Development of Creative Commons licenses

[James Grimmelmann <james AT grimmelmann.net>]

Joachim Durchholz wrote:
> James Grimmelmann schrieb:
>> Are there examples of significant legal disputes that have arisen out of
>> disagreements about the use of freeware?  I would think that exactitide
>> of license doesn't matter so much.
> 
> Well... imagine a company with a mindset that's similar to SCO.
> All that's needed is a history similar to SCO's: the old business model 
> falters, new management desperately tries to find sources of income, 
> reputation is irrelevant since the end is inevitable anyway, so we can 
> sue anybody with impunity and hope that it will work often enough to 
> drag on another year.

Who is this new SCO suing?  The former customers of its freeware?  Or
freeware developers?  Both scenarios seem unlikely to me, given freeware
business models.  And I also don't see how license clarity would change
matters.  The GPL is doing as much as any license could as a
counterweapon against SCO; SCO's claims, such as they are, have to do
with process, rather than with license clarity.

>> The use of CC licenses for software is discouraged (for reasons already
>> noted).
> 
> I must have overlooked these.
> Care to give a short list?

The list archives are full of them; this has been pretty heavily debated
over the years.  First, software is functional.  Ensuring that the
license gets right questions of continued functionality is important.
Second, software is produced in both /modifiable (source code) and
largely unreadable/unmodifiable (object code) forms, so that
source-specific terms are important.  Third, software is often highly
interactive, which again leads to specialized terms.  Fourth, software
routinely implicates patent rights, which are a whole additional ball of
wax.  I bet some of the others here can fill in further reasons.

Basically, software is hard, and it's hard in a way that's unlike a lot
of creative or informational works.  There are tough boundary cases, but
it usually seems to work best to have software-specific licenses for
software and general-purpose licenses for other kinds of stuff.

>  > But you can apply a CC license to software.  For freeware,
>> BY-ND seems fairly decent.  Anyone can use the free version; commercial
>> intermediaries can make some money distibuting it conveniently; no one
>> can make money off of it.  IF you take the freeware business model as
>> given, and IF you're not worried about getting the license exactly
>> right, BY-ND seems like a perfectly fine license.
> 
> Well, getting the license exactly right would definitely be something 
> I'd want.
>  From the perspective of the licensee, that is; the licensor couldn't 
> care less. Maybe that's another reason why such a license hasn't been 
> drawn up yet.

What are you afraid of as a licensee?

James