The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that the Artistic License is enforceable! Happy day! The 16-page opinion is a good read.

From Lawrence Lessig:

So for non-lawgeeks, this won’t seem important. But trust me, this is huge.
[snip]
In non-technical terms, the Court has held that free licenses such as the CC licenses set conditions (rather than covenants) on the use of copyrighted work. When you violate the condition, the license disappears, meaning you’re simply a copyright infringer. This is the theory of the GPL and all CC licenses. Put precisely, whether or not they are also contracts, they are copyright licenses which expire if you fail to abide by the terms of the license.

Important clarity and certainty by a critically important US Court.

via reddit

Update:

orig photo by Sam Ogden

Filed under: all talk, lessig, no code, opensource · 1 Comment