Development of Creative Commons licenses

["Jonathon Blake" <jonathon.blake AT gmail.com>]

Terry wrote:

On 2/14/07, Terry Hancock <hancock AT anansispaceworks.com> wrote:

> But they also EXPLICITLY state that they allow everything allowed by "fair 
> use".

US Statute Law regarding "The Fair Use Doctrine" allows for things
which are explicitly prohibited by the CC-NC licence.

With the NC licence, if you met a specific set of criteria (natural
person, or "IRS registered non-profit") you may use the material.  If
you aren't, you may not use the material.  "The Fair Use Doctrine"
simply defines what may be done with the material _without_ requesting
permission from the creator.  The CC-NC is a EULA, and as such, trumps
"Fair Use Doctrine".

> > CC-NC is a EULA.  As such, it is technically _more_ restrictive than ARR 
> would be.

> Hence anything you are permitted to do with ARR you are also permitted
> to do with any CC license.

If that is true, then the NC Guidelines are false.
If your statement is false, then the NC guidelines are true.

Since Step 1 of the NC guidelines does define a non-commercial entity,
any organization that does not meet those definitions may not use
material that has an NC licence--- unless they negotiate with the
creator of the material to use it.

I'll grant that the definition is somewhat unclear for some types of
organizations, it is pretty clear for other types of organizations:
If not a natural person, and not an IRS Registered non-profit / local
legal equivalent then usage is prohibited.

The blurry part is whether or not religious organizations and
political organizations may use the material --- that is only because
of a footnote in those guidelines.

> In short, NC was a bad, bad, BAD idea.

I'm not sure that the concept is a bad idea.

What is a very bad idea is that it shares the same brand name as the
libre licences.

Line extension kills the brand name,and this instance CC-NC ( and to a
lesser extent CC-ND ) are killing CC-SA.

#####

The reason I think the concept is not a bad idea, is that it can
provide the basis for a clearly defined licence that has the same
legal meaning across jurisdictions. IMNSHO, the two biggest issues
with it are:
* The lack of a definition of "non commercial" within the licence;
* The confusion it causes with licences that are libre;

Rename it to _gratis non-commercial licence_, and take away "Creative
Commons"as part of its name, and the confusion with licences that are
libre will go away.

I'll grant that we will be stuck with CC-NCC 1.0, CC_NC 1.5, CC-NC
2.0, CC_NC 2.5, and  maybe CC-NC 3.0 for a long time,but at least
there won't be a CC-NC 3.5 or higher to cloud the issue of libre v
non-libre.

Note: I am not a lawyer.

xan

jonathon