Development of Creative Commons licenses

[David Chart <bydosa AT davidchart.com>]

On 2011/12/30, at 4:11, Heather Morrison wrote:

> For the  
> avoidance of doubt, educational use is not considered commercial for  
> the purposes of this license, and is therefore permitted.

I don't agree with this suggsted change.

I make my living from two sources, writing and editing books, and teaching. 
When I am a writer, I make my living by selling books. When I am a teacher, I 
make my living by selling education. Both of these activities build the 
culture in which I live. (Assuming I do them competently.) I see no reason at 
all to distinguish them; a teacher being paid to teach is using the material 
commercially. Of course, I can give writing away, and that's non-commercial, 
and similarly I can give education away, and that's non-commercial.

Of course teachers would like to be able to make money off things licensed 
for non-commercial use only. But that doesn't mean they should be allowed to.

On the practical side, are you going to exclude online education? Are you 
going to make teachers liable under copyright law if students skip class? If 
not, you're going to find it very hard to stop people selling the stuff by 
charging "course fees", providing the "course material", and offering to 
provide feedback just as soon as the student submits the draft of the 100,000 
word dissertation. Note that you can't really put a requirement on the 
standard of the feedback, either. Is it only available to good teachers?

I think this is even harder to define than derivatives only.

So, I'm afraid I think it's philosophically unjustified, and practically 
unrealisable.

-- 
David Chart
http://www.davidchart.com/Blog/