Licensing: Definitely Not Black and White

I'm not, what I would consider, particularly good at music (although I play a mean Guitar Hero). I don't intend on ever inventing anything, and my photography is typically a blurry thumb. However, my secret desire is to one day be the next great American novelist. I've always seen myself writing a single novel that defines me as an author and then fade away from the public eye. J.D. Salinger and Harper Lee are two authors that were able to do this- write a single, great, defining novel that speaks to a generation and then continues to be able spark conversation and love. However, both were authors that closely guarded their works- Salinger even made a rare public appearance to go to court to prevent another author from trying to publish a sequel to Catcher in the Rye.

While I admire both authors, I'm not sure that I could be so close-minded about my what I would write. If the purpose of writing something is to both get and give enjoyment, then wouldn't keeping everything to yourself be going against this? I want to think that I would be one of those people who would allow the public to use my work however they like, but I think that wouldn't necessary be 100% true.

I liked what Creative Commons offers by providing a place to make your work available or even just giving the ability to have samplings. Even though they claimed that the man who wrote a book and put it in creative commons and had it printed did okay, he was read by far more for free than who paid for the book. I suppose this begs the question of whether you are in it for the money or whether you are in it to provide the public with enjoyment. I guess there is also the question of integrity and not wanting to see your work mutilated or passed off and sold as someone else's. I don't know. It's a hard thing to decide.

I think I would probably allow for samplings of my work to be used without any problem, but I think in order for me to allow for full-unhindered use and access, I would have to be absolutely sure that the person using it wasn't going to be passing it off as his or her own creation and giving some credit where credit is due. I may not be as driven by making money off my creation as some, but I definitely don't want someone else making money off of it either. But then again, I guess it would depend upon the context and ultimate use.

I was trying to find something to show as being able to be posted and used, and one thing I found was a page that had picture of Snoopy as Joe Cool. I didn't think that Peanuts characters were in public domain, but maybe this somehow fell under fair use (although it wasn't a parody). What I settled on was the picture at the top of the page. I was struck by it since I always feel like colors are so bright right before a good thunderstorm.

I went through Creative Commons searching for photos to find this. Creative Commons has a little disclaimer that they only make the search a little bit easier, but some things you find might not technically be under creative commons. So I looked underneath the photo and found the cc logo, a link to the profile of the photographers, and a message saying that this photo was labeled for reuse under creative commons. I feel about as sure as I can be with this sort of thing that I won't have any lawyers coming for me by posting this photo on my blog.

Although I can't speak for the photographers, I'm assuming that they wanted it to be available for resuse so that it could be spread throughout the world. They obviously appreciate the colors before a storm like I do, so perhaps they hoped that their photo would bring me joy, and I, in turn, would post and pass those emotions that come from looking at a world before a storm with others. To certain degree, I can go along with this, although there is nothing really to stop me from claiming I took this photo in my backyard, which is my greatest fear with these licenses.

These are hard questions to think about, but maybe I'll have better answers by the time I finally get my novel done (or started).