an ideal way via the internet. No one wants
a text=paper of a software program. Most people want paper books. 

> The lack of free  
> literature (NC isn't free) is puzzling, and is presumably cultural or  
> contractual.

Contractual? Isn't that somethign to do with the licence?

> The license that approaches GPL is CC-BY-SA. That match is there. 

The licences would match if they applied to things that are used in
the same way, but the media (software and text) are not used, 
or most importantly distributed in the same way. 
 
> A  medium-specific license such as no-binding can easily be subverted  
> (print the book on loose sheets and distribute it with a pre-glued  
> cover),

Pre glued sounds pretty difficult to me. 

>  will be made irrelevant by advances in technology (ebooks)  
A long time away, sadly.

> and prevents cultural re-use (turning a book into a play).
...one might allow provision for htat. 

Tim