Development of Creative Commons licenses

["Greg London" <email AT greglondon.com>]

> repeating arguments over and over again does not
> help in having a useful discussion.

probably not. Problem is that most people have not
been repeating an argument. They may have been ARGUING.
But almost no one has presented a logical argument
that shows their starting premises, their logical
train of thoughts that dealt with those premises,
and showed everyone how they arrived at their result.

Your answer below is more of the same.
It took some arm twisting, and you had to give a bit
of attitude doing it, but after a few digs, you answered
the two questions. You immediately had to bring in the
"but we have to be careful" response.

If you're argument is sound, you shouldn't be worried
about showing your work, or going through it one step
at a time, or whatever. If this had been a physics exam
and you had to show your work, you wouldn't be listing
the data given in the question and immediately add a
"this is not the complete answer".

The problem is most people start out with their
conclusion, either par-dist or anti-tpm, and then
simply shout down any who disagree with them.

But if we all agree on the initial problem,
if we all agree on effects of the different
proposals, if we all agree on what exactly
the outcomes of each proposal is, then that
information can be presented to the rest of
the community, and then THEY could make their
opinion known.

The issue according to the latest newcomers
is that there hasn't been enough discussion
outside of the few who have made their opinion
known. After an initial flurry of responses,
no newcomers have voiced their opinion.

If they have remained silent because they
dont understand all the issues then showing
your work would be oen way to inform them
so THEY can choose.

But no one wants to play that game.
You may notice that the people who did NOT
answer those two questions are mostly
in the crowd that supports Parallel-Distribution.

You can make whatever assumptions about that
that you wish. But I say it's because if you
start with the objective effects of no DRM
clause at all, and step through the different
possible solutions (pardist, anti-tpm, local drm),
I think that most people will arrive at supporting
the anti-tpm clause with local-drm allowed.

And of course the par-dist folks dont want that.
So they've taken their ball and gone home.
They won't answer the questions. They wont show
how they arrived at ParallelDistribution. And I
say its because somewhere in their thinking they
jumped the shark, they made some tradeoff that
would NOT hold up in the bright lights of plain
inspection by the world.

Think of this discussion as a FLOSS piece of code.
Show your source. Show what inputs you took,
and what algorithm you put them through, and how
you arrived at the outcome you got. Then if others
agree, they would run your code, adopt your position,
and so on and so forth.

Here's my version. I'll invoke your statement to me:
please take the time to read what I've wrote and
think about it:
------------------------------------------------
Without any DRM clause in CC-SA,
DRM-Dave can monopolize the rights to CC-SA
from any platform and he can monopolize the
distribution and commercial rights on his
platform.

Parallel distribution stops Dave from being
able to monopolize the content. If Dave creates
a derivative of a CC-SA work and distributes
it in DRM, no one can access the content in a
clear format, no one can create derivatives.
Parallel distribution makes sure that Alice
gets a clear copy of the content so that she
can create new versions of Dave's derivative.

But parallel distribution does not address
Dave's ability to monopolize the distribution
and commercial rights on his DRM-only platform.

Dave can use DRM plus the DMCA to disallow anyone
from selling CC-SA content that plays on his
platform. Dave can become sole source provider
of CC-SA content that plays on his platform.

Not only does ParDist allow this, but some people
have argued that they want to ENCOURAGE this
because they argue that unless Dave has some
incentive, he won't permit CC-SA works on his
platform. So the tradeoff is to allow dave a
monopoly to commercial rights on his platform.

While ParDist proponents like to compare ParDist
with the SourceCode requirement of GNU-GPL,
they fail to point out that SourceCode in GNU-GPL
means that if Dave distributes a binary for his
platform, he must distribute source code, and
this source code allows Alice or Bob or anyone else
to compile the source code ON THAT SAME PLATFORM
and COMPETE against Dave's commercial sales.

ParDist with DRM does not allow commercial competition.
It actually encourages and allows a commercial
monopoly on teh platform.

For this reason I support Anti-TPM-plus-local-drm.
Unless EVERYONE gets the same rights to the same
work on the same platforms, then CC-SA should not
allow the work to go to that person or platform.

Anti-TPM addresses the problem with monopolizing
the content. Dave must give you a clear, open copy,
and must give an application that applies DRM to the
open copy. Alice has an open copy of the content
equal to Dave.

Anti-TPM also addresses the problem with distribution
and commercial monopolization. Dave cannot directly
sell DRM-only versions of content for his platform.
He is prevented from directly exercising this monopoly.

He can distribute the content in an open format,
sell Alice an application tool that applies DRM
locally, and off you go, but that's equivalent
to GNU-GPL's approach to allowing local compiles.
Local compiles could be leveraged by Microsoft
to sell their binaries as All Rights Reserved,
and use a local makefile so that Alice does the
build on her local machine.

But the tradeoff there has always been to allow
local compiles to enable people to use the content.
For that reason, I support Local-DRM applications.

-----------------------------------------------

You'll notice that most of my argument shows the
steps I took to arrive from the inputs to the outputs.
That at every step of the way, I try to show the
FUNCTIONAL and OBJECTIVE outcome or sideeffect of
any option. This option will allow Dave to do this.
This option will allow Dave to do that. I then
explain why I CHOSE one option over another.

The ParDist people have not done this.
They start with their conclusion and back up
just enough to show the piece they want you
to see, and they tend to focus on the bad
outcome they want to fix but ignore any
bad outcomes of their solution.

They also avoid talking in terms of the rights
in the license. The rights are very simple and
basic. Copy, Distribute, Derive. and every
option has one of two possibilities for each
right: either the right is FREE or the right
has somehow been MONOPOLIZED.

If you care to present ParDist's argument in
this form, show your work, speak in terms of
the rights of the license, indicate whether
the rights are FREE or MONOPOLIZED, and show
all the outcomes of an option, rather than
just the bad outcomes of the option you dont
like and just the good outcomes of the option
you do like, then maybe we could get somewhere.

The people who support ParDist have so far
been unwilling to do this.

Greg


 Please take your time to read what
> the other participants wrote and think about it: you are of course
> entitled to your own opinions, but restating them 5 or 10 times a day
> won't make you more convincing...
>
> That having said, I can "throw a yes/no answer" to your questions.
>
>> Without any DRM solution applied to CC-SA:
>> CAN Dave monopolize the content on and off his platform?
>> CAN Dave monopolize Distribution and Commercial rights on his
>> platform?
>
> Without *any* anti-DRM clause, Dave can do both the above-quoted things.
> So it's yes to both.
>
> Should this be disallowed?
> I think disallowing both these scenarios is desirable, *but* let's be
> careful: we should *not* throw away the baby along with the bath water.
> My primary concern is freedom for the licensees: we should *not*
> sacrifice the essential freedoms for users, in order to fight back
> against evil DRM Daves.  A strong defense against the bad consequences
> of DRM/TPM is good *as long as* it's not obtained through non-free
> restrictions.
>
> For further details, please see:
> https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/cc-licenses/2006-November/004596.html
>
> --
> But it is also tradition that times *must* and always
> do change, my friend.   -- from _Coming to America_
> ..................................................... Francesco Poli .
>  GnuPG key fpr == C979 F34B 27CE 5CD8 DC12  31B5 78F4 279B DD6D FCF4
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>


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