Comments on: Creative uncommons?

By: Lewis Hyde

Lewis Hyde — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:49:09 +0000

Two places where work on this issue is going on:

At Creative Commons—thier CC0 rights waiver protocol language:

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/CC0

An October workshop in Amsterdam will address technical and legal aspects of public domain marking in Europe:

http://www.communia-project.eu/node/109

By: littlehorn

littlehorn — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:09:19 +0000

Can someone explain to me how NIN’s last album fits into all this ? They gave it away for free. They seem to have come up with some sort of legal status for that. Am I completely offhand ?

By: Ginger Yellow

Ginger Yellow — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:55:44 +0000

“If this goes ahead, we will see an author’s work given more protection than his vital organic parts (precious bodily fluids?). ”

Doesn’t seem that crazy to me, especially compared to the current system in the UK where you have effectively no control over your organs. What are you (or even your heirs) going to do with your organs after you die?

By: chris y

chris y — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:21:58 +0000

You could, I imagine, set up a trust to ensure the free availability of your work, and include some impossibly difficult condition for changing the terms of it. But it would be an expensive and arduous way of doing something that ought to be straightforward.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 08:37:34 +0000

Leave your copyright to the National Trust…? Not really their job, and I doubt they’d be interested. But then, we are looking for a copyright holder who’s uninterested in enforcement, aren’t we…??

By: derrida derider

derrida derider — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 03:54:53 +0000

While it would be better if the law was changed, derekm has the right interim solution. Seems like a good thing for a UK version of the CCF to set up.

By: Matthew Kuzma

Matthew Kuzma — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 03:18:43 +0000

This is just disgusting. Copyright laws are so far from reasonable they verge on farce.

By: derekm

derekm — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 22:18:37 +0000

Under English law, could I avoid the risk of my heirs revoking the public domain assignment of my work by explicitly granting all my copyright rights to a third party set up to hold such copyrights?

In New Zealand there is a special perpetual trust (the Queen Elizabeth II Trust) set to allow land-owners to apply perpetual covenants to land – perhaps what is needed is an equivalent for copyrights. IANAL, but I don’t see that it would even need to have to be a special perpetual trust – it could possibly be a company.

By: Fellow Traveller

Fellow Traveller — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 21:45:30 +0000

Funnily, the UK government has proposed effective ‘nationalization’ of the bodily organs of the entire population by opting them into organ donation without their prior consent (with, of course, the saving grace of an opt out provided you take the trouble to register your objection to the government before you get killed in an accident which the government knows most people will not bother to do).

If this goes ahead, we will see an author’s work given more protection than his vital organic parts (precious bodily fluids?). The public (or rather the National Health Service or even the international donor organs market) will get the right to make use of your body before they get your creative work.

By: MrTimbo

MrTimbo — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 19:52:32 +0000

I’m not sure academics realize how different their information regime is from the rest of ours, but it can give these discussions an air of unreality sometimes.

They're aware. Especially the scientists. Read Peter Suber on Open Access/

By: lemuel pitkin

lemuel pitkin — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 17:25:48 +0000

Actually, in most US states a family cannot override an individual's decision to donate organs. Here in New York, we just recently eliminated families' veto on organ donations:

"Family permission wouldn't be required to proceed with an organ donation," said Claire Pospisil, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Health. "The individual's consent would suffice." The change, approved by the Legislature in 2006, makes New York the 44th state to establish such a "registry of consent," rather than rely on its eight-year-old "registry of intent."

By: Maynard Handley

Maynard Handley — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:41:08 +0000

“That death could void out the creator’s power to dispose of their work as they wish seems equally wrong.”

This is no different from organs, isn’t it? Kieran, I assume, can give us the details, but my understanding was that in all the anglo countries, even if I explicitly consent to donation via a donor card, if I am unconscious and family say no, well my wishes get overridden.

Amazing the details that lurk in some legal relationships.

By: stuart

stuart — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:06:25 +0000

$30 to access one article for 24 hours…is it some sort of legal requirement they make these publicly available, but then they set the price to avoid the risk anyone actually doing so?

By: lemuel pitkin

lemuel pitkin — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 15:10:17 +0000

access may depend on whether you or you firm or institution has a subscription

As someone who cannot read the linked article (without paying $29.95 for access for 24 hours), I find it a little ironic, and not in a pleasant way, to be excluded from a discussion of copyright law by … copyright law. I’m not sure academics realize how different their information regime is from the rest of ours, but it can give these discussions an air of unreality sometimes. Isn’t there an ethical obligation to conduct discussions like these in a way that doesn’t explicitly limit participation to the IP-privileged?

(And yes, among other things that means writers at places like CT should try to avoid linking to stuff their non-academic readers won’t be allowed to access.)

By: Sage Ross

Sage Ross — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 14:41:14 +0000

In answer to my own question, it seems that because CC licenses are explicitly perpetual, this wouldn’t affect use and downstream reuse of such licenses.

From the article, it seems that UK public domain is like a free license with totally unspecified terms. So like with a CC license, an author can stop offering their work under than license at any time. But unlike a CC license, there is no clear statement of the rights of anyone already using the license to continue to do so and to distribute it under the same license.