On 03/12/2007, Gavin Baker gavin@gavinbaker.com wrote:
After rereading the CC-BY legal code it does appear you (and others who made this point) are correct, and I was quite mistaken about the strength of the CC-BY license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode "You may Distribute or Publicly Perform the Work only under the terms of this License."
Indeed it seems CC-BY is already the "weak copyleft" I was thinking CC-BY-SA is... CC-BY is much stronger than I realised. I thought CC-BY just meant "include a byline with my name".
I am probably not the only one who had this impression, because the Wikimedia Commons summary as it stands is deeply misleading. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:Cc-by-3.0
How embarrassing.
So, is this understanding correct: using CC-BY, a reuser could create a derivative work that was not freely licensed, but provide info that the source image was CC-BY (and provide link), and that would be acceptable? Is that true?
Well... now I think shoring up CC-BY-SA to be a strong copyleft is a good idea, since Greg is correct...if we can correct the misperceptions of people like me then I don't see why this idea wouldn't receive widespread support.
cheers, Brianna
Brianna Laugher wrote: [...]
No it isn't, there is one important difference: derivative work, i.e. modified versions. Again, compare to the LGPL: modified versions must be distributed under the same license (though larger works which use/incorporate clearly demarked LGPL components do not). This is not true for CC-BY: if i make a derivative of a CC-BY work, I have to attribute the author, but i can license my version under whatever conditions i like. That's not weak copyleft, that's no copyleft at all.
Yes, that is correct, but again, we lose the distinction of using/aggregating works, and modifying them. I believe this is a very important difference (as exemplified by the LGPL), and I maintain that an LGPL-Like CC license would be useful - at least for me, it would reflect exactly what I, for one, want:
People can *use* my work *in* theirs, as long as they attribute me, but if they *modify* my work, that modification must be freely licensed. This is stronger than CC-BY but weaker (or rather, softer) than CC-BY-SA/GFDL (in their "strong" interpretation).
I think having a clearly strong/viral CC-BY-SA is just as important as having a soft version. Of course, adding yet another license to the mix is not so great, but I would hope that having *clearer* labels will clear up more confusion than adding *another* label creates....
-- Daniel
On 03/12/2007, Daniel Kinzler daniel@brightbyte.de wrote:
Yes, but as Greg argued, images are not typically modified in the heavy fashion that text is. The edits that are made, are arguably easily reproduced and so having them or not having them in the ShareAlike silo is not that significant.
I think you would recognise this on Commons: the vast majority of images are only ever edited by the uploader. For FPs and QIs the case is different, and those photographers and illustrators have good incentive to use a SA license. But for the majority it's not that important, especially if any derived works have to link to the original and state its license. A person seeing the derived work, if correctly obeying the license, could easily think "bugger that, I'll just go get the original and make the same changes this chap did, and release it under my personal favourite copyleft license".
I think perhaps it is too fine a distinction. There are many distinctions CC could make but for the sake of simplicity don't, e.g. educational use, or personal use. So perhaps this scenario makes more sense:
* Solidify CC-BY-SA as a "strong copyleft" license * Let or encourage people like you and me to add the additional freedoms as we like when granting the license. (Commons could have a template for it, doesn't mean CC necessarily needs a separate license for it.)
e.g. "This image or its derivatives can be combined with text without affecting the text's copyright, as long as the license for the image is clearly and separately stated."
(I think it's OK to use a strong copyleft license and grant additional rights, but not OK to use CC-BY and demand additional restrictions [such as derivs must be same license].)
cheers Brianna
Brianna Laugher wrote: [...]
Hm, true - that would be kind of like an "add-on" to CC-BY-SA. If it was to become popular, it might actually become semi-official and well-know, something like "CC-BY-SA/commons-mod".
-- Daniel
Daniel Kinzler wrote:
I like that concaption. However, as simple it is to differenciate when it's a text/image issue, what happens when the modified version is also an image, but breader. Eg. the virgin case. Is that a composition of your photo with the text and background (it would have been composed in layers) or simply a derivative work?
The LGPL doesn't either define the difference.
Daniel Kinzler wrote:
something like "CC-BY-SA/commons-mod".
Don't call it so. People would start confusing it with Cc-by-sa. Maybe CC-BY-LSA (Less Share-Alike) following LGPL sample?
On Dec 3, 2007 8:38 AM, Brianna Laugher brianna.laugher@gmail.com wrote:
It's not deeply misleading, it's just too short. It should probably say "In short: you are free to distribute and modify the file as long as you attribute its author(s) or licensor(s) and add a copy or link to the license".
I don't think it is copyleft, because derivative works should not be under the same license: "If You Distribute, or Publicly Perform the Work or any Adaptations or Collections, You must, unless a request has been made pursuant to Section 4(a), keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and provide, reasonable to the medium or means "
Bryan
On 03/12/2007, Bryan Tong Minh bryan.tongminh@gmail.com wrote:
I agree, but even as a not-copyleft license it's much stronger, ie more demanding, than I realised.
I think I assumed from the title that it literally was just a "byline license" (actually, like {{attribution}}), and so never actually read the legal code until now. Assumptions are so deadly. I deeply mislead myself. ;)
cheers Brianna