Development of Creative Commons licenses

[Christopher Covington <cov AT vt.edu>]

On Sat, 2012-05-12 at 13:29 +0200, Francesco Poli wrote:
> On Fri, 11 May 2012 15:32:10 -0700 Sarah Pearson wrote:

> > Alternatively, is there anything in this list that is unnecessary
> > for licensees to provide even when it is supplied by the licensor?
> 
> I would be happier, if the requirement to mention the "Attribution
> Parties" were dropped entirely.

Some works are made possible by an institution's resources, such as a
university lab, company-owned equipment, or the tools at a hackerspace.
In cases where copyright is not assigned to the institution (and thus
would appear in the copyright notice) it seems nice to be able to still
consistently credit it.

> Also, please don't forget my attribution-related suggestion:
> https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/cc-licenses/2012-April/006729.html

I agree on this point as well. If this sort of attribution removal is
covered under existing moral rights laws, perhaps it would be good to
remind people of that, but if it isn't, I'm not convinced that the
benefit to this clause outweighs its cost.

> > *(4)* Some licensors have more detailed expectations for attribution of
> > their work. Should we make allowances for licensors who want to include
> > specific attribution requirements (e.g., a particular attribution
> > statement), or would this unnecessarily complicate license compliance?
> 
> No, please!
> It is already non-trivial to comply as it is now!

Agreed. I would be disappointed if it became even more work than it is
now to filter a collection of Creative Commons licensed works into libre
and non-libre classifications.

> [...]
> > 
> > *(5) *Another possibility is to change the language to a more general
> > requirement to acknowledge the author and cite the original work and
> > applicable license. We could then include the current list of attribution
> > and marking requirements as an example of best practices rather than as a
> > specific legal requirement. This would potentially give licensees more
> > freedom to adapt attribution to their particular circumstances, while
> > maintaining the spirit and purpose of the requirements. Is this a proposal
> > we should pursue? Why or why not?
> 
> This could be a good idea, in my opinion.
> It would make life easier for licensees: we should remember that Free
> Software (or Free Culture, if you prefer this term) is about giving
> freedoms to licensees, so that they may share/participate and,
> possibly, become licensors themselves.

I also agree that this might be an excellent approach.

Regards,
Chris