Innovation and Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a license that lets the creators of intellectual property clearly define how that property may be used by others. Partially this license is a reaction to the poor way copyright law is being viewed today (see links below).

Partially it is tool that gives creators a way to provide for more interaction with their ideas. And this interaction is a great way to market, in the right circumstances. More managers should be thinking about how their organizations can use this tool to improve performance.


A great example is found in this Wired article, Open Source Opens Doors to SNL:

Live from New York, it's -- three comic talents who first made a name for themselves on the internet.

Andy Samberg will become a performing member of Saturday Night Live's 31st season cast debuting Oct. 1, while Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer have joined the show as writers. But all three got their first big break online, thanks in part to the viral popularity of video shorts they released on the net. In a move that may have helped fuel rapid grass-roots distribution, the comics released their work under Creative Commons licenses, which essentially let anyone copy a given work for free provided that person doesn't try to profit from it.

This was an effective strategy to get their work into the public eye and market themselves.

Copyright background links:

• Keeping Up With Uncle Sam by Katie Dean, Wired
  
• Misinterpreting Copyright, Richard Stallman
• The Public Domain, Lawrence Lessig
• Creative Commons Is Rewriting Rules of Copyright, Ariana Eunjung Cha, Washington Post