Development of Creative Commons licenses

[Anthony <osm AT inbox.org>]

On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 7:37 PM, Alexander Genaud <alex AT genaud.net> wrote:

Anthony> If people want to use SA 1.0 (and there aren't
Anthony> that many that do), nothing is stopping them.


Perception is a powerful thing. Indeed it is the basis
for our entire subjective reality. In what way would a
curious or typical individual discover the CC SA 1.0?

Well, that brings up another issue:  Whether or not we want a curious or typical individual to discover CC SA 1.0.

The balkanization of copyleft licenses is problematic, and shouldn't be done without careful consideration.  To wit, I think CC-SA-1.0 is a better license than CC-BY-SA-3.0, but for most works I still wouldn't use it.  CC-SA-1.0 is incompatible with CC-BY-SA-3.0.  That means content under one license can't be mashed up with content under the other, and that in itself is usually much more of a missed opportunity in creating a free and open commons than the somewhat watered-down, and largely ignored to the extent it hasn't been watered down, attribution requirements of CC-BY-SA-3.0 (which includes phrases like "reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing" and "to the extent reasonably practicable" and "may be implemented in any reasonable manner")  .

Much can be said for, instead of having a battle between SA and BY-SA where each licensing party chooses sides, instead working out a compromise solution like CC-BY-SA-3.0.  In many ways the attribution-is-too-onerous group (of which I consider myself a member) have accomplished more by watering down the attribution requirements of CC-BY-SA-3.0.

  Restrictions 4(c)
    * keep intact all copyright notices for the Work
    * (i) the name of the Original Author
    * (ii) the title of the Work
    * (iii) the URI .. associated with the Work
    * (iv) credit identifying .. the Adaptation


Outside of academic journals, have you EVER seen a BY
work properly cited according to all of 4(c)? Such a beast
is rare indeed. Wikipedia does not properly attribute its
CC BY-SA works.

In addition to the watering down terms I outlined above, there's the good old "if the Original Author and/or Licensor designate another party or parties (e.g., a sponsor institute, publishing entity, journal) for attribution ("Attribution Parties") in Licensor's copyright notice, terms of service or by other reasonable means".  However, I believe Wikipedia is mainly relying on 1) "may be implemented in any reasonable manner", 2) implicit permission, and 3) explicit permission via their TOS.

All that said, I do think there are places where CC-SA-1.0 might be useful.  But it kind of makes sense to reserve it for people who really know what they're doing.