David says:

“So the discussion of copyleft approaches versus public domain approaches comes down to a simple question: do we choose to privilege people, or do we chose to privilege content?”

The distinction is not between people or content, but between individuals and society. The Share Alike option privileges society - it is a mechanism that is designed to make more content available to more people now, and in the future.

This extends to the developing world, where the concept of shared ownership is nothing new (or western, or imposed) at all.

What is imposing developed world standards on developing countries is the Non Commercial clause. We do not have the infrastructure needed to distribute free and open electronic content to everyone, which means printing and selling copies might be the only option. The NC option prevents this.

“Perhaps it is time for us to seriously discuss whether or not copyleft is good for the open education community?”

I hope we will rather focus on explaining that the NC option creates more problems than it solves. On this note, I think it is fantastic that WikiEducator has chosen a BY-SA license and hope that others will follow this example.

>> So the discussion of copyleft approaches versus public domain approaches comes down to a simple question: do we choose to privilege people, or do we chose to privilege content? >Perhaps it is time for us to seriously discuss whether or not copyleft is good for the open education community?

David wrote: In the copyleft model, we privilege content (we guarantee it stays in the commons) at the cost of author freedom (to choose which license to use). In the public domain model, we privilege authors (we guarantee their freedom to choose which license to use) at the risk that some derivative works may leave the commons (be copyrighted).

The real questions here should be in which case we privilege the “learner”?

So should we privilege (1) content, (2) current authors, or the (3) future authors (learners)?

When we privilege content the way you see it happening with the copyleft model, we also privilege learners – the future authors.

David wrote: “Content is simply a means to the end of supporting people’s learning. Content is never the end in itself. The idea that we might privilege content over people is frightening to me. As educators, people should always be the first, most important focus of everything we do.”

In learning content should be the means but even more the end. We should educate future authors and not consumers of content. So when you privilege content the way “copyleft” does it, you also privilege people – not necessary that much the current authors but the future authors, you students.

From the perspective of those people who are only now entering to the global media market the “share alike” is definitely a better choice than giving your pieces away in public domain.

I think jazz-rock-pop is a good example. In West all “rhythms” in “rhythm music” are traditionally considered to be “public domain”. To make sure that the creators of the beats will never get a penny we Europeans decided that in the case of music you get copyright only to the melody. We are so clever.

This is why I never propose people to give their work away under public domain, but rather to license it under copyleft license. Copyleft makes it possible for other people to cultivate your piece and same time protects your rights to the original piece. Make me an offer.

Pick up just about any commercially available copy of a public-domain book and check to see if it has a copyright notice. Odds are that it does, despite there being no difference in the supposedly ‘copyrighted’ content, beyond merely mechanical transformations such as typography and layout.

Works do not have to be ‘moved out of the public domain’ to diminish the commons if they can be ‘fenced off’ to achieve the same ends. Similar stories can be told regarding visual and audible media, though the details are more involved. Note the difficulties that the Gutenberg project has had at times in locating enencumbered (ie. pre 1923) copies of books to digitize.

copyleft licenses combat this via a ‘triumph of the commons’ effect by ensuring that no part of the commons can be fenced off.

A license may not solve “all” issues, but it seems like it does solve a significant number of problems including those which Stephen points to. I agree that there is a larger issue here regarding network traffic, commerce, and social networks that should not be obscured. But let’s look at this in the light of specifics. Given Stephen’s example, if the SA clause had been around and used for Huckleberry Finn, would any of the problems he cites remain?

“But with advertising dominating the Google listings, the commercial versions of Huck Finn will be all you find in the search. Should you find the URL, with net neutrality now history, the free copy of Huck Finn will take ages to download, if it’s accessible at all, while the ebook will take a couple of seconds. If you decide to copy it, you will have to break DRM in order to do so, since we now have trusted computing built into the computer chip - except, of course, it is against the DMCA to break DRM. Finally, our ISP, in order to comply with copyright enforcement legislation, will arbitrarily remove all ‘book’ files from users accounts (while Vista will remove them from their computers) just as some ISPs now remove MP3s.”

The above is a good argument for net neutrality and reasonable (or no DRM), but not for SA. Licensing is too blunt of an instrument to be used to prevent all copyright woes. A successful copyleft license must be supported by a network of laws that are conducive to open content, rather than having the license do all the heavy lifting. Most don’t want to hear that, they would rather believe that a carefully crafted license page on their website will solve copyright problems.

Also, David, in the previous post you alluded to possible changes to your USU OCW courses. I’m curious what implications this has for code produced. Because GPL requires a SA clause(that’s a simplification) does that make it less than ideal compared to, say, a BSD license?