Difference between revisions of "4.0/Internationalization"

Summary = One of our highest goals for the 4.0 process, consistent with all prior license development efforts, is to ensure that our licenses operate globally and atop applicable copyright law as intended. This page provides context for making internationalization an express priority for 4.0, and aggregates relevant considerations and proposals for improving still further the international reach and usability of its core licenses.

Importantly, internationalization of the license in 4.0 is critical regardless of whether CC continues to port its licenses in the future, a matter to be determined in consultation with our community once version 4.0 is published. Regardless of your views on the porting question, which is not a topic for discussion on this wiki, we need your assistance on this key drafting issue.

Context and importance

As public licenses, any CC license can be used by anyone, anywhere, even those licenses ported to the laws of a particular jurisdiction where the licensor has no connection. Beginning with version 3.0, CC ceased the practice of drafting its international (formerly known as the unported or generic) licenses against U.S. copyright law, and changed its approach. With 3.0, CC deliberately chose to use the language of major international copyright treaties and conventions in its international suite ^[1] and designed the international licenses to fully operate anywhere in accordance with applicable copyright law. We introduced a new provision in the international licenses to make this explicit:

The rights granted under, and the subject matter referenced, in this License were drafted utilizing the terminology of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (as amended on September 28, 1979), the Rome Convention of 1961, the WIPO Copyright Treaty of 1996, the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty of 1996 and the Universal Copyright Convention (as revised on July 24, 1971). These rights and subject matter take effect in the relevant jurisdiction in which the License terms are sought to be enforced according to the corresponding provisions of the implementation of those treaty provisions in the applicable national law. If the standard suite of rights granted under applicable copyright law includes additional rights not granted under this License, such additional rights are deemed to be included in the License; this License is not intended to restrict the license of any rights under applicable law.^[2]

Notwithstanding, Creative Commons continued its long-standing practice of allowing legal teams within the jurisdictions to localize the licenses. As of 1 December 2011, 30+ jurisdictions have ported the 3.0 license suite, bringing the total number of unique licenses stewarded by CC to more than 550.^[3]

CC believes further internationalization of the CC license suite is a high priority, and ought be a priority for the entire CC community. The most central reasons include:

• Although 55+ jurisdictions have ported some version of the CC licenses to their jurisdiction, there are more than twice that number of jurisdictions party to major copyright treaties that do not have ported licenses.^{[4] [5]} We want to be sure that the international suite addresses the needs (both legal and cultural) of users in those jurisdictions.^[6]
• Having a more internationally accepted and understood license suite gives added confidence to those who do not wish to use a ported license for any number of reasons. ^[7]
• Relatedly, licensing data suggests a trend in preference for using the international licenses over ports, thus the benefit of ensuring the international suite is as understood and widely-accepted as possible. ^[8]

4.0 considerations

Further internationalizing the licenses implicates important drafting considerations:

Proposals for internationalization in 4.0

[Note: these proposals are not necessarily mutually exclusive]

• Further align license definitions with those used in international copyright treaties such as Berne, the Rome Convention, and the WIPO Copyright Treaty where possible, accounting for differences.

• • Pros:
  • Cons:
  • Other comments:

• Incorporate universal drafting conventions and styles in the licenses (to date, based largely on U.S. conventions and styles).

• • Pros:
  • Cons:
  • Other comments:

• Modify Section 8(f) (or its equivalent) to clarify intended interpretation of license terms and conditions.

• • Pros:
  • Cons:
  • Other comments:

• Account for differences between laws using accepted language and/or provisions that make reinforce that terms and conditions apply to the fullest extent permitted by (but not in contravention of) applicable law.

• • Pros:
  • Cons:
  • Other comments:

• Authorize official/approved translations of the 4.0 international licenses.
  • Pros:
  • Cons:
  • Other comments:

[Please add other proposals here]

Related debate

We encourage you to sign up for the license discussion mailing list, where we will be debating these and other 4.0 proposals. HQ will provide links to related email threads from the license discussion mailing list here.

Relevant references

Please add citations that ought inform this 4.0 issue below.

• Presentation by Paul Keller at the CC Global Summit dated 16 September, 2011.
• Presentation by Massimo Travostino at the CC Global Summit dated 16 September, 2011.

Notes