Need help choosing a free licence for my website
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Hey guys!
I finally got my server working and having my own domain!
I was searching what license should I use for my website and man this is very confusing and lot of reading lol.
Basically in my website I will:
-Post my opinions about everything
-Writing,uploading my own articles/videos/tutorials/files about programming, free software movement etc...
-Make the JavaScript code of the website under GPLv3 license.
-Choose only free software code from third party JavaScript libraries.
-Create my own instance of nextcloud and gitlab but in separate subdomains like (gitlab.mydomaine.com and drive.mydomaine.com).
-Sell something in my website (like videos,source code etc...)
What is the best license for these kind of work? Should i put license on each page depending on the context?
Don't know what to choose :(. any advice? What do you think about:
- Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 4.0 International
- Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Thanks!
Don't know what to choose :(. any advice? What do you think about:
- Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 4.0 International
Non-free.
- Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
Free, and ensures that your work will stay free when redistributed.
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Free, but does not ensure that your work will stay free when redistributed.
name at domain wrote:
> Don't know what to choose :(. any advice?
I'm not sure what it means for your website to have a license. Are you
talking about licensing software which generates a website, licensing
articles posted on the website, or something else?
I currently use the GPLv3-or-later: https://jxself.org/license.shtml although for a while it was a disjunctive tri-license of your choice of CC-BY-SA-4.0-or-later, FDL-1.3-or-later or GPLv3-or-later: https://web.archive.org/web/20150421234023/https://jxself.org/license.shtml
I did that for maximum compatibility because copyleft licenses are usually incompatible with each other.
CC BY-SA has a downside, in my view, by not requiring the distribution of a "source" whereas the GPL does. https://freedomdefined.org/Licenses#Practical_modifiability talks about that in more detail under the section of "Practical modifiability." CC-BY-SA doesn't require distribution of a "source" so while it gives people the *legal* right to modify it how someone might actually go do that without a "source" is an open question. If a book were CC BY-SA and I had no source I guess I'd have to run it through a book scanner to re-scan and OCR it.
I question if CC-BY-SA can really be considered copyleft without the practical ability to exercise it. Perhaps at best it could be considered a "weaker" copyleft. Distributing of source for editing was important to me but I compromised because of the popularity of the CC-BY-SA license.
Anyway, one day CC-BY-SA was declared to be one-way compatible with the GPL: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/creative-commons-by-sa-4-0-declared-one-way-compatible-with-gnu-gpl-version-3 and so that solved my license compatibility concerns. Once this happened I no longer saw the need to continue to make that compromise and so no longer do.
See https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-recommendations.html
You should put a (possibly different) license notice on each Web page and file you distribute and the whole license on separate page/file.
If you are interested in RMS' views on copyright in general (not only for software), watch his "Copyright vs. Community" talk, e.g., https://audio-video.gnu.org/video/2016-04-11--rms--copyright-vs-community--athens.ogv
(RMS would probably keep the license of existing or slightly modified free software, including the JavaScript the website distributes; choose GPLv3+ for new software or for major changes to existing software; Apache 2 if that new software is very short, e.g., code snippets in an article about programming; GNU FDL 1.3+ for documentation/tutorials/...; but CC-BY-SA 4.0 would be fine too; and CC-BY-ND 4.0 for opinions.)
See https://www.gnu.org/software/librejs/free-your-javascript.html for how to set the license(s) of the JavaScript you website distributes.
Thanks guys!
@J.B. Nicholson-Owens
I'm not talking about any source code here (I only write free software, so the website JavaScript is GPLv3, and other source code uploaded to the web site will be GPLv3 too), but you mentioned something important about the source code of the web site which is running on my server(Please see my questions down below).
I talk mostly about the content of the web site :
- Text/Articles
- Videos
- Source code snippets
- (Maybe I will make some programs using WebAssembly using OpenGL, but like I said any source code for software will be GPLv3)
@MagicBanana thanks for the 2h30 minutes video and links :D
@Jxself I see your website is under GPLv3 that means the source code of your website is also available or it apply only for the content of the website?
So if I understand correctly, I should use licenses depending on what I publish to the website:
-For text/articles/videos in my website stating a Viewpoint/Opinion => Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 4.0 license (a.k.a. CC BY-ND)
-For text/articles/videos/code snippets about software => GNU Free Documentation License or Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International
J.B. Nicholson-Owens mentioned something about the source code of the website:
- the front side is already free software (JavaScript)
- But how about the server side should I release it also as a free software?
Thanks again.
You do not distribute the server-side software: no need for a license.
"@Jxself I see your website is under GPLv3 that means the source code of your website is also available or it apply only for the content of the website?"
Um; I'm not sure I understand the difference here. The 'source code of the website' is what you download right? The HTML and CSS? Because that's all my website is. Static HTML and CSS. Served by Apache.
"For text/articles/videos in my website stating a Viewpoint/Opinion => Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 4.0 license (a.k.a. CC BY-ND)"
See https://jxself.org/noderivs.shtml
No-Derivatives is non-free. Please don't use non-free licenses. Look up the free culture movement.
Of course if your web site contains only static HTML in this case I can download it.
For CC BY-ND I watched the video provided by MagicBanana and RMS said for works that state a Viewpoint/Opinion we should use CC BY-ND, also in the fsf website and gnu.org they use CC BY-ND.
So Im missing something?
In gnu.org (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#OpinionLicenses) they explain why choose CC BY-ND
> For CC BY-ND I watched the video provided by MagicBanana and RMS said for works that state a Viewpoint/Opinion we should use CC BY-ND, also in the fsf website and gnu.org they use CC BY-ND.
Yes, that is RMS's view, but not everyone agrees with him. He seems to believe that only freedoms 0 and and 2 are important for cultural works, whereas free culture advocates believe that all four freedoms are important.
He distinguishes between functional works that "do a job" and non-functional works that don't, and he does not think that all four freedoms are necessary for non-functional works. I disagree with the distinction. A cultural work does do a job, whether that job is to entertain, to inspire, or in the case of a work of opinion, to persuade.
The ND clause denies users freedom 1. RMS thinks that this is necessary in order to prevent works of opinion from being misrepresented. I don't have anything to add to the link jxself shared.
"A cultural work does do a job"... not the spectator. In those circumstances, is the freedom for the spectator to modify the work essential? Well, as you write, "not everyone agrees". But the distinction functional/nonfunctional exists, in my humble opinion.
Note: the topic has been raised several times on this forum, e.g., https://trisquel.info/forum/nd-creative-commons-licenses-reasonable
> "A cultural work does do a job"... not the spectator.
That's a good point. I do see now how one could draw a distinction between when the work does a job on behalf of the user/audience (e.g. a user renders a web page with Abrowser) and when it does a job on behalf of the author (e.g. RMS tries to persuade readers of the GNU Manifesto). However, if the user has freedom 2 (which RMS seems to believe they should) then they can redistribute the work to do the same job (e.g. I read the GNU Manifesto to someone hoping it will persuade them) or a different job (e.g. I send someone this video[1] hoping they will be disgusted by such obvious propaganda). With freedoms 1 and 3, I could modify such works to do that job better:
In the case of works of opinion, the most obviously useful modification would be translation into the audience's language, but I can think of others. For example, parts of the GNU manifesto are unclear. RMS recognizes this, and has annotated the work with footnotes clarifying these parts. However, the footnotes make it very awkward to read the work to someone, as in order to include them I have to interrupt reading the original, indicate to the listener that this is a footnote and not the next sentence, read the footnote, and then back up a sentence or two to remind the listener where I left off. I would prefer to use RMS's annotations to rewrite the unclear sentences so that they convey the message he intended without the footnotes.
In the case of the video I linked to, I might modify it by inserting brief clips that contradict some of its claims. This might not be a modification the original authors approve of, just as sharing it verbatim as an example of pro-copyright propaganda might not be a use they approve of, but what right to they have to control how I use a copy of information I've received, whether it's software or a video? (I think that this would be considered fair use anyway.)
It is reasonable to require me to not misrepresent the intentions of the original author, but the BY clause does this by requiring me to acknowledge that I have modified the work, so I see the ND as unnecessary in addition to imposing unjust restrictions.
As for works of art or entertainment, I might want to listen to some music recordings while driving in order to have a more pleasant drive. If the music has a lot of dynamic contrast it might be difficult to hear the quiet parts over the sound of the engine or air conditioning or external sounds, requiring me to constantly be adjusting the volume. I might want to modify it using a compressor, and perhaps share my modified version with a friend to use for her car drive. Or maybe I think a film has some unnecessary exposition that undermines suspense later in the story, so I want to cut some scenes before sharing it with someone so that they will find it more compelling. I can think of plenty of situations in which a cultural work could be modified by someone other than the original author to do its job better.
> But the distinction functional/nonfunctional exists, in my humble opinion.
Yeah, I do see the difference now, if I understand correctly that you are saying that some works do not do a job an behalf of the user/audience until they redistribute it, but since we are discussing terms of redistribution I don't see this as affecting the ethics of the situation.
"A cultural work does do a job"... not the spectator. In those circumstances, is the freedom for the spectator to modify the work essential?
It is probably not useful into divide people into mere passive spectators vs those that are doing work to make a given thing any more than it is useful to divide people in free software into mere passive users that don't deserve freedom. ("In those circumstances, is the freedom for the computer user to modify the software essential?" They are a mere passive user after all.) A key tenet of both free software and free culture is that anyone can be anything at any given time. I think chaosmonk has given some examples.
Free software is about having users ultimately be in control of the software they run. Not the programmers who wrote that software. Of course, some users can program and programmers often are users of the programs they wrote. But that is irrelevant.
Unlike spectators, software users are not passive. They do a job with the software. They deserve the control over that job, what requires control over the software. That is only possible if the software comes with all four freedoms. In particular, freedoms 1 and 3 combined allow non-programmers who need modifications (a bug fix, a new feature, etc.) to get them: they can have programmers make such modifications (including against money). Those modifications may indeed be essential to the work they do with the software.
Right, people can build on their software. People can build on non-software works too. There's no need to differentiate that software should somehow be elevated above non-software things. This is a false dichotomy. There's no need to divide us up that way. Someone may passively watch or read something but also make changes and re-share it. Perhaps they will translate it. Perhaps they will write and continue the story. This has happened in, for example, areas called "fan fiction." People have reused things since the start of time. Like the primates we evolved from, we're social creatures. Sharing's in our nature. This is correct and proper because being able to change and share things is our natural right, only limited by artificial copyright restrictions which block our natural rights. Creative works contribute to our shared history and culture. They're published for the benefit of -- and rightfully belong to -- everyone in the world because of those rights, not locked up. In fact, the Internet Archive is planning a celebration for the re-opening of the public domain in the U.S. next week: https://blog.archive.org/2018/12/05/join-us-for-a-grand-re-opening-of-the-public-domain-january-25-2019/
I hope to see everyone there.
The dichotomy is between functional and nonfunctional works. It is not between modifiable and non-modifiable works: artwork and opinions can be modified, of course. The question is whether not letting the public modify the work (beyond fair-use) is mistreating that public, denying it an essential freedom.
For functional works, my answer is "yes, because the user is entitled to control whatever she does with the functional work". That argument does not stand for an artistic work: the spectator does not achieve anything with it. It does not stand either for opinionated works, where it could even be argued that it is better to guarantee the public the opinion was not altered against the will of its author (who can always grant another license, with modification permissions, to whoever contact her to clarify/translate/etc.).
Of course, the "consumer" of the work may be as well a "producer" who could build upon that work. That is true for all works, functional or not. Repeatedly pointing out that to defend the free culture movement basically amounts to recognizing that this movement is about giving freedoms to authors; that modifying artistic works is not an essential right the public is morally entitled to. It is fundamentally different from the situation with functional works.
In my humble opinion, that freedom to modify, the free culture movement deems essential (again: to artists), is not that essential for nonfunctional works. It can wait a little. If that time helps the original author live off her work and, consequently, produce more (that hypothesis could be scientifically tested), then having those additional works produced is worth the lateness of derivative works. Since, in practice, for almost all cultural/opinionated works, financial gains are only made during a few years after the publication, having a copyright exceeding that is detrimental. And, after the death of the author, copyrights to "right holders" make absolute no sense to me.
About the social nature of human beings: it entails that redistributing (at least non-commercially) is an essential freedom of the public (all Creative Commons licenses grant that freedom). As you write: "sharing is our nature". I do not think that "modifying is our nature", that preventing modifications is fundamentally attacking our nature. That is where we diverge.
About fan fictions: aren't they fair-use? They should be: they are not derivatives but new works reusing ideas of the original work. Ideas should not be copyrightable/patentable.
It should be between modifiable and non-modifiable works. What practical or functional use someone might be able to imagine about others finding in a work shouldn't even be in the picture. After all, maybe someone's imagination about that is just poor and they they can't even imagine one. Nina Paley counters what the FSF says about "works for practical use" in http://blog.ninapaley.com/2011/07/04/rantifesto/ It's a bit of a rant (hence the title Rantifesto) but I think it gets the point across.
"About fan fictions: aren't they fair-use?"
The only answer that can be given to any question of "is it fair use", at least in the U.S., can only ever be "it depends." Because only a court can decide if a use is fair or not, no matter how much others might say one way or the other. There are examples mentioned in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_issues_with_fan_fiction where it was determined not to be fair with the use of copyright-restricted characters. I can imagine that it might be hard to make fan fiction without the characters. But I suppose it depends. There's that word again.
If the freedom for spectators to modify a cultural work was really essential because they can have practical or functional uses of it, shouldn't the free culture movement at least be able to imagine such uses?
In her rantifesto, Nina Paley does not give any example of such uses by *spectators*. She basically does not talk about spectators. She talks about *artists*, *commerce* and *businesses*. She "want[s] a Free Culture ecosystem that allows artists to make money", she "want[s] commerce without monopolies", and she "want[s] a Free Culture ecosystem that includes equivalents of businesses like Red Hat and Canonical".
She misunderstands the free software movement writing that "[the Free Software Foundation] says coders alone are entitled to Freedom, but everyone else can suck it". It is not at all what the FSF says: it says *users* of software (not *coders*), and other functional works, are entitled to freedoms.
In fact, Nina Paley talks about "open source", which misses the point of the free software movement: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html
Yes, I agree that she could have written it better but circling back to why I pointed to that in the first place her point remains about how it should not be based on a work being "practical" or not. "You do not know what purposes your works might serve others. You do not know how works might be found 'practical' by others. No one can claim to understand the limits of 'utility' of cultural works..."
Understanding that and moving the discussion away from it being about practical uses is an important first step.
"shouldn't the free culture movement at least be able to imagine such uses?"
I didn't say they didn't. I was referring to you, actually. That maybe you might not be able to imagine such uses but such a person not being able to imagine them shouldn't be a determining factor in whether they should be granted. But let's go there:
This line you seem to be drawing between "spectators" as you call them and "authors" (which I'm putting in quotes deliberately) seems much like drawing a distinction in the software world between "users" and "developers." If such distinctions are useful. And, I'm not sure they are so I put them in quotes.
To go by the same standard to make use of the software freedoms a person must transition from "user" to "developer" and write some code. So by this same standard of distinction only "developers" need software freedom and not mere "users". Of course that's not true. The "user" of a program could also have someone else make that change for them. Then again, maybe one could say that it's still the "developer" that is exercising the software freedom rights. Still, the original "user" needed to have the right to be able to have that person come along and make those changes. And as such, the four freedoms must be granted to them so that they could have someone do that for them (i.e, it would not be sufficient for the original person that made the program to release under terms that would forbid anyone else from ever changing it regardless of whether someone does it on their own or has someone else do it.) Other people might not take advantage of those freedoms (i.e., change from "user" to "developer") or maybe not. They need those freedoms either way so that they can if they want to.
But this same standard of distinction in the free culture world someone must transition from "spectator" to "author" to take advantage of their freedoms. So really your distinction between "spectator" and "author" seems identical to "user" and "developer" and really seems to be synonyms for "someone that somehow takes advantage of their freedoms." So if I frame it that way, then yes I could agree with you that "only authors" (and not "spectators") deserve freedom just like "only developers" (and not users) deserve software freedom.
Of course, I don't actually agree with any of what I just wrote. There's nothing useful to be gained by drawing a distinction between "spectator" and "author" anymore than there is to do one between "developer" and "user." Anyone can be a "user" or a "developer", just like anyone can be a "spectator" or an "author". In addition to the point I was making about not making the distinction being about "practical" works, the freedoms also need to belong to everyone so as to not exclude anyone. So those are my two points.
That maybe you might not be able to imagine such uses but such a person not being able to imagine them shouldn't be a determining factor in whether they should be granted.
I am not able to imagine practical uses of artistic works by the audience (is this term more general than "spectators"?). That is why I would like some examples. Especially if, as for software, that is the base to "prove" freedoms 1 and 3 essential in that context. In the article you linked, Nina Paley is supposed to counter FSF's stand. But she does not give examples of the audience practically using artistic works. Instead, she focuses on uses by other artists and businesses, the equivalent of what "open source" says in the software realm.
In https://trisquel.info/forum/need-help-choosing-free-licence-my-website#comment-138507 chaosmonk gave some examples (@chaosmonk: sorry for not replying to your post; keeping up with two parallel conversations on the same topic is confusing and time-consuming). I would not say that there are examples of practical uses though. In my humble opinion, they are about making the artistic work more enjoyable (possibly for a specific audience and/or in a specific context). But enjoying is not practically using.
Christianity pointed out than the code in video games is for enjoyment too, not for work (@Christianity: same "sorry" as above). However, that code can abuse the player (e.g., DRMs are common in proprietary video games) because unlike the (rest of the?) artwork, it is functional. Removing the malware requires the freedom to modify.
As for the second point, what I mean is very simple. Let me rephrase it without using the user/spectator and developer/author roles you dislike:
- Should running a program entitle you to modify it (individually or collectively)? Yes, for you (not the editor of the program) to be in control of whatever you do running that program, which is a tool (that can even harm you if out of your control, malware). That answer deals with fundamental rights of a human being in front of a computer. It has nothing to do with getting more/better software, a thriving IT ecosystem, etc. That would be the "open source" answer.
- Should reading/listening/watching/... art (or opinions) entitle you to modify it (individually or collectively)? The free culture movement answers yes but the argument remains unclear to me. As far as I understand, you say it is for the same reasons as above: to be in control of whatever you do reading/listening/watching/... art (or opinions), which is a tool. Personally, I do not find the rarely met examples of "art as a tool" convincing. Allowing derivations certainly allows more and better art to be created, a thriving art ecosystem, etc. That open-source-like argument is more commonly heard. It does not deal with the fundamental rights of a human being in front of a piece of art.
Compare the preamble of FSF's definition of free software with freedomdefined.org's definition of free culture (that you linked to). The preamble of the free software definition is all about users' freedom and the developer is the bad guy:
“Free software” means software that respects users' freedom and community. Roughly, it means that the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. (...) We campaign for these freedoms because everyone deserves them. With these freedoms, the users (both individually and collectively) control the program and what it does for them. When users don't control the program, we call it a “nonfree” or “proprietary” program. The nonfree program controls the users, and the developer controls the program; this makes the program an instrument of unjust power.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
The preamble of the free culture definition focuses on the authors, not the audience:
Most authors, whatever their field of activity, whatever their amateur or professional status, have a genuine interest in favoring an ecosystem where works can be spread, re-used and derived in creative ways. The easier it is to re-use and derive works, the richer our cultures become. To ensure the graceful functioning of this ecosystem, works of authorship should be free.
https://freedomdefined.org
Removal of DRM is a practical benefit of a video game being free software, but I don't find it convincing as an ethical argument for why we should feel obligated to allow any modification we wish to the game. I'd also like to hear where you would draw the line regarding the questions I asked in my other post.
In my humble opinion, the freedom to modify the text in a video game is not essential. Like (if any) its sounds, its graphics, its 3D models, etc. Because they are nonfunctional. And the text can be considered as a whole, it does not matter whether the final text comes from one single string, from the juxtaposition of several strings or whatnot. I am not a lawyer but I am pretty sure the ND clause of Creative Commons licenses forbids "adding a string that says 'not' in a clever place". That looks acceptable to me.
"audience (is this term more general than "spectators"?)"
No. Whether you want to call them user, author, spectator, audience, developer, or whatever there should be no separation. As I was saying back in #18 but put in a different way now: No classes of people.
"I am not able to imagine practical uses of artistic works by the audience (is this term more general than "spectators"?). That is why I would like some examples. Especially if, as for software, that is the base to "prove" freedoms 1 and 3 essential in that context. In the article you linked, Nina Paley is supposed to counter FSF's stand. But she does not give examples of the audience practically using artistic works."
You keep going back to practical uses. I never pointed to Nina's Rantifesto to give examples of the audience practically using artistic works because that was not my goal. Please re-read what I said when providing the URL in #16 and don't change it back. Specifically when I said "Nina Paley counters what the FSF says about "works for practical use"" I was referring to where the FSF says that works not for practical uses need different permissions and what her response directly to that point was: "You do not know what purposes your works might serve others. You do not know how works might be found 'practical' by others. No one can claim to understand the limits of 'utility' of cultural works..." All of this is saying it should NOT be about if someone considers a work "practical" or not for the reasons she stated: No one can (seriously) profess to know the limits of practicality/utility so whether a work might have a practical or utilitarian use is not a useful criterion to use to decide if something should be free or not. Neither she nor I are providing examples because we're both saying it shouldn't be about that in the first place. I've said that in #16 and #18 and I'm not sure why you keep coming back to wanting examples to stuff I've been saying it shouldn't be about in the first place. Understanding that and moving the discussion away from it being about practical uses is an important first step. So: Whenever you feel yourself wanting those practical examples, keep repeating to yourself that "no one can (seriously) profess to know the limits of practicality/utility so it's not a useful criterion to use to decide if something should be free or not." I'm not sure if a conversation can be possible until/unless this realization happens.
"but the argument remains unclear to me"
I'm not sure why. I've tried pointing to some reasons. Like all the way back in #4 when I said "being able to change and share things is our natural right, only limited by artificial copyright restrictions which block our natural rights." So, free culture would be (among other reasons) an attempt to restore this. Now I could be wrong about that and/or maybe you disagree with it, but regardless of which I'm not sure why it would be an *unclear* reason. You do seem to pick up on that there are different reasoning for why free software and free culture are important, yes. (Control over one's computing vs restoring the rights of humanity that existed before copyright took them away, among other reasons) but that doesn't make one somehow more fundamental or more important than the other. They address different issues for different reasons but both are important and each have their reasons for why.
But if this conversation has gotten to the point where I keep having to point back to things I already said and keep redirecting things (like about how it's not supposed to be about practicality/utility) multiple times and seeming to not get through then perhaps this conversation has run its course?
It has, I believe. Thank you for this nice conversation. I believe the arguments to deem essential or not the freedom to modify cultural works were expressed. And my apologies for misunderstanding you. I now understand that you have another reason than the FSF to justify the freedom to modify software: for you, it is a "natural right" that applies as well to Art, whereas the FSF says "it is to be in control of whatever you do using the software or any other functional work: practicality/utility is the criterion".
How is this,
> Of course, the "consumer" of the work may be as well a "producer" who could build upon that work. That is true for all works, functional or not. Repeatedly pointing out that to defend the free culture movement basically amounts to recognizing that this movement is about giving freedoms to authors; that modifying artistic works is not an essential right the public is morally entitled to.
a fundamentally different argument from this?
Of course, the "user" of the work may be as well a "developer" who could build upon that work. That is true for all works, functional or not. Repeatedly pointing out that to defend the free software movement basically amounts to recognizing that this movement is about giving freedoms to developers; that modifying software is not an essential right the public is morally entitled to.
(My apologies for exercising freedom 3.)
> If that time helps the original author live off her work and, consequently, produce more (that hypothesis could be scientifically tested), then having those additional works produced is worth the lateness of derivative works. Since, in practice, for almost all cultural/opinionated works, financial gains are only made during a few years after the publication, having a copyright exceeding that is detrimental. And, after the death of the author, copyrights to "right holders" make absolute no sense to me.
This part I agree with. I am not necessarily opposed to a few years of copyrestrictions if it can be proven that a total lack of restrictions would impact the creation of new works, but the way to prove it is to gradually decrease the both the duration and nature (I suspect that a non-commercial monopoly would be sufficient) until it starts to harm the public and then back off. This should be done independently for different media, since the appropriate compromise could be different for each. I think this applies to software too, not just art and entertainment, since the creation of new software can be just as beneficial to the public, but I suspect that the minimum restrictions needed for software will be very brief and limited, possibly zero years, because there is so much popular free software.
Free software supporters talk about users' freedoms, not developers'. They do not repeatedly point out that users can be developers, because it is irrelevant: users who cannot program are entitled as well to the control (including the modification, they can typically get by paying a programmer) of the software they use. Because it is their own work they achieve with that software.
See, for instance the text introducing the free software definition:
“Free software” means software that respects users' freedom and community. Roughly, it means that the users have the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. (...) We campaign for these freedoms because everyone deserves them. With these freedoms, the users (both individually and collectively) control the program and what it does for them. When users don't control the program, we call it a “nonfree” or “proprietary” program. The nonfree program controls the users, and the developer controls the program; this makes the program an instrument of unjust power.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
About public domain software: the law should force not only the proprietary program binaries (what was released in the first place) to enter the public domain but also the corresponding source codes. Otherwise, studying and modifying is unpractical and the reduction of the copyright term would mainly help proprietary software developers subjugate their users with the integration of ex-copylefted code that entered the public domain.
> Free software supporters talk about users' freedoms, not developers'. They do not repeatedly point out that users can be developers, because it is irrelevant:
It is relevant to freedoms 1 and 3. If no users of a program are developers, then users of the software cannot exercise freedoms 1 or 3, either as individuals or as a community. If free software supporters do not point this out often, then perhaps they are not asked to defend the usefulness of freedoms 1 and 3 as often as free culture supporters.
> About public domain software: the law should force not only the proprietary program binaries (what was released in the first place) to enter the public domain but also the corresponding source codes. Otherwise, studying and modifying is unpractical and the reduction of the copyright term would mainly help proprietary software developers subjugate their users with the integration of ex-copylefted code that entered the public domain.
Yes, abolishing copyright would be a disaster for free culture and free software unless DRM were also eliminated and the public had access to the source code of published software. This could be enforced by law, or by a cultural shift toward rejection of software that lacks source code and information restricted with DRM. Neither is likely to happen in the near future, but neither is the abolition of copyright. A climate in which which copyright has a chance to be abolished is likely to also be hostile toward DRM and lack of source code.
Let's first say that all my program does is an artsy display of an article I wrote myself under an ND-clause, included in the program as just one string. Can I still release the program as free software and keep the ND-clause on that one string?
Similarly, let's say I make a text-based game as a way of creatively expressing my opinion. Is it okay for me to declare that modification of the software is only allowed if none of the strings in the code are modified? After all, those strings are non-functional. But maybe I think there's a danger that someone might pervert my opinion when modifying the code, by adding a string that says "not" in a clever place. Is it ethically okay to prevent them from doing this? It was okay to prevent them from doing this with my original article.
I think video games can be artistic works. I don't really understand why an author can validly claim that altering his work is not okay because the work only functions as art/opinion, but that argument doesn't hold for a creator of a video game. Modifying the game is modifying the artistic work.
Art does have a function - it functions to entertain, inform, etc. I might want to alter that function, so that it entertains a different crowd. I don't really understand why we should discount this kind of function when considering whether modifications are acceptable.
> Art does have a function - it functions to entertain, inform, etc. I might want to alter that function, so that it entertains a different crowd. I don't really understand why we should discount this kind of function when considering whether modifications are acceptable.
I agree. Things like word processing and emails are important to many people's lives, but so are art and entertainment. We deserve freedom in those aspects of our lives as well.
Man life is complicated... :D. But I'm enjoying your posts.
I don't agree with some of you guys, but here is my point of view:
-With software I agree the source code should be libre software, because when you make a program you can do harm to others (stealing bank accounts,selling user data without his consent etc.) and we can't trust binary code.
-When you guys talk about free culture do not forget that you must respect others freedom too, here is an example :
I made a video of me talking about how I became a programmer while walking in the desert for example... and uploaded the video to my website and I made it under CC Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International. So I give you the right to share copy and sell it but not to modify it and redistribute it, ok? ( Correct me if Im wrong about this :D )
Why in the hell do you want me to give you the right to alter what I was saying in the video? You may cut the scenes of the video and make me saying weird stuff :D... Sorry but I can't understand why you want me to give you the right to modify the video.
Plz don't say I must give you that right because you deserve freedom, it does not make any sense because you are not respecting mine first...
I'll give another example here :
Imagine the same scenario but I made a video explaining how to write a Hello world application in Assembly language for example. in this I case I have multiple choices CC-BY-SA or CC-BY-ND etc...
So now imagine if I made a mistake in the video writing or explaining something wrong about the program in this case it may be interesting to release it under BY-SA so someone can alter the video and add a text in it saying this is wrong and you give your explanation for example and send it back to me so I can learn from you :).
So I think its depends on the situation/context, and hey you can do what ever you want just don't do harm to me or others its more important than making a derivative version of a work :D.
> Why in the hell do you want me to give you the right to alter what I was saying in the video?
Maybe to do something like this, for example:
https://www.invidio.us/watch?v=9JRLCBb7qK8
Note, by the way, that the linked video is protected under U.S. copyright law as fair use, so if you want to stop people from being allowed to mock you, you can't do so to Americans. Not so in all jurisdictions, though, so your use of CC BY-ND may limit the freedom of a person in a jurisdiction without this protection.
> With software I agree the source code should be libre software, because when you make a program you can do harm to others (stealing bank accounts,selling user data without his consent etc.) and we can't trust binary code.
That is a good argument for freedom 1, as we can use freedom 1 to determine whether software is malicious and change it if it is. However, even if a developer does not implement any malicious functionality into their software, it would be unjust for them to place restrictions on how we use it, so we also need freedom 0. Sharing and cooperation are also important to society, so there should not be restrictions on our ability to share and cooperate, which is why we also need freedoms 2 and 3.
> I made a video of me talking about how I became a programmer while walking in the desert for example... and uploaded the video to my website and I made it under CC Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International. So I give you the right to share copy and sell it but not to modify it and redistribute it, ok? ( Correct me if Im wrong about this :D )
Correct. Other than requiring attribution (which does not infringe any of the freedoms) there are no restrictions on use or verbatim distribution, but modifications are not allowed, so we have freedoms 0 and 2 but not freedoms 1 and 3.
> Why in the hell do you want me to give you the right to alter what I was saying in the video? You may cut the scenes of the video and make me saying weird stuff :D... Sorry but I can't understand why you want me to give you the right to modify the video.
You can't give anyone the right to modify the video. The state can impose restrictions on my right to modify it. Otherwise I could do whatever I want with the information I've received. The question to ask is not why I want the right to modify, but rather how do these restrictions benefit the public? If very few authors would produce cultural works without such restrictions in place, then there is some benefit to the public. However, the benefit must be weighed against the social costs of the restrictions, and we should accept the minimum amount of restrictions necessary to have a healthy body of cultural works. This is called the "copyright bargain." If you haven't read RMS's essay[1] on the topic I highly recommend it.
As for the example you bring up ("You may cut the scenes of the video and make me saying weird stuff"), it is true that someone could cut together scenes from the video in a misleading way. Fortunately, the Attribution clause of the license would require anyone who does this to say that they have altered the video. That way they can't fool people into thinking that those were your words. The only requirement this imposes is that they be honest about the video's origin. The No Derivatives clause goes much further than this, forbidding modifications of any kind. Is this warranted? Again, the question is not whether there is a good enough reason to allow modification, but whether forbidding modification will benefit the public.
> Plz don't say I must give you that right because you deserve freedom, it does not make any sense because you are not respecting mine first...
Not respecting your freedom to do what? Copyright law might affect what you can do with other information, but it has nothing to do with your freedoms regarding your own video. The question is whether forbidding modification will benefit the public.
[1] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/misinterpreting-copyright.html
"So Im missing something?"
Yes - Their focus is on software and software documentation. They don't believe in free culture (saying that only software and software documentation deserves freedom and everything else can suck it) and so it doesn't make sense to look at them as a guide or leader of what to look for regarding licensing choices outside of software and software documentation anymore than it would make sense to look at someone making proprietary software and say "they say we should make our software proprietary" and follow that. Because non-software things are outside their scope of work. For non-software things, it would be better to look at the free culture movement instead of the free software movement: See http://freedomdefined.org/Definition and also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-culture_movement
I'm new to this (free culture/free software) movement, so of course I'm looking for some "guide" or "leader" and thats why I'm here asking questions in the forums :).
For now I'm more interessed in the free software movement because you can do harm to others with software. Free culture is another subject and maybe I'll consider reading more about it later :).
Thanks all for your help! Still have a lot to learn from you guys :)
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Choosing a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 is what I need for my website
Older comment :
But to summarize most of the content of my website is just about programming stuff so a Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 4.0 is ok to use?
and like you said it is one way compatible with GPLv3 see (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#ccbysa)
The Creative Commons website recommends against using Creative Commons licenses for software: https://creativecommons.org/faq/#can-i-apply-a-creative-commons-license-to-software
But for article about programming, CC-BY-SA is OK. If you write more than snippets, you can provide a tarball (or a link to a software repository) with a COPYING file (e.g., including the text of the GPLv3) and a license notice at the beginning of each source code file.
Yes Thank you I'm aware of that.
Like I said in the previous posts all source code = GPLV3 and not CC BY-SA (Only the web site is CC BY-SA)
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