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cc-licenses - Re: [cc-licenses] Parallel Distribution Statement

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Subject: Development of Creative Commons licenses

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  • From: James Grimmelmann <james AT grimmelmann.net>
  • To: Discussion on the Creative Commons license drafts <cc-licenses AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [cc-licenses] Parallel Distribution Statement
  • Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:20:30 -0500

Rob Myers wrote:
James Grimmelmann wrote:
It's unfortunate every time that unpalatable license choices cause dissatisfied authors who want to encourage free redistribution to opt out of the Creative Commons ecosystem entirely.

Absolutely. Think how many will opt out if CC support DRM.

From the discussion here so far, I would guess that not many people will opt out either way that the parallel distribution question is resolved.

(And, by the way, I disagree with your characterization of parallel distribution as "support[ing] DRM" -- neither version of the anti-DRM clause supports DRM. But I recognize that my belief that this is the case is just a restatement of my belief that adding a parallel distribution clause does not have significant dangerous consequences for the spread of DRM, and that you think otherwise, so that arguing over what counts as "support" is just an unhelpful diversion from our important and genuine disagreements.)

Freedom is about use, not the distribution of broken versions of your work by third parties for your misperceived benefit as an author.

I much don't care about whether a distributed version of my work is "broken" so long as anyone who wants can readily obtain a non-broken version. Are you saying that I should care about the brokenness of the work in itself because my interests as an author are tied up with it not being broken? Or that I should care about it because as an author I have an ethical duty not to let readers be tricked into using broken versions? (I say "tricked" rather than "forced" because with parallel distribution, readers are not forced to use any particular version.)

DRM allows pockets of "redistribution" under the control of third parties to be sure, but it removes freedom within those pockets and prevents the very downstream redistribution that you are claiming it encourages.

I would like for all of my readers to have the full practical resources they need to engage in any of the reworkings and redistributions they would like to. But I don't see it as my duty as an author to make sure that they have equal access to high-speed broadband connections, to printing presses, and to wireless broadcast technologies. These things are good, and there are human rights interests in making sure that everyone has fair access to them, and it is an important goal for technology and copyright policy to encourage their equitable distribution. But I don't think that using Creative Commons license terms to forbid the use of technologies that not everyone has access to is a good idea.

This will probably draw an objection that DRM is different because it artificially restricts access. This is true. It is a reason to be even more urgently concerned about DRM-created inequalities than about simple network-access or unequal-wealth inequalities. But I don't think it makes a difference for my stance towards CC licensing. I want everyone who encounters the work to have the essential freedoms they need in relation to the work. Parallel distribution gives them that. Fixing the underlying inequality of differential access to one platform is an important issue, but it is not really a problem of access to the work.

You talk about "the very downstream redistribution." By that, I take it you mean that the platform monopolist has the freedom to redistribute the work on the platform, but that later downstream users do not have a similar freedom. I agree. I merely disagree that this freedom, **by itself** is the right object of concern. These downstream users enjoy the freedom to use the work in an unencumbered form, thanks to parallel distribution. That gives them the full range of freedoms they would enjoy if the DRM platform had never existed in the first place. Adding the distribution through the DRMed channels has not hurt them or subtracted from their freedom.

Unless the DRM achieves a monopoly, in which case we are no longer talking about freedom.

If people have the freedom to use dual distribution *as an author* they do not need it. If people do not have the freedom to use dual distribution *as a consumer (sic)* they are not free anyway.

I am not sure quite what you mean here. How does a consumer "use dual distribution?" Do you mean that, having received the work, they are not free to become a redistributor on both platforms? Or is there some larger freedom at stake?

James




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