Crazy Idea Creative Commons NC Fee

Crazy Idea Creative Commons NC Fee
 Copyright 2012 drew Robert


Crazy Idea Creative Commons NC Fee by drew Roberts is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

So there is quite the debate going on right now on the Creative Commons mailing lists and on identi.ca as to the possibility of CC dropping or deprecating BY-NC and BY-ND variants as a part of the upcoming license version refresh.

I have asked for years that if CC does not drop the NC and ND stuff, they at least create a FreeCC brand / logo / etc. that those who use CC licenses but are only interested in the Free side of things can use and promote.

Dropping them would be OK with me too,

So this morning I had this crazy idea.

Since the people who use the NC license on their works reserve the right to make commercial use (make money from / profit from?) of their works for themselves and seek to restrict others from doing so, might it be fair to ask them to pay Creative Commons a small fee for the use of the NC license for each work that they release under such a license? Would it also be fair for CC to demand a small ongoing rate tied to revenue from the work on a yearly basis?

I can hear the howls now. Sorry.

If you are an NC user and are howling, consider this:

Those who use a Free BY or BY-SA license for their works allow others to earn revenue and possibly make a profit from their works. CC can do so if it chooses. The people who comprise CC can too. You, on the other hand want to reserve all of the revenue and profit for yourself. Why should you not pay a small fee to protect your works with such a finely crafted license? Why not pay a small percentage of the revenue you earn from your work thus protected? (Don't forget that a small percentage of $0.00 revenue is $0.00.)

If you don't want to pay with money, pay by sharing.

Hah! Ouch? I just had an even crazier idea to add to this:

CC could begin charging web sites etc for the right to offer the NC licenses for use in their site. If the sites need to, they could pass this on the the users as well. Nice way to double dip a bit there...

all the best,

drew
(who may try and improve on this bit of crazy. Help doing so appreciated.)

Crowd Funding Freedom

Crowd Funding Freedom

Copyright 2012 drew Roberts


Crowd Funding Freedom by drew Roberts is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

So KickStarter kicked it off in the minds of many and IndieGoGo lets people outside of the US get in the game. (There are others as well, if you have such a site, send me the link for possible inclusion in the little post.)

This is something for people who crowd fund projects to consider and if they like the idea to insist on.

If you are going to participate in crowd funding a project which results in copyrighted works, patented or to be patented products / designs, inventions, etc. then why not insist on Free Licensing for the resulting works / products?

If you think about it, why should you pay to fund the creation of something which you can then be sent to jail or seriously fined for copying and sharing with friends.

If you think about it, if you are paying the creative person *up front* for the work they are doing, why do they need the government granted monopolies of copyright or patent to give them an incentive to create the work that gets the monopoly protection? Is the money that the crowd is paying them up front not enough of an incentive for them to create?

If crowd funders get into the swing of this, artists/musicians/creatives will get paid, and fans will be free to share the creations and promote their favourite artists.