discussion of the Creative Commons Metadata work

[Mike Linksvayer <ml AT creativecommons.org>]

Apologies for this late reply.

On Mon, 2006-01-23 at 02:15 +0200, Antti J. Salminen wrote:
> I'm wondering about what's the actual significance of the verification
> URL and what should I do when a file has a proper cc-metadata tag but
> the verification URL referenced has become defunct after I downloaded
> the file.
> 
> As I understand it, even if the verification web page goes away, I'm
> still licensed to use the file and also redistribute it to others who in
> turn have all the same rights.

That's right, same as if you had saved a licensed web page and that web
page goes away or the CC license gets removed.  Once you've accepted the
license it cannot be revoked.

However, the publisher of a verification page, or a any web page, cannot
license content they do not have the rights to license.  The
verification URL allows you to check a web page and gauge its
trustworthiness, just as you could for content in the web page itself.

> But should/could I change the URL to
> point to a page that actually exists? I anticipate broken addresses
> becoming an increasing problem as I collect material.

You could, if you're willing to document that the content was licensed
in the manner you state on your replacement web page by the content
rightsholder.

The problem of disappearing verification pages is really no different
than the general problem of disappearing web pages.  Search engine
caches are of transient help, the wayback machine is an incomplete long
term help, and using services that shouldn't go away, e.g. hosting
content at archive.org, is a good practice.

> Also is there an ETA on the revised guidelines for tagging mp3s and ogg?

MP3 will be updated as stated at
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/cc-metadata/2005-December/000752.html
would appreciate comments on the same regarding Ogg.

Updated guidelines for MP3 will be on creativecommons.org by the end of
next week, and supported in the next ccPublisher2 beta, also out soon.


-- 
  Mike Linksvayer
  http://creativecommons.org/about/people#21