NY Times Copyright debate between Tim Wu and Rick Cotton

The New York Times had an interesting debate last week between Rick Cotton, the general Counsel of NBC Universal, and Tim Wu, the Columbia law professor, regarding copyright law, monitoring of network traffic, filesharing, piracy, and digital rights management, among other topics.
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NMR Studio Application

Have questions or want to talk about how you could use our studio to make your dream a reality? Contact us at studio@newmediarights.org or 619-591-8870

NMR is looking for innovative projects that are outside the realm of mainstream studio-produced content. Preference will be given to projects that: contribute to the public domain by committing to creative commons or other versions of open source licensing that permit future creators to reasonably build upon existing creative works , make use of new media distribution channels, and are within NMR's current interests. The NMR Studio is available primarily for individuals and non-profit organizations, but for-profit businesses with projects that meet the stated criteria can apply to use the studio as well.

If you have a great idea, but you don't meet all the requirements, don't worry about it. Send us a form anyway! The last thing we want is to see a great idea lost for all of eternity just because you didn't have a place to make it happen!

Papercraft tabletop monster combat strategy game

Big Big Battles: Crawly Combat is a forthcoming tabletop miniatures combat game where you cut out, assemble and color the tokens.

Any thing that creeps and squeaks is fair in a game of Crawly Combat. The premier set of the miniatures system Big Big Battles, Crawly Combat is an all ages miniatures game with rules so easy a child could comprehend and yet enough play value to keep even adults coming back for more.
Link (Thanks, Mike!)

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Unpublished

The major Creative Commons licenses

The content on this page was originally created by CreativeCommons.org and has been edited and remixed under a creative commons 3.0 attribution license.


The following describes each of the six main licenses offered when you choose to publish your work with a Creative Commons license. We have listed them starting with the most restrictive license type you can choose and ending with the most accommodating license type you can choose. It’s also helpful to know there are a set of baseline rights all six licenses offer to others and we’ve prepared a list of things to think about before choosing a license.

Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives (by-nc-nd)

by nc nd

Choose by-nc-nd licenseThis license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, allowing redistribution. This license is often called the “free advertising” license because it allows others to download your works and share them with others as long as they mention you and link back to you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.
Read the Commons Deed | View Legal Code

 

Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike (by-nc-sa)

by nc nd

Choose by-nc-sa licenseThis license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. Others can download and redistribute your work just like the by-nc-nd license, but they can also translate, make remixes, and produce new stories based on your work. All new work based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also be non-commercial in nature.

 

Attribution Non-commercial (by-nc)

by nc

Choose by-nc licenseThis license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.
Read the Commons Deed | View Legal Code

 

Attribution No Derivatives (by-nd)

by nc

Choose by-nd licenseThis license allows for redistribution, commercial and non-commercial, as long as it is passed long unchanged and in whole, with credit to you.
Read the Commons Deed | View Legal Code

 

Attribution Share Alike (by-sa)

by nd

Choose by-sa license This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial reasons, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use.

 

Attribution (by)

by

Choose by licenseThis license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation. This is the most accommodating of licenses offered, in terms of what others can do with your works licensed under Attribution.

 

Other licensesdisable rich-text

We also offer a set of other licenses for more specialized applications. Sampling+Licenses allow for snippets to be remixed into new works, even commercially. Our Public Domain Dedication lets you free works from copyright completely, and our Founders Copyright lets you do the same, but after 14 or 28 years. Musicians looking to share their work with fans might want to look at the Music Sharing license. The Developing Nations license lets you offer less restrictive terms to countries that aren’t considered high income by the World Bank, and finally, for those licensing software, we offer the GNU GPL and GNU LGPL licenses.


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The basic features of Creative Commons licenses & alternatives

The content on this page was originally created by CreativeCommons.org and has been edited and remixed under a creative commons 3.0 attribution license.

The features of the major Creative Commons licenses are discussed below. Creative Commons also offers numerous other creative licensing choices including

 

CC0- A universal tool for copyright holders to waive their interest in their own copyrighted work. This is a particularly good license to use if you would like to freely share your work without requiring attribution.

The Public Domain Mark- Is a tool to detonate a copyrighted work by an author that is not you that has fallen into the public domain in all countries in the world. Because the public domain is often very difficult to decipher, you should not place this mark on a work unless you are 110% sure something is in the public domain.  Also if you are using works that have been marked as public domain, you should do your own research to ensure those works are actually in the public domain. We have seen a large number of false positive public domain marks.

Open Source Software specific licenses – Creative Commons has versions of the Free Software Foundation's GNU General Public License and GNU Lesser General Public License.

 

Basic features of all Creative Commons licenses

 

All Creative Commons licenses have many important features in common.

Every license will help you

  • retain your copyright

  • announce that other people’s fair use, first sale, moral rights and free expression rights are not affected by the license.

Every license requires licensees

  • to get your permission to do any of the things you choose to restrict — e.g., make a commercial use, create a derivative work;

  • to remove attribution at the original authors request;

  • to keep any copyright notice intact on all copies of your work;

  • to link to your license from copies of the work;

  • not to alter the terms of the license

  • not to use technology to restrict other licensees’ lawful uses of the work

Every license allows licensees, provided they live up to your conditions,

  • to copy the work

  • to distribute it

  • to display or perform it publicly

  • to make digital public performances of it (e.g., webcasting)

  • to shift the work into another format as a verbatim copy

Every license

  • applies worldwide

  • lasts for the duration of the work’s copyright

  • is not revocable

Note that this list of features does not apply to the Public Domain Dedication, Creative Commons' Sampling Licenses, or Founder’s Copyright.

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Choosing a Creative Commons License

The content on this page was originally created by CreativeCommons.org and has been edited and remixed under a creative commons 3.0 attribution license.

Remember, offering your work under a Creative Commons license does not mean giving up your copyright. It means offering some of your rights to any member of the public but only on certain conditions.

What conditions? You can find an overview of the Creative Commons licenses here. All of our licenses require that you give attribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor.

AttributionAttribution. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your copyrighted work — and derivative works based upon it — but only if they give credit the way you request.

Example: Christy publishes her photograph with an Attribution license, because she wants the world to use her pictures provided they give her credit. Ben finds her photograph online and wants to display it on the front page of his website. Ben puts Christy’s picture on his site, and clearly indicates Christy’s authorship.

What NMR says about it:

Note that ALL Creative Commons licenses require attribution. The legal code itself tells the user to include the name of the original author, the title of the work, and a link to the legal code in the license. That said, the code also requires that users “keep intact all copyright notices,” so we highly recommend that you specify exactly how you want others to attribute your work.

For example, here is what the NewMediaRights.org creative commons license says about attribution when using our content.

“You must attribute the work in the manner specified by New Media Rights (but not in any way that suggests that New Media Rights endorses you or your use of the work).

  • As a requirement of this license, when attributing, New Media Rights requires that you make the following attribution BEFORE and AFTER the content is displayed:

  • "This content was originally created by NewMediaRights.org" where "NewMediaRights.org" should be hyperlinked DIRECTLY to the url on which the content can be found.

We specify exactly what the notice should contain when someone wants to use our content. The clearer you can make it the better.

Your other license choices are as follows

NoncommercialNoncommercial. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform your work — and derivative works based upon it — but for noncommercial purposes only

Examples: Gus publishes his photograph on his website with a Noncommercial license. Julie prints Gus’ photograph. Julie is not allowed to sell the print photograph without Gus’s permission.

What NMR says about it:

If you don't want people to be able to make money off of your work without your explicit permission, then you likely want to require uses to be noncommercial on our creative commons license.

This is an effective way for artists and creators, especially those that are new or emerging, to get their creative work to a larger audience, because the creative work can be redistributed noncommercially on noncommercial blogs, podcasts, social media websites, and elsewhere. Your photograph, song, story, or other creative work can gain the attention of the public, but it can't be used for an advertisement, sold by a record label, or turned into a television sitcom without your permission and compensation.

No Derivative WorksNo Derivative Works. You let others copy, distribute, display, and perform only verbatim copies of your work, not derivative works based upon it.

Example: Lionel licenses a recording of his song with a No Derivative Works license. Wendy would like to cut Lionel’s track and mix it with her own to produce an entirely new song. Wendy cannot do this without Lionel’s permission (unless his song amounts to fair use).

What NMR says about it:

Derivative works are creative works that build upon previous works. If you do not allow derivative works, then, as stated above, the only thing that can be distributed, copied, displayed, or performed is your exact original work(except for users' fair use rights).

This is a condition to carefully consider. For instance, if CreativeCommons.org has selected the “no derivative works” condition, NewMediaRights.org might arguably only be able to present the conditions we are discussing here exactly as they appeared on the Creative Commons website. Instead we have taken Creative Commons work and added our own to create an new, derivative work that combines Creative Commons' creative work with our own creative work.

Remember, allowing derivative works doesn't mean others can necessarily profit off the work without your explicit permission. Even if you allow others to create a derivative work, say recording and distributing their own version of your song, they cannot exploit the song commercially if you have chosen to require uses to be “noncommercial” as discussed above.

Allowing derivative works can often mean you've provided a great building block for grassroots culture. Therefore unless you want to restrict all adaptations or modifications of the work and only allow distribution of identical copies, you should consider allowing derivative works.

Share AlikeShare Alike. You allow others to distribute derivative works only under a license identical to the license that governs your work.

Note: A license cannot feature both the Share Alike and No Derivative Works options. The Share Alike requirement applies only to derivative works.

Example: Gus’s photo is online and licensed under the Noncommercial and Share Alike terms. Julie is an amateur collage artist, and she takes Gus’s photo and puts it into one of her collages. This Share Alike language requires Camille to make her collage available on a Noncommercial plus Share Alike license. It makes her offer her work back to the world on the same terms Gus gave her.

More examples are available on our examples page. Also note that every license carries with it a full set of other rights in addition to the allowances specifically made here.

What NMR says about it:

This condition requires that any use of your creative work carry the same licensing terms as you chose for your work. This can be helpful to ensure that others use your content with same spirit of sharing that you embraced.

That said, you don't need the “sharealike” condition to ensure that uses are noncommercial or don't allow modifications/adaptations (derivatives) as specified above. The “sharealike” requirement does place some additional restrictions on the user of the content, because they have no choice in the licensing scheme for a work that incorporates your work.

For example, let's say Rita composes and records a song, then shares it under a Creative Commons license that only requires attribution and contains the “sharealike” condition. This license does not restrict commercial use of Rita's song, so anyone can use her song commercially so long as they give her attribution. Now let's say Kevin is making a film, hears Rita's song, and wants to include it in his film. To use the song, Kevin has no choice but to make his film available under the same conditions, which allow anyone to commercially exploit his film so long as they give him attribution. If Rita did not choose the “sharealike” condition, Kevin could use the song in his film, respect Rita's wishes by attributing the work to her, and then offer the film under any conditions he chose, for instance a Creative Commons license requiring noncommercial use only.

Important for reusing, remixing “sharealike” content: Remember, even if your website uses a creative license, when you reuse or remix other creative commons material that has the “sharealike” requirement, you want to clearly label the Creative Commons licensed content you are using with exactly the license that was specified by the copyright owner. This is because your site might not have the same license as the content you are using. For instance, you may allow people to use your content with attribution as the only condition, where as the content you are using may require attribution, noncommercial use, and have the “sharealike” requirement. In that case you should label the license terms for the content clearly.

 

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Poker game interrupted by police raid

A Boing Boing reader says: "This a first-person account of a raid that took place at a home poker game on Saturday. About ten officers in riot gear ran in with guns drawn. Afterwards they took the homeowner's 13 year old and put them into child protection services. Apparently an officer went "undercover" for a few months before the raid. The reason for the raid was a $5 food and drinks chip-in, apparently you can't charge any fee, even if you're spending more than that on food and drinks and cards. No one ever contacted the homeowner and warned them not to collect any fee. Anyway, the whole story in the link. It's on a number of other sites too, such as Reason.com"
This account suggests the police hinted to individual players that the hosts may have been cheating or defrauding them, though that's not apparent in the news accounts. Firsthand accounts on poker sites have only good things to say about the hosts. Of course, even if the hosts were cheating, it wouldn't justify a full-on raid, particularly in mid-tournament. The SWAT tactics seem more like intimidation. Raiding in mid-tournament also ensures there's a $1,300 pot to seize for the sheriff department's general fund.
Link

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Large truck converted to mobile home

Photos of a garbage truck UNICAT TerraCross converted into a nice living space. Looks well-fortified against a zombie attack, too.
200801151507

This machine combines the rugged "go anywhere" off-road capabilities of the MAN 6x6 with the comforts of living at home. Safe 2 years of design, construction and testing. Built to the exacting standards of the world-class UNICAT engineering team, this "Home on Wheels" is ready for your immediate occupancy. You do not need to be a experienced expedition traveller.

Link (Thanks, Bill!)

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Meraki free mesh WiFi network spreading across San Francisco

Evan sez, "Meraki makes it brain dead simple to share wi-fi and pushes it out to massive scale at super low costs. The result is free wi-fi across areas much bigger than previously feasible by individuals, and at much lower cost and subject to much lower red tape than previous municipal wi-fi projects."

Free the Net is a community-built network. Meraki provides the technology, but we rely on people to help build and grow. There are a number of ways you can help:

* If you can see the Free the Net signal, sign up for a free repeater to boost your signal.
* Volunteer to host an outdoor repeater on your roof or balcony. The outdoor units help spread the signal throughout your neighborhood and are critical to the growth of the network.
* Spread the word! Tell your friends and neighbors to sign up at http://sf.meraki.com.
* Check out the network map and keep yourself up-to-date on our progress.

Link to project, Link to map

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Thuggy Stardust and the Hustlers from Mars: Bowie/gangsta rap mashup


The Rise and Fall of Thuggy Stardust and the Hustlers from Mars is MAN-CAT's mashup album in which all the tracks from David Bowie's classic Ziggy Stardust album are mixed with a wide-ranging variety of gangsta rap. None of these tracks floored me, but they all raised a smile and some of them were positively bumptious. Link (Thanks, Opitz!)

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