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cc-licenses - Re: [cc-licenses] CCau v3.0 public launch

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Subject: Development of Creative Commons licenses

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  • From: Björn Terelius <bjorn.terelius AT gmail.com>
  • To: Development of Creative Commons licenses <cc-licenses AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [cc-licenses] CCau v3.0 public launch
  • Date: Wed, 02 Jul 2008 03:54:21 +0200

geni wrote:
2008/6/29 Björn Terelius <bjorn.terelius AT gmail.com>:
The CC could equally well be considered to agree with me since it seem
both texts have been used.

Did they or did they not accept the EFF's free music license being
merged with their's?
Sorry, but I don't understand you.
This discussion started when Jessica Coates reported that the Unported text reads

"You may Distribute or Publicly Perform the Work only under the terms of this
License."

I was trying to point out that the "foundation" of all CC licenses does indeed not permit relicensing the work under newer versions. To claim that CC as a whole think that the license should contain a version-upgrade clause seem a bit premature, don't you think?
IANAL, but if the license allow relicensing under future versions and
a future version does not comply with some implicit intension I would
not hold it for granted that a court would disqualify the later
version. Stricly speaking you have permitted redistribution under
_any_ future version whether or not it comply with the original
intension. In any case, the intension is not an acctually part of the
license text.

I'd hate to true and argue that one particularly when you consider the
name's of the licenses.
I can't debate your arguments if you dont bother to write them down.
Let us instead see if I can explain what I mean differently. If you sign an agreement with someone, both parties will be bound by the text in the agreement, right? Now, if the title of the agreement does not seem reflect the content, the content would still remain legally binding. Of course, a court could revoke the agreement for example if one of the parts was "tricked" into signing the document, but you would not want to sign a document that you know contain some loopholes and rely on the court to invalidate the greement if the loopholes are used. Similarly here, if the license permit any later version and a later version is so flawed that it no longer adhere to the original intention, a court *might* invalidate the later license or make some other exception, but I don't want to rely on that.
One could just as well argue that any licensor who doesn't care about
his/her own rights to the work place it in the public domain or write
their own messy homebrew license.

The former doesn't happen in a useful manner and the latter is
unhelpful as far as free content is concerned.

It can definitely be useful to place thing in the public domain, and it is possible to write your own special purpose license.
I don't mean to encourage peple to write their own licenses, however. I meant the text above as an objection to your argument that anyone not satisfied with a CC-license allowing later versions could just write their own. This argument could equally well be turned the other way: anyone not satisfied with a CC-license that does not allow later versions could just write their own. The advantage with not having a version upgrade clause in the license is that someone who wants it won't have to write their own since they can just specify the license as "x.x or any later version".
Again, IANAL, but I don't think it is possible to force an exact
version of the license if the license text itself give away the right
to use different licenses.

"not withstanding the above text only this version of the licence may
be used" wrap that up in legalese and off you go.

You mean to insert that text into the license?
In that case, you've modified the license thus causing more incompatible licenses, not less.
If you instead specify "CC v x.x or any later version" you won't have to modify the license to control which versions of the license that are permissible.
To do that, one would have to restrict the
rights granted by the license in which case it would no longer be a CC
license. Creating a license that look like a CC but isn't would likely
be a trademark infringement (assuming CC is a trademark).

So call it a modified creative commons license.
Sure, but if you modify a CC license I doubt that you could use the CC-logo, the wizard, the human readable summary or any of the other advantages of using a CC license. You would basically have your own home-made license that just happen to resemble CC in most respects.

In any case a risk benefit analysis suggests that given the likely
minimal risks compared to the benefit of avoiding multiple
incompatible licenses (the CC/GFDL/FAL issues are annoying enough)
that updatable as standard is the best option for the time being.

Well, I'll admit that the probability that a future version of the license does follow the original intestion is small. On the other hand, should a future license be flawed it can have severe consequenses for the licensor especially if the licensor is commersial. If they could inspect the license and see that the license gives away precisely the right they want to give away (for example CC BY-SA-NC -ND) they might use CC instead of writing their own. I would consider this a major improvement since I actually read most license agreements for products I use, so a few standard licenses would be much better that many small.

I must confess that I completely fail to see your point in most of your comments above. Please elaborate.

A compromise might be to let the the wizard add the "or any later version" as dafault, or perhaps do as GPL and write in the license agreement that any version may be used unless the version is explicitely specified.

Just my thoughts
Bjorn




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