openswitch

A little over a year ago I started blogging. I had a very basic knowledge of HTML, a blogger account and a passion to change the world. Almost immediately after entering the blog-oh-sphere I was confronted with a new concept, “Creative Commons.” I had heard of Copyrighted content, but not Creative Commons. It sounded cool and forward thinking so I jumped on the bandwagon putting the cool CC image in my footer. It wasn’t until just the other week that I believe I’ve gotten a firm grasp on exactly what Copyright is, what Creative Commons is and how all that plays into blogging. Most of what I’ll share here is the result of a great conversation between Elliot, Phu, Jonathan, Joe, Paul, Koray and myself. I don’t link to those guys just to drop names, I do it because I want to make sure that I give appropriate credit for the ideas in this post. Lots of information was also gleaned from Wikipedia.

Copyright

Copyright law is part of Federal Law and is authorized by the US Constitution. Copyright means that the author has the exclusive right to publish and vend anything they write and/or create. There are certain important points to note regarding Copyright.

• Everything created since March 1, 1989, unless otherwise stated, is copyrighted. “United States law in effect since March 1, 1989 has made copyright the default for newly created works.” -Wikipedia. For bloggers, that means that if you don’t put any notice of copyright or your intention of use for your writings then that content which you create is automatically under a full Copyright. This may be a viable option for many people. However, there are a lot of folks out there who are not aware that a lack of copyright notice is the same as an “All Rights Reserved” copyright notice. This is why it is important to state your intended use for your works.
• Everything that is copyrighted, even “All Rights Reserved” is subject to fair use. Fair use refers to, “reproduction in copies or phonorecords …, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research.” -Wikipedia. This concept of fair use is based upon four factors:
  1. “The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes.” Why is this work being copied? Is it for personal gain or is it to benefit society as a whole by building upon the original?
  2. “The nature of the copyrighted work.” Basically, things like, the theory of Gravity can’t be copyrighted. Interestingly, neither can the video of John F. Kennedy getting shot. This is because it is in the public best interest that it remain copyright free.
  3. “The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole.” How much, and what parts of the original work are being used?
  4. “The effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.” Is the use of this material going to detract from the marketability of the original?

The point to take note of is this: whether or not a specific instance of the use of Copyrighted material is considered Copyright infringement or fair use is subject solely to the decision of the courts. Cases which are superficially similar can yield completely different verdicts based (seemingly) upon the whim of a judge. But regardless of the viability or nonexistence of concepts like “intellectual property,” copyrighted materials do have some level of protection in the courts today.

Creative Commons

As cool as Copyright is, not everyone wants to limit the use of their works. While under a Copyright their works may still be used, even in full, but the user must first seek permission from the author (except for what is considered fair use). The terms of use are then be decided and agreed upon by both parties. This can be a tedious process if the author intends for his work to be used by anyone who wants to use it. It can also be a deterrent from people using the work. In such cases the author (presumably) views his works not so much as a personal creation for self-serving reasons, but a contribution to the public good. He therefore desires that everyone have full access to do whatever they want with his work. Also, in such cases the author usually recognizes that his work is implicitly based on the works of others; and as such, doesn’t desire to claim his work as his own but rather a conglomeration of knowledge. Enter Creative Commons.

Contrary to popular belief, publishing your work under a Creative Commons license does not negate the Copyright. As Elliot pointed out, even on the Creative Commons website it states:

“Offering your work under a Creative Commons license does not mean giving up your copyright. It means offering some of your rights to any member of the public but only on certain conditions.”

It’s basically the author making an agreement with everyone on earth about how exactly he intends for his Copyrighted work to be used. There are different kinds of Creative Commons licenses. Some are more strict than others, but all are more lenient than a full Copyright. Copyrighted materials may be quoted legally, or used for criticism, etc (fair use) without express permission from the author but any work licensed under even the most strict Creative Commons license may be used in its entirety so long as credit is given to the author. In fact, all Creative Commons licenses at least require attribution to the author. Some also put stipulations such as “no derivative works” and “no commercial use” on the work.

What’s a blogger to do?

Creative Commons sounds good, and it is. It’s a great option for many people who blog. However, along with all the freedoms it grants the general public it also leaves the door wide open for splogs using your content on their site. As Phu points out, if you’re publishing your blog under a Creative Commons license

“it’s perfectly fair for sploggers to reuse and republish your whole blog content as long as they have a credit somewhere.”

And sploggers are certainly doing this. They’re taking full posts from popular blogs and republishing them on their own sites which are riddled with ads. Just ask Paul, he’s had more than one run-in with a splogger stealing his content.

However, this isn’t happening as much as some people would have you believe. It may become a very real threat to the average blogger at some point in the future but today it’s mostly a problem that mainly “A” and “B” list bloggers seem to be dealing with. Jonathan explains why he’s not too concerned about sploggers:

“My thoughts are on how do people find content and where do they find it useful. If people find the content and it’s attributed accurately, the user has the option to follow that link and consume that content in a mostly ad free environment. What more could you ask for? Doing a Google search for the stuff I write about invariably has my site coming before any splogs so I don’t see a loss of traffic. If anything, it may potentially lead to more traffic.

In any case, while we’re all concerned about people stealing our content, I currently don’t see it as a threat.”

Yet, Jonathan still has a full Copyright notice on his site. When I inquired as to why he has done this he replied,

“By using a full copyright, I avoid any confusion between copyright of design and copyright of content. This way, there’s no confusion. You ask me before you do anything with it… the only thing I have been explicit about is the original code examples that I provide in my articles. Those are public domain (because I’m all about sharing the love).”

That makes sense to me. Jonathan isn’t opposed to someone using his content (even in full), but he is concerned about someone using his design; basically he just wants control over what is used and where it is used. This is why I’ve decided to place all my content at openswitch under a full Copyright. It’s not that I’m opposed to people using my content, I just want to have full control over where and for what purpose it is used.

Another option to consider is that as Joe pointed out you, as the author, can draft your own license. After all, this is all that Creative Commons has done. They’ve just gone into much more detail than the average citizen could do.

If your blog is currently under a Creative Commons license and has been for a while now you should note that it’s legitimate to change your mind and place it all under a full Copyright. Koray points out the consequences of a decision like this:

“Everyone who has used [your] posts when they were CC are still bound by CC, and only CC. But [you] can say that “Now, for everyone else from this point forward, these posts are Copyright.”

So the people who used [your] work before can continue to use them as they were. But new people can’t come along and say “Oh well they WERE Creative Commons (before I even knew about them) so I can just keep using the CC license.”“

Of course, going from a full Copyright to a Creative Commons license carries with it no such consequences. What was once Copyrighted material is now Creative Commons.

Conclusion

In the end it ultimately comes down to you, the author, and how you want your work to be used. Both full Copyright and Creative Commons are perfectly viable options but the ramifications of each are different and should be carefully considered. The choice is up to you.

I hope you learned a little bit from this post and I’m interested to know what you think about Copyright, Creative Commons and the future of blogging.