The Free Software Foundation has launched a public discussion on proposed changes to the Free Document License, a license designed “can be used for any textual work” but which, in the world enriched by Wikipedia, now attempts to license all creative work. I’ll be studying the changes carefully, and will post my own comments, both here and there, but I really would encourage people to do the same. Please spread the word broadly.
Comment. Most research articles that use OA-friendly licenses use Creative Commons licenses, even though there are many other kinds, including the GNU Free Documentation License. But I haven't seen a good discussion of why this is so or whether it should be. I can give a quick handful of reasons why CC licenses are beneficial, but if anyone has done a systematic comparison with other licenses, focusing on the purposes of research and scholarship (rather than, say, fiction, software, music, or photography), I'd appreciate any leads or links.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 9/27/2006 10:29:00 AM.
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.
