Lessig

First, let's be clear about objectives. When Eric Eldred pressed some of us to look at this problem, we decided any solution must satisfy three conditions:

(1) It must simplify: Copyright law is an insanely expensive system for 95% of creative work. Yet the way the law is written and increasingly applied now, the same insanely expensive system applies to all. So our first and most important objective was to lower the cost of the law -- to make it easier for people to signal their preferences effectively, and without the need to hire a lawyer.

(2) It must be machine-readable: But in making it simpler for people to express their preferences, we wanted to make sure we wouldn't be making it harder for the system to process those preferences. Put differently: text sucks, and legal text sucks more. What the world didn't need was the equivalent of a privacy policy pages attached to every bit of content. Instead, we believe that licenses are positively evil if they are not machine readable.

(3) It must be reliable: Finally, we want to build a system that others can reply upon. Who's the others? Commercial as well as non-commercial sorts. So obviously, (but remember, it used to be obvious that the RIAA wouldn't sue 12 year olds), there's little reason to worry about someone suing you for using an image from their website. But if we want a world where others can build upon what we build easily and reliably -- and in ways no one can imagine today -- then bullet proof licenses lowers legal uncertainty.

In a single line: CC aims to support a convention to make it simple to mark content with freedoms that people and machines can understand, and the law must respect.

So, against that background, some responses to the comments on my blog inspired by Ping's post.

(lower case) nate makes a great point about meaning: What is the meaning of using a device such as ours? Is it really an advance to turn a housesitting relationship into a legal relationship.

No, it isn't. And come take my contracts class, nate, as much of it is about where we ought to be limiting the reach of "legal-like" rules, and preserving norm-based rules instead.

But you make an important assumption that I believe is false when you write: "The small private user is looking for much more lightweight solution, more akin to adding a line “Copyright 2004, permission required for commercial use”." The assumption that "lightweight solution[s]" will be recognized as "solutions." Until copyright law is changed, there's no good reason to believe that. Hence, such "solutions" would fail condition (3). They would also fail condition (2) -- not machine readable. Again: "Instead of concentrating on bulletproof contracts, work on reducing people’s fear that they will be sued." You assume you can do the latter without the former. We looked at it. I don't think it can be done under the law as it is.

Ping suggests a couple modifications. One (which I agree with but was voted down (for good reasons) by the rest of CC) is various time-stamp options on CC licenses: e.g., this license good until X. Or after this date, restriction X is lifted. Or after this date, the work enters the public domain.

As I agree with the time-stamp idea, I am hopeful we can roll that into the scheme sometime. (I in particular find it odd to license stuff perpetually rather than for "limited times.") But I agree with this idea because I think it can be done in a machine-readable way. (And note: The Founders' Copyright (inspired by Tim O'Reilly) does allow you a crude way to put stuff into the public domain after a (truly) limited time.)

But those changes are very different from the "arbitrary condition" requirement, or a "fill in the blank" field. Both would fail requirement (2) -- machine-readability. If to understand the license you need to go back and read text, then the objectives of (2) are lost.

That, at base, is my strongest disagreement with Noise. As a lawyer, I of course love the idea of people crafting licenses. And as a law professor, I love the idea of people trying to learn more about how the law works. But again, I think the law of copyright is too complicated and hence, a waste of cycles. And even if an amateur could draft an effective and valid license (and I count myself as an amateur in this respect -- we drew upon the talent of excellent licensing lawyers at excellent law firms), the problem with the world that Noise would create is, in a word, noise. Noise's world fails condition (3): If every time I went to a page, I had to wade through a license to understand what I could do with the content on the page, that would not be a "solution" to the burden the law of copyright imposes.

In the end, I hope Thien is right. We are trying to fit the model to the demands of creators. We've versioned, and we're adding new choices -- but all subject to the three requirements of (1) simple, (2) machine readable, and (3) reliable. If we do that, and at the same time, internationalize the project sufficiently, then there will be an easy way for creators to signal the freedoms they intend to run with their work.

That won't be enough for everyone, no doubt. But "everyone" is not the objective. Those who reject the control-freak world of "all rights reserved" but have better things to do than become an amateur lawyer -- those people are the objective.

And finally, re Oyez: I know many have complained about Oyez's CC license. I view this along the lines I described here. In fact, there are many who believe that the act of digitizing can produce a sufficiently original work to create a separately copyright-able interest. Oyez removes the questions about that by releasing their work under a CC license. I would prefer the work were licensed under a simple attribution license. But the good that comes from removing an uncertainty seems to me to be worth the commercial use restriction.

Thanks again to Ping and Noise for launching this discussion.