|
Tags: Blanking Manual revert Reverted |
| (327 intermediate revisions by more than 100 users not shown) |
| Line 1: |
Line 1: |
| {{divbox|blue|Unstable version|This is the openly
| |
| editable version of the definition. Please try to find a consensus for
| |
| any significant changes you make on the
| |
| [[Talk:Definition/Unstable|discussion page]]. If you want to work on a
| |
| substantially different derivative, you can try [[creating a fork]]. See
| |
| [[authoring process]] for more information.}}
| |
|
| |
|
| ----
| |
| This document provides a definition of "Free Cultural Works" [the
| |
| Definition], which are roughly works or expressions that can be freely
| |
| studied, applied, copied and modified, by anyone and for any purpose.
| |
| The Definition distinguishes between ''free works'' and
| |
| ''[[licenses|free licenses]]'' which can be used to legally protect the
| |
| status of a free work. The definition itself is ''not'' a license; it
| |
| is a tool to determine whether a work or license should be considered
| |
| "free." This document also describes restrictions that respect or
| |
| protect the freedoms of Free Cultural Works.
| |
|
| |
| == Summary ==
| |
|
| |
| '''Free Cultural Works''' are works which anyone can
| |
| * '''Use'''
| |
| * '''Study'''
| |
| * '''Copy'''
| |
| * '''Change and Improve'''
| |
| * '''Sell'''
| |
|
| |
| '''Free Culture Licenses''' are legal instruments by which copyright
| |
| owners grant users these freedoms and make their works into Free
| |
| Cultural Works.
| |
|
| |
| In addition to the 5 freedoms listed above '''Free Cultural licenses'''
| |
| may also include certain restrictions. These can include:
| |
| * '''Attribution''' - acknowledge other authors
| |
| * '''Share-alike''' or '''Copyleft'''- derived works must be licensed
| |
| under the same or compatible license as the original
| |
| * '''Protection of Freedoms''' - the license may require additional
| |
| permissions or information is distributed with the works (such as source
| |
| code, design drawings, musical scores, access codes) where these are
| |
| needed to create new versions of the work.
| |
| * '''Due Credit''' Give credit where credit is due. If it's not your
| |
| work do not claim it as yours.
| |
|
| |
| == Preamble ==
| |
|
| |
| Since the earliest humans appeared on planet earth they have drawn,
| |
| painted, sang, carved, weaved, danced, recited, built, studied. These
| |
| cultural works have been passed down from parent to child, from master
| |
| to apprentice ever since, each taking the works of those that went
| |
| before and passing it on to those who came after; each adding and
| |
| improving and polishing and translating what they received so that human
| |
| culture could grow and develop.
| |
|
| |
| Since Science has been based on an explicit philosophy of sharing
| |
| information, with all scientists expected to publish and any scientist
| |
| free to repeat any experiment, we have seen an unprecedented explosion
| |
| of scientific knowledge.
| |
|
| |
| In recent years social and technological advances make it possible for a
| |
| growing part of humanity to share cultural works that can be
| |
| represented in digital form with other people they have never met in
| |
| person. These works include artworks, scientific and educational
| |
| materials, software, stories, audio and video recordings. Many
| |
| communities have formed to exercise these new possibilities and create a
| |
| wealth of collectively reusable works. As these collaboratively
| |
| produced works grow in commercial value there is ever greater pressure
| |
| to monetise these works, to erect toll gates so that the community who
| |
| collaborated to create these works can be charged to access them.
| |
|
| |
| At different time over the years Copyright and Patent legislation has
| |
| been introduced as a way of restricting and taxing that free flow of
| |
| information - as a way of rewarding particularly innovative new
| |
| contributions or favoured supporters of the government of the time.
| |
| These laws have been used to create the tollgates mentioned above.
| |
|
| |
| '''Free Culture licenses''' have been created to provide a legal
| |
| framework which reflects these collaborative working practices,
| |
| providing a simple way for people to share with others the rights needed
| |
| for such collaborations to happen, so that users can collaborate and
| |
| work together to create and improve '''Free Culture Works''' and ensure
| |
| that these works stay free.
| |
|
| |
| ==Free Cultural Works==
| |
| Free Cultural Works are works where
| |
| * '''anyone''', i.e. rich or poor, socialist or fascist, man, woman or
| |
| corporation;
| |
| * '''anywhere''', i.e. worldwide;
| |
| * '''anytime''', i.e. unlimited and irrevocable and forever.
| |
| has each of the following freedoms
| |
| ====The freedom to use and perform the work====
| |
| to make any use, private or public, of the work. For kinds of works
| |
| where it is relevant, this freedom should include all derived uses
| |
| ("related rights") such as performing or interpreting the work. There
| |
| must be no exception regarding, for example, political or religious or
| |
| commercial considerations.
| |
|
| |
| ====The freedom to study the work and apply the information====
| |
| to examine the work and to use the knowledge gained from the work in any
| |
| way. The license may not, for example, restrict "reverse engineering".
| |
|
| |
| ====The freedom to redistribute copies====
| |
| whether they are sold, swapped or given away for free, as part of a
| |
| larger work, a collection, or independently. There must be no limit on
| |
| the amount of information that can be copied. Neither may there be a
| |
| limit on who can copy the information or on where the information can be
| |
| copied. The license may not, for example, forbid "Commercial'
| |
| exploitation of the work.
| |
|
| |
| ====The freedom to distribute derivative works====
| |
| including modified versions (or, for physical works, a work somehow
| |
| derived from the original), regardless of the intent and purpose of such
| |
| modifications.
| |
|
| |
| == Permissible restrictions==
| |
| There are certain requirements and restrictions on the use or
| |
| interchange of works that we feel do not impede the essential freedom in
| |
| our definition. These restrictions can therefore be included in Free
| |
| Culture licenses. They are described below.
| |
|
| |
| === Attribution of authors ===
| |
|
| |
| Attribution protects the integrity of an original work, and provides
| |
| credit and recognition for authors. A license may therefore require
| |
| attribution of the author or authors, provided such attribution does not
| |
| impede normal use of the work. For example, it would not be acceptable
| |
| for the license to require a significantly more cumbersome method of
| |
| attribution when a modified version of the licensed text is distributed.
| |
|
| |
| In addition to the requirement for attribution the license may include
| |
| restrictions to ensure the original author is not seen to be responsible
| |
| for changes to the work made by others. This may include restrictions
| |
| on the use of trademarks.
| |
|
| |
| === Transmission of freedoms ===
| |
|
| |
|
| |
| The license may include a clause, often called ''copyleft'' or
| |
| ''share-alike'', which ensures that derivative works themselves remain
| |
| free works. To this effect, it can for example require that derivative
| |
| works are made available under the same free license as the original.
| |
|
| |
| The license may restrict the redistribution of the work as part of a
| |
| compilation with other works unless the other other works are under the
| |
| same license or are under another free license.
| |
|
| |
| The license may require that where the work is used to provide a service
| |
| over the internet then users of the service will have rights under the
| |
| license, such as the right to access, copy, amend and redistribute the
| |
| source code for software.
| |
|
| |
| === Protection of freedoms ===
| |
|
| |
| The license may include clauses that strive to further ensure that the
| |
| ability to exercise the freedoms listed above is not restricted by
| |
| technical or other means. These can include:
| |
| * '''Availability of source data:''' Where a final work has been
| |
| obtained through the compilation or processing of design information or a
| |
| source file or multiple source files, the license may require that
| |
| underlying source data should be available alongside the work itself
| |
| under the same conditions. This can be the score of a musical
| |
| composition, the models used in a 3D scene, the data of a scientific
| |
| publication, the drawings and parts list of a machine, or any other such
| |
| information.
| |
| * '''Use of a free format:''' For digital files, the license may require
| |
| that the format in which the work is made available should not be one
| |
| that can only be read using a particular manufacturers program. Formats
| |
| should be documented and should not be restricted by patents, unless
| |
| these patents are licensed for use in free works. While non-free formats
| |
| may sometimes be used for practical reasons, a free format copy means
| |
| that the information will be accessible to everyone, for ever.
| |
| * '''No technical restrictions:''' The license may require that the work
| |
| must be available in a form where no technical measures are used to
| |
| limit the freedoms enumerated above.
| |
| * '''No other restrictions or limitations:''' The license may specify
| |
| that it may not be used to distribute works which are covered by legal
| |
| restrictions (patents, contracts, etc.) or limitations (such as privacy
| |
| rights or being for non-commercial use only) which would impede the
| |
| freedoms enumerated above. This can mean that if you agree to pay a
| |
| patent holder for the right to use a program then you can lose the right
| |
| to distribute that program (since you have acknowledged that you think
| |
| the patent applies to the programme). This is sometimes known as a
| |
| '''Liberty or Death''' clause and makes it more dificult for owners of
| |
| weak patents to divide the users by offering deals to some users under
| |
| the threat of a costly lawsuit.
| |
|
| |
| ===No other restrictions ===
| |
|
| |
| Apart from these allowed restrictions, the license ''must not'' include
| |
| clauses that limit essential freedoms. See [[Permissible restrictions]]
| |
|
| |
| == Free Culture Licenses ==
| |
| It is important that any work that claims to be free provides,
| |
| practically and without any risk, the aforementioned freedoms.
| |
|
| |
| All new works are automatically covered by existing copyright laws which
| |
| default to All Rights Reserved. All Rights Reserved considerably limit
| |
| what others can and cannot do with the work. Authors can make their
| |
| works free by choosing among a number of legal documents known as
| |
| licenses which grant users the 4 freedoms listed above.
| |
|
| |
| Licenses are legal instruments through which the owner of certain legal
| |
| rights may transfer these rights to third parties. Free Culture
| |
| Licenses do not take rights away — they specify freedoms that are not
| |
| included in a default copyright license such as All Rights Reserved.
| |
| When accepted, they never limit or reduce existing user rights and
| |
| exemptions under copyright law. Because the grant rights which are
| |
| additional to the rights users have under copyright therefore users are
| |
| not required to accept the license unless they want to exercise those
| |
| additional rights.
| |
|
| |
| == Identifying Free Cultural Works ==
| |
| This is the ''Definition of Free Cultural Works'', and when describing
| |
| your work, we encourage you to make reference to this definition, as in,
| |
| "This is a freely licensed work, as explained in the
| |
| ''[http://freedomdefined.org Definition of Free Cultural Works]''." If
| |
| you do not like the term "Free Cultural Work," you can use the generic
| |
| term "Free Content," or refer instead to one of the [[Existing
| |
| Movements|existing movements]] that express similar freedoms in more
| |
| specific contexts. We also encourage you to use the [[logos and
| |
| buttons|Free Cultural Works logos and buttons]], which are in the public
| |
| domain.
| |
|
| |
| Please be advised that such identification does ''not'' actually confer
| |
| the rights described in this definition; for your work to be actually
| |
| free, it must use one of the Free Culture [[Licenses]] or be in the
| |
| public domain, or equivalent of.
| |
| Please don't use other terms to identify Cultural Works; terms which do
| |
| not convey a clear definition of freedom; terms such as "Open Content"
| |
| and "Open Access." These terms are often used to refer to content which
| |
| is available under "less restrictive" terms than All Rights Reserved, or
| |
| for works that are just "available on the Web", but they don't
| |
| necessarily carry with them the freedoms referred to in this document.
| |
|
| |
| == Availability of legal instruments ==
| |
| ''Can'' in ''anyone can use, study, copy, change and improve''
| |
| ([[Definition/Unstable#Summary|summary]]) means anyone can realistically
| |
| make his case in court that such freedom was granted. It implies that
| |
| where a work is made free by way of a free cultural license, the legal
| |
| instrument, by which the copyright or other right owner grants the
| |
| license, must also be available to anyone in the legal form that is
| |
| legally binding in the relevant legal context. The legal instrument
| |
| should not be jealously and secretly kept by the first licensee.
| |
|
| |
| == Further reading ==
| |
|
| |
| * See [[Licenses]] for discussion of individual licenses, and whether
| |
| they meet this definition or not.
| |
| * See [[History]] for acknowledgments and background on this definition.
| |
| * See the [[FAQ]] for some questions and answers.
| |
| * See [[Portal:Index]] for topic-specific pages about free cultural
| |
| works.
| |
| * See [http://communities.libre.org/ Libre Communities] and
| |
| [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_knowledge Wikipedia on Free/Libre
| |
| Knowledge]
| |
| * See [http://ictlogy.net/?p=12#fourkinds The Four Kinds of Freedom of
| |
| Free Knowledge]
| |
|
| |
| == Versioning ==
| |
|
| |
| New versions of this definition shall be released as soon as a consensus
| |
| (achieved directly or through a vote, as per the [[authoring process]])
| |
| has developed around suggested changes. Numbering shall be 0.x for
| |
| initial draft releases, 1.x, 2.x .. for major releases, x.1, x.2 .. for
| |
| minor releases. A minor release is made when the text is modified in
| |
| ways which do not have an impact on the scope of existing or
| |
| hypothetical licenses covered by this definition.
| |
|
| |
| __NOTOC__
| |