Development of Creative Commons licenses

["Kevin Phillips (home)" <tacet AT qmpublishing.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Greg London" <email AT greglondon.com>
To: <jake AT countersinkdg.com>; "Discussion on the Creative Commons license
drafts" <cc-licenses AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2007 2:29 AM
Subject: Re: [cc-licenses] Need clarification: What is "commercial"?


[snip]

> Basically, the view is that there's
> "money" and then there's "MONEY".
> University money is OK.
> Mail order MONEY is not OK.
> Which becomes an irresolvable mess trying to
> codify into a license, because, really, its a
> totally arbitrary distinction.
> We're good. They're bad.
>
> There's one other fairly common use for NC:
> Codifying the logical fallacy known as Argumentum ad lazarum
>
> http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/mathew/logic.html#lazarum

Good grief....

Argumentum Ad Vertisium
Double-spin linking to a page full of subconscious advertising cues.

"meaning of life", "insight" and "logicam".....logicam....."oo! what a
give-away" ;)

Just kidding ;)

Ahem, sorry, I'll make a serious point now.  I do see where you're argument
works for this "good" vs "bad" money issue.  However, I think the real
problem is that there really might be no solution, because as you say NC is
being re-coloured for each individual and their unique ideal.

> The idea that money is evil.
>
> Some folks use NC because they want to release their
> works under a NC license and they don't want their
> work to get "dirtied" by money, or they don't want
> "the man" to get their work and make money off of it.
> There is no money that is "good" money, so it's all
> forbidden.

I think it can be taken a little too far.  I'm not sure it's a fight against
"the man" but there is an element of fairplay which people measure things
by, particularly when it's something they fostered or created.   MPAA/RIAA
methods are well known, and hardly fair.  DRM for instance, as you suggested
in your fair use comments is the bane of most people's lives and gives an
indication of "lengths" to which a corporate will go to get the level of
control they want.

I'd be happy with the NC license if it truly did mean NO commerciality,
however Sound Exchange is another good example of manipulation of a system
to ensure retention of control.  It was invented by the recording industry
to mop-up fees paid for playback to unsigned/unregistered/unknown artists.
It's the bane of most webcaster's lives, and is currently a major point of
controversy in terms of the amounts of fees it collects.

I was more than surprised to read the NC license does _not_ waiver these
fees, whilst other "commercial" licenses DO waiver these fees.

I still wonder if I've read something wrong or if I've got the wrong end of
the stick, but this is how it appears to be.

[snip]

> (3) and (4) seem like they are wholly based on
> religious style arguments. Dogmatic views passed down
> from people who think the world should be their way,
> and want a license that implements that. They don't
> really change the landscape of the problem, though.
> But they got a license that follows their ideology,
> so they're happy.
>
> So, the moral of the story, I suppose, is that, yes,
> you'd probably find some people who would like to
> change NC or create alternate versions of NC, because
> there are several groups using NC for wildly different
> reasons. And I'm sure none of them are exactly happy
> with where teh lines got drawn in the license compared
> to where they drew the lines in their mind.
>
> Whether a change to NC is a good thing, I'm not sure.

You could be right, but keep in mind the balance of things.  People are
increasingly paranoid where corporations are concerned because of their
personal experiences and close-quarter judgements.  It's not dogmatic to
worry about being cheated or hussled (in the financial sense, not the
emotional sense).

> I'm pretty sure that making two NC alternates is a
> bad idea simply because that doesn't resolve any of
> the confusion about what NC actually is, it just adds
> confusion about what THIS NC is versus what THAT NC is.

I don't agree, I think increasing the options can sometimes increase
clarity.  The situation seems like it would be made worse right now because
so many folks are bending the current NC license out of shape.

> But you're not the first person to raise the quesiton
> of what is NC. And unfortunately, you probably won't
> be the last.

I think a good reason for folks to be purplexed by the NC flavour is that
it's the polar opposite of BY/SA flavours.  There's no middle ground for the
creative commoners.  The middle ground appears to be more for the
establishment with Sound Exchange showing up on NC, and if Drew and Eric are
correct there's even an "opportunity" to break BY/SA license terms and
scale-up and right out into the blue sky of copyright.

omg, tin foil hats everyone! :)

Kev