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. Which is more just, a world where only some authors have the legal wherewithal and knowledge to proceed to terminate the rights of others over their work and thereby get the option to grant more access to the work they authored, or a world where all authors have access to the tools to liberate their work? 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. ToT, to me, and I'm no legal scholar, is a reality that ALL licenses are going to have to deal with, and something that the more transparent and aware authors are of it, the better society as a whole is. My hope was that the Creative Commons group was about finding ways to
encourage access and participation. Whether copyright is adapted to operate in a way which facilitates participation instead of binary fencing or if we are looking for a more negotiated space or fee for service approach which does not start from a copyright perspective I dont know. I just feel that the group I was visiting to look for first steps towards a legal understanding/promotion of participative culture was working on projects which are reducing access and making the idea of commons more tenuous. 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. 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? Janet _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
Fred -- The content of this email message is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 License, Some Rights Reserved. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/
_______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
