Development of Creative Commons licenses

[Heather Morrison <hgmorris AT sfu.ca>]

Second draft of this proposed new definition of "noncommercial". This  
second draft removes the phrase "to educational institutions" from the  
section on educational use and adds the scenario of selling the  
content as well as including it in packages. The purpose of this  
change is to address the issue raised by David Chart below, as he  
would interpret the original clause as meaning that he could sell  
coursepacks including NC materials to students.  To be clear, I do not  
think that when people use a CC license, they mean to give such  
permission. My assumption is that when creators use a Noncommercial  
license, the most basic and general interpretation is that selling the  
work for private profit is not covered in the CC license.

Full draft below.

Currently, this reads:

(f) NonCommercial means not primarily intended for or directed towards  
commercial advantage or private monetary compensation. For purposes of  
this Public License, the exchange of the Licensed Work by digital file- 
sharing or similar means is NonCommercial provided there is no payment  
of monetary compensation in connection with the exchange.

suggested change to:

(f) NonCommercial means not intended for re-sale or re-use of the  
Licensed Work for private monetary compensation (for example, as a   
means to attract advertising revenue). For purposes of this Public  
License, the exchange of the Licensed Work by digital file-sharing or  
similar means is NonCommercial provided there is no payment of  
monetary compensation in connection with the exchange. For the  
avoidance of doubt, educational use - teaching and learning - is  
Noncommercial, and permitted by this Public License, while selling the  
content for profit, or including the content in a package intended for  
sale for profit is Commercial, and prohibited by this Public License.

Web-based or other discovery services that rely on advertising  
revenue, such as search engines, may use advertising IN CONNECTION  
WITH THEIR SERVICES in connecting searchers to this content; this does  
not constitute commercial use of the content. Advertising that  
constitutes exploitation of the content for commercial purposes, such  
as advertising inserted into a derivative, advertising that readers  
are forced to watch before viewing the content, creating the  
impression of sponsorship, or advertising that implies that the  
creator endorses the advertised product, constitutes commercial use  
and is prohibited by this license.

Background:

After re-reading the Executive Summary of the Defining Noncommercial  
report, it strikes me that part of the problem with the overly broad  
definition of noncommercial stems from lack of understanding of  
copyright by most of the population (as noted in this report). The  
idea that you cannot use a work if what you are doing is commercial in  
nature, from my perspective, suggests that copyright is not just about  
expression of ideas, but rather about ideas themselves. I think this  
sets a bad precedent, and it would be a good idea for Creative Commons
to steer away from this.

best,

Heather Morrison
hgmorris AT sfu.ca
On 6-Apr-12, at 11:29 PM, David Chart wrote:

> On 2012/04/05, at 10:29, Heather Morrison wrote:
>
> > For the
> > avoidance of doubt, educational use - teaching and learning - is
> > Noncommercial, and permitted by this Public License, while including
> > the content in a package intended for sale to educational  
> > institutions
> > for profit is Commercial, and prohibited by this Public License.
>
> I'd like to reiterate my opposition to this. Education can be  
> commercial or non-commercial in the same way as any other activity,  
> and can be judged by the same standard: does the educator make money  
> off it? Commercial education use strikes me as a clear example of  
> commercial use. I think it would be deeply unfair to people who have  
> used earlier NC licenses to change the meaning in this way.
>
> Your wording still lets me sell absolutely anything NC as part of a  
> "course pack" for a "distance learning course", incidentally. I'm  
> selling to the "students", not an educational institution.
>
> --
> David Chart
> http://www.davidchart.com/
>
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