Development of Creative Commons licenses

[Ben Finney <bignose+hates-spam AT benfinney.id.au>]

drew Roberts <zotz AT 100jamz.com> writes:

> I make a stone sculpture of a god and put it in a public park with a BY-SA 
> license.

What copy are recipients receiving? To what does the license apply? That
question needs to be answered before it makes sense to talk about
putting a copyright license on a stone statue.

> John comes along with a block of wood and copies my stone statue in
> wood, he puts the BY-SA license on the wooden version. He sells the
> wooden version to you. What is the source?

The license becomes interesting only when copyright applies. I don't
know whether that occurs when John carves the figure in wood.

To the extent that copyright applies to that act, though, I think the
licenses would apply to the *information*, and copies of that
information.

> Jack paints the statue on canvas with oils and puts the painting under
> the BY-SA as well. He sells the painting to Sue. What is the source?

Again, I don't see how copyright is involved with this act. To know how
the license applies, I need to understand what copyright-covered action
is being done.

Painting an image one sees in one's ocular vision doesn't strike me as
one that copyright cares about.

> I think you are thinking only in terms of works that are or perhaps
> were at one time in the digital realm. What about for works that have
> never yet maid it there?

Then one needs to understand exactly what is being copied, since
copyright covers only copies of expression.

-- 
 \     “I wrote a song, but I can't read music so I don't know what it |
  `\    is. Every once in a while I'll be listening to the radio and I |
_o__)        say, ‘I think I might have written that.’” —Steven Wright |
Ben Finney