... French authors still cannot put their work under free licences, such as Creative Commons, for non-commercial use while being members of [French collecting society] Sacem, they said. Some European collecting societies are trying to find a compromise. ...
French authors give their exclusive rights to Sacem, including on non-commercial use. “We have discussed for years with Sacem without any luck, but our colleagues in the Netherlands and in Denmark are working with [the Dutch and Danish collecting societies] Buma Stemra and Koda to try to achieve an effective compatibility between Creative Commons and collective management,” [Mélanie Dulong of Creative Commons France] said.
In the United States, collecting societies do not have exclusive rights on the works of authors, so the compatibility problem does not arise, she added. ...
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
