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Cory Doctorow @ Locus Magazine: Why I Copyfight

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Author, blogger, and permissive copyright activist Cory Doctorow writes a regular column for Locus, a monthly magazine that covers science fiction and fantasy publishing. His current column, “Why I Copyfight,” is filled with thoughtful analysis of why writers are increasingly using open approaches to distributing their work. A year ago, Doctorow wrote a great piece about Creative Commons for Locus; both columns are highly recommended.

I was recently talking to a friend, D.K. Thompson, who has been posting pieces of a YA novel entitled Unbelievable Origin of Superspiff and the Toothpick Kid, for the past several months. We’d never talked directly about Creative Commons before, so I was particularly interested to hear that he was publishing the entire story via poscast under a CC BY-NC-ND license. He, like other authors I have met, told me that he’s using CC because it helps define clear usage permissions and extends the work’s reach. Superspiff is a lot of fun – you can download episodes from it on D.K.’s site.

Literary publishing is a quickly-changing field, with new distribution models emerging regularly. We’re always eager to hear about authors who are using our tools to achieve their desired ends. If you or someone you know is offering their novel, short stories, poetry, or other literature under Creative Commons licenses (or if you’re a reader who has enjoyed someone else’s work that has been made available under CC terms), we’d be grateful if you would point us to it in the comments section of this post.

Posted 17 November 2008

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