Development of Creative Commons licenses

[rob AT robmyers.org]

Quoting drew Roberts <zotz AT 100jamz.com>:

> On Wednesday 29 November 2006 04:37 am, Rob Myers wrote:
>
> Rob, as an overall comment, in all fairness to James, who's views I also do
> not hold at this time, your rebuttals do not seem to take into account that
> all of what he is saying is being said in the context of parallel
> distribution.

I appreciate that they are being said in the context of parallel distribution,
and I am sorry if I have given the impression that I am not aware of this.

> > How about when it allows no study, modification or sharing?
>
> Parallel distribution would allow it.

Not in the instances where DRM has been applied. If the argument is that users
should be careful to always download the non-DRM version in case they 
will need
it in fifty years time, the same logic means that they should simply buy a
non-DRM device and avoid the problem in the first place. Personal
repsonsibility isn't something that starts only the millisecond after 
you buy a
Zune.

If I have the capability to receive and use a non-DRM version I do not 
*need* a
DRM version. If I *need* to receive a DRM version, I am not free to exercise
the rights in the license, and I cannot redistribute because I cannot fulfil
the dual distribution requirements.

And in fact this is another problem with parallel distribution. Is it 
burdensome
or ineffective? If I have to dual *re*-distribute, this limits the 
freedom (sic)
of DRM hostages to redistribute and burdens ordinary users by forcing them to
always give both versions to friends. If I do not have to dual re-distribute,
dual distribution can be foiled trivially by me releasing my work in non-DRM
and DRM versions to a trusted thrid party and them passing on only the DRM
version.

The dual distribution proponents aren't looking at this two steps downstream
from release, or two days after release. And they aren't even using Debian's
thought experiments (Dissident, Desert Island, etc.) to examine what happens
with dual distribution outside of the time and place of the last stages of the
Web 2.0 bubble in the post-industrial west.

> [...] I have no problem with my works migrating out of the
> digital realm and into the physical.  Once there, copying can indeed be more
> difficult, the question is, is it illegal, not is it difficult.

Quite. This is a matter of law, not technology. DRM is law, not code 
(and not a
string of bits or a file format or whatever).

> > > I would be similarly delighted if my work were ported to
> > > DRMed platforms.
> >
> > I would not.
>
> Neither would I unless any joe user wal legally and technically able to apply
> the DRM. Well, not delighted as I am not delighted with the platforms in
> general, but at least accepting. (With some means to also provide the
> freedoms naturally, on of which could be parallel distribution.)

The problem with DRM, and this has been demonstrated in The Real World 
by Apple,
is that DRM vendors, not users, control DRM. Apple have slowly reduced the
rights they give you over tracks you have bought from iTMS.

> > CC covers cultural works. If Free Software is a means to the end of
> > cultural freedom this is good. If it does not then it is damage to be
> > routed around.
>
> Rob, careful here. The first time I read through it, I took your meaning, the
> second time, I read it differently and couldn't believe what you were saying.
>
> Second meaning... "If Free Software is a means to" "the endo of cultural
> freedom" "this is good." What, Rob is interested in the end of cultural
> freedom? Read that again! Perhaps a different wording would have been better.

LOL @ myself. Yes I see what you mean. :-)

> Can you explain how getting a DRM copy that can be used on a DRM platorm
> violates freedom 0?

DRM can remove my Fair Use right to quote the work or indeed any use not
explicitly permitted by the DRM platform. If I have the ability to do so
elsewhere I am better served by protecting that right than by helping 
to remove
it.

- Rob.