On 2/28/07, Fred Benenson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 2/27/07, Janet Hawtin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > My concern is that tot is a project to enable authors to remove access.
> Regardless of whether or not CC develops a tool, authors will always be able > to "remove access" via ToT. Moreover, CC doesn't actually do the removing of > the access, the author does it via the US Copyright office. To that extent, > I don't think CC should be seen as enabling authors to remove access. On the > other hand, if enabling means educating and attempting to be transparent > about a un-waiverable right of law, then perhaps CC can be seen as > "enabling." The point to understand is that ToT will exist with or without > CC's tool, and some authors will be privy to the legal tools in order to > understand it (and grant more or less access), and some won't. There is an opportunity to make money out of not generating a new work but by controlling existing assets. There will be no shortage of people offering to help with that, as I can see by the advertisements which Google offers me whenever we talk about patents or copyright. The process of doing tot will provide a lot of debating room for lawyers interested in defining when a work is itself, a clone, a derivative, and when an author or third party is able to remove access. With such good sport to be had in facilitation of removing access there is no risk that the feature will be unknown or that it will be straightforward even with a tool which makes the process more popular. > It's not that CC shouldn't make the tool that facilitates ToT, it's that > authors shouldn't revoke their work from the world. It then seems like we > should be blaming the authors, not neutral legal tools, for revoking access > to their work. The only other option is to take an essentially paternalist > perspective and assume the costs of some authors revoking access to their > work outweigh the benefits of other authors liberating access to their > works. Fortunately, I feel that it is within the scope and reach of FC and > CC to educate authors about the benefits of FC and the harms of revoking > access. Creative *Commons* makes a tool that facilitates *Termination* of Transfer. One of these terms should not be in this sentence in my opinion others obviously differ. IMHO Commons is a misnomer if the group is about creative licensing regardless of impact on commons. > > That a law exists now to terminate transfer is one thing. > > That CC invests in that and is only about working within the existing > > model and not about starting with the idea of participation and > > commons and generating debate and projects to match those values was > > for me a disappointment. > > > > My core question is why is CC not best placed to promote and develop > > commons friendly law/policy? > > This is because CC is a 501(c)3 and cannot, according to law, endorse any > laws or anyone running for, or in office. This is a sacrifice they had to > make in order to become a non-profit corporation with tax-deductible > donations. It is also a sacrifice that FreeCulture.org has been long > contemplating and attempting to implement. If what you're looking for is a > Political Action Committee, consider the Information Policy Action > Committee, who, though currently appears dormant, is intending to develop > commons friendly law and policy. Thankyou! It is an irony to me that in order to attract donations for supporting Creative Commons they needed to be an entity type that could not effect change in policy and law. The fundraising campaign was "Support the Commons" Which is described here as: http://creativecommons.org/about/legal/index_html#commons If Free Culture makes a similar sacrifice in order to attract funds then for me the model used to attract funds is costing organisations which look as though they are about advocacy for participation their right to participate in those debates in any robust and experimental kind of way. Freedom and commons are words which are important in communicating values which do need to be supported actively and to have groups which are able to work with those values as their first priority. If the method for formalising those groups disables any exploration beyond the current models/law/policy then that seems to be a problem which is worth looking at? > > If there is a reason why that is a > > problem how does that work? How do people who are interested in > > promoting a commons based perspective avoid that block to make some > > space for debate and progress in this area? > > Good question -- but I don't think it is CC's intention or goal. Their > mission is to develop licenses and tools for authors to safely and > reasonably work outside the All Rights Reserved regime of traditional media, > not disassemble it. > > > If Creative Commons cannot > > be a testbed for new models of generating value without reducing > > participation then where should we focus our efforts? Thankyou folks for an informative thread. Janet _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
