Practical example to reuse, revise, remix and redistribute Creative Commons resources #OCL4Ed

The task for e-tivity 4.1 at the course #OCL4Ed is to write a Blog post of 700 - 900 words based on practical example to reuse, revise, remix and redistribute Creative Commons (CC) resources plus reflection on the exercise. In this Blog post I will like to:

• Reflect on how creativity builds on  the past
• Discover how CC uses copyright law to provide permission to copy, distribute, modify and share creative works
• Study the components of the six CC licences
• Identify the three layers of a CC licence, namely the legal code, the licence deed and the machine readable code
• Study the legal compatibility among different licence types when remixing materials

For my own preparing of material, writing etc, I always look if something similar already exists. It is important to remember that Creative Commons licenses are not an alternative to copyright. They work alongside copyright and enable you to modify your copyright terms to best suit your needs. The crucial is that with CC one can build forward on others work, and don´t have to reinvent the wheel oneself all the time. This was also the meaning with copyright from its very beginning, to give acknowledge to the originator/s. The great issue with CC is that the originator clearly and conciously decides her/hiselves, that allows the others as well to also decide tehmseles, and to always acknowledge the creator.

In my experiences I dons see that much unfortunatly on revising, remixing and distributions of others material. True OER users mean for example tht real OERs are just materials with CC BY and CC BY SA.  Most often however, I see materials with the so called strongest CC licence. I would have love to see more materials available with possibilities to really reuse and remix so one can bild further on on ideas etc. Then it automatically will be quality reviewed as well, with so called peer review. That’s whay I very much appreciate the project on Open Edcuational Ideas. 

As it is said in the introduction webpage of this project: ...the main purpose of licensing educational material under open licences is to allow for anyone to use, re-use or re-purpose them. However, despite a strong movement in recent years to publish such material, OER reuse is still not a common practice in Higher Education, schools and enterprises. The project intend to tackle these issues by enabling Open Education at an early stage: instead of sharing complete OER or Open Educational Practices (OEP), the aim is to share ideas in the early design process. Probably, through, this this process a fundamentally different uptake of OER can be possible by creating Emotional Ownership of OER from teh very start.

The three layers of a CC licence, namely the legal code, the licence deed and the machine readable code

The public copyright licenses incorporate a unique and innovative “three-layer” design. Each license begins as a traditional legal tool, in the kind of language and text formats that most lawyers know and love. This is  call this the Legal Code layer of each license.

But since most creators, educators, and scientists are not in fact lawyers, the licenses are available in a format that normal people can read — the Commons Deed (also known as the “human readable” version of the license). The Commons Deed is a handy reference for licensors and licensees, summarizing and expressing some of the most important terms and conditions. Think of the Commons Deed as a user-friendly interface to the Legal Code beneath, although the Deed itself is not a license, and its contents are not part of the Legal Code itself.

The final layer of the license design recognizes that software, from search engines to office productivity to music editing, plays an enormous role in the creation, copying, discovery, and distribution of works. In order to make it easy for the Web to know when a work is available under a Creative Commons license, a “machine readable” version of the license  is provided— a summary of the key freedoms and obligations written into a format  those software systems, search engines, and other kinds of technology can understand. We developed A standardized way to describe licenses that software can understand is developed and which is called CC Rights Expression Language (CC REL) to accomplish this.

Searching for open content is an important function enabled by this approach. One can use Google to search for Creative Commons content, look for pictures at Flickr, albums at Jamendo, and general media at spinxpress. The Wikimedia Commons, the multimedia repository of Wikipedia, is a core user of our licenses as well.

Taken together, these three layers of licenses ensure that the spectrum of rights isn’t just a legal concept. It’s something that the creators of works can understand, their users can understand, and even the Web itself can understand.

• Content is available under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike License.
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OCL4Ed, task 3 on Copyright

One of the task for OCL4Ed (task3) is about to reflect on copyright

Lawrence Lessig (2004) argues in his book Free Culture. How big media uses technology and the law to lock down culture and control creativity that the default "© copyright all rights reserved" (applicable in most countries) contradicts the original purpose of copyright: to promote progress in science and the useful arts - a public good.The purpose is not to enrich publishers or authors, or to grant them undue influence on development and distribution of culture. So where does the common understanding of copyright as to be proteced for others to use and build further on come from. As Lessig argues:

...copyright was never intended to be primarily a vehicle for protecting the rights of the copyright holders. On the contrary, copyright was initiated specifically to promote learning by removing the perpetual rights of the copyright controllers transferring the rights to the authors and imposing a reasonable time limit on their privilege.

McGreal (2004) says that:

...copyright law was expressly introduced to limit the rights of the controllers and distributors of knowledge. Yet, these controllers are successfully turning a “copy” right into a property right. The traditional rights of learning institutions are being taken away. The balance for researchers should be restored. Research and learning must be allowed the broad interpretation that was intended in the original laws.

At an international level concerning copyright it is important to get an understanding of for example the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the Trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPS) and the Berne Convention

The law gives artists, authors, composers or other creative persons the right to decide how their literary or artistic works are to be used. Compositions in speech or in writing, computer programmes, databases, musical and stage works, works of pictorial art, architectural art, applied art - as well as all types of spiritual creation of a literary or artistic work - are protected by copyright law. Some issues on copyright for ceative work has to be followed:

• Copyright is used to protect creative works
• The form anr style of the exxpression is protected
• Copyright requires often an expression in  a particular form
• The work need to be original
• No formalities are required

The task was also to reflect on copyright and CC in ones own country. Questions to be reflected on are:

• Who owns the copyright of the teaching materials you create?
• How do feel about the ownership of your creative works?
• Is it right for institutions to claim ownership of education materials?

In my country, Sweden, we have signed the Berne convention. At universities we follow the copyright law, however it is often like that, that we apply teh sk "lärarundantaget", which means that the academics owns its own material which they have created. The law in breif as below (in Swedish):

Undantag från regeln att en arbetsgivare äger ensamrätten till ett verk eller en uppfinning som en anställd skapat som en del i sitt arbete.

Det finns två skilda undantag som båda benämns "Lärarundantaget": Dels ett lagreglerat som rör patenträtt till uppfinningar, dels ett undantag som växt fram i praxis rörande upphovsrätt till verk.

Patent på uppfinningar

Enligt Lag (1949:345) om rätten till arbetstagares uppfinningar (LAU) så har som huvudregel en arbetstagare patenträtt till de uppfinningar som en anställd skapar. Det finns dock ett undantag för "lärare vid universitet, högskolor eller andra inrättningar som tillhör undervisningväsendet" (1 § 2 st LAU).

Upphovsrätt till verk

Huvudregeln inom upphovsrätt är att den som skapar ett verk har upphovsrätten till det. För verk som skapats inom ramen för ett anställningsförhållande har dock en princip vuxit fram, enligt vilken arbetsgivaren får upphovsrätt till den anställdes verk, om sambandet mellan verket och anställningen är tillräckligt starkt.

För anställda lärare finns dock ett undantag från denna princip, som ibland omnämns som det upphovsrättsliga lärarundantaget. Enligt detta tillfaller upphovsrätten lärarna själva, i enlighet med huvudregeln inom upphovsrätt (det är dock oklart vad som gäller för datorprogram, jfr 40 a § URL). Detta undantag är baserat på sedvänja, som kan skilja sig mellan olika universitet och högskolor.

Vidare läsning

• "Lärarundantaget och upphovsrätt", Universitetsläraren nr 5/2009
• Sanna Wolk, "Anställdas immaterialrätt i arbetsgivarens konkurs (JT 2002/03 s 372)

However, it is more and more discussed at Universities to apply CC, and at least discuss with the originator of the material.

Discussing Copyright it is crucial to consider that copyright provides protections for a number of exclusive rights for the copyright holder, like:

• Economic rights relating to the rights to restrict reproduction, distribution and adaptations of the work
• Moral rights relating to interests which are not financial or monetary
• Related rights to protect persons other than the authors who are involved in the dissemination of copyrighted works
• Transfer of rights relating to assignment of rights, licensing and transfer of rights

Copyright aims to balance the exclusive rights of authors with the general interests of society regarding access to knowledge and information. Furthermore, it is important to consider that copyright means:

• Freedom of expression
• Access to knowledge for the benefit of the public
• Private or personal use

Creative Commons builds on copyright and its meanings. What is important to remember about CC is that it is easier to apply and to understand what one can do or can´t do, as it is cleared expressed by the originator her/or himself. So it is clear from the beginning both from the originator and for the user.

Lessig, L. 2004. Free Culture. How big media uses technology and the law to lock down culture and control creativity. The Penguin Press.

McGreal, R. (2004). Stealing the goose: Copyright and learning. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 5(3). Retrieved on 30 December 2010.