Innovations

Glenn Otis Brown, March 10th, 2003

This week we’ll roll out several potential innovations to our licenses, then call for your comments. First, we’ll post some proposed text for two new kinds of license options: “sampling” and “educational use.” Second, we’ll float some draft language that we’ve considered adding to our licenses as enhancements: an explicit safe harbor for search engines under our “noncommercial” condition; a clear distinction between privacy-enhancing encryption tools and over-reaching digital rights management; and a potential link requirement as an addition to our “attribution” provision.

We plan to post around one draft provision a day this week; by the end of the week, we’ll have upgraded our blog so that you can share comments with other readers. Please weigh in: Let us know if you think the proposed enhancements and options are worth it, and if so, how we might improve the specific language of each.

Note: We’re not changing or versioning the licenses — not yet, anyway. We hope through this process simply to vet publicly issues that a few of you have raised via email, and to explore how Creative Commons and our adopters might best work together as our project grows. After a healthy comment period, we’ll take stock and move on from there.

Creative Commons at SXSW

Matt Haughey, March 9th, 2003

Today, Creative Commons metadata advisor Aaron Swartz joined blogger and author Cory Doctorow, programmer Brandon Wiley, Rice University’s Chris Kelty, and Executive Director Glenn Otis Brown to talk about the Creative Commons at a panel discussion at the South By Southwest (SXSW) interactive conference. The panel covered issues surrounding the project, how people have used our licenses, and what comes next.

This afternoon, Creative Commons chairman and co-founder Lawrence Lessig will deliver a much-anticipated keynote.

Commons Sin Fronteras

Glenn Otis Brown, March 5th, 2003

We are excited to announce today the launch of the International Commons project. The goal of the International Commons is to “port” our licenses to operate in the legal systems (and languages) of countries across the world.

Christiane Asschenfeldt, a copyright expert and the newest member of the Creative Commons team, will coordinate the effort from Berlin.

Digital Dictionary of Buddhism

Neeru Paharia, March 3rd, 2003

Charles Muller has licensed the Digital Dictionary of Buddhism under a Creative Commons license. The dictionary is a compilation of Buddhist terms and texts — as well as names of temples, schools, and people — found in East Asian Buddhist canonical sources. The dictionary project, which began in 1986, is thought to be the most comprehensive compilation of Buddhist terms available in English today.

Copyright Comics

Glenn Otis Brown, March 1st, 2003

Two new additions to our site help explain the how and why of using our licenses.

These comics walk the Creative Commons walk: our very own Neeru Paharia built them from Ryan Junell’s original artwork, which debuted in our Flash movie under a Creative Commons license, and from photographs taken and licensed by our webmaster Matt Haughey.