Question: "Has CC been recognised in Singapore's legal scene?"

[Ivan Chew]

Hi all, Kelvin's question in an earlier thread hasn't been addressed. He asked:
- "has CC been recognised in Singapore's legal scene?"
- "I know that there's a CC SG licence, but what does that mean?"

Kelvin - I don't have the legal training and knowledge to answer it
authoritatively. So I'll cite what has been written by those more
knowledgeable:

From Giorgos:
"...Singapore-specific licenses - these are crafted with a language
that is tailored to Singapore law and this will be helpful for local
legal experts and courts in case you ever need to take legal action
against unlawful uses of your content..."
Source: http://creativecommonssingapore.wordpress.com/2008/11/29/singapore-licenses-are-online/

And this was what Anil clarified when I asked what the porting process involved:
"The porting process involves both linguistically translating the
licenses (where applicable) and legally adapting them to particular
jurisdictions. So whilst CC does not and
is unable to warrant that the localized licences will be enforceable,
the idea is that the adaptation process will make it more likely that
a local court will enforce the ported licence given the fact that the
licence has been adapted to take into account the nuances of the local
laws in the country concerned.

... It is also probably worthwhile to note that the CC licences
contain "severability" clauses -- meaning that, if a certain provision
is found to be unenforeceable in a certain place, that provision and
only that provision drops out of the license, leaving the rest of the
agreement intact. "
Source: http://groups.google.com.sg/group/creativecommonssingapore/browse_thread/thread/7279acc5a4a3a694

thanks
ivan

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Kelvin Lim <darkho...@gmail.com>
Date: Mar 28, 5:07 pm
Subject: new members to the list
To: Creative Commons Singapore

Thanks Ivan for inviting me to this group.
I think that there's still a lack of knowledge in Singapore of what CC is
and how its use can benefit individuals/organisations.

Hope that we can change that! :)

I do have a question - has CC been recognised in Singapore's legal scene? I
know that there's a CC SG licence, but what does that mean?

[Kenneth G Pinto]

Also not a legal eagle, but this is what I understand:

Copyright can be assigned by contract, e.g. an artiste assigning rights to a record label. This is similar to how CC works, in that the creator is assigning (in this case, easing off) certain rights to everyone.

So, I think that the only test of CC being recognised in any individual country is if a case is brought to court in that particular jurisdiction. I believe there were Dutch and Spanish cases involving CC where the courts recognised CC as valid. Of course, this might not hold true in Singapore.

The bottom line is that we won't really know if CC is recognised until there's a court case involving CC here.

Ivan has answered the second point with Giorgos and Anil's quotes. I'll just add that this increases the chance of CC being upheld in a local case.

Cheers,
Kenneth

--
(e) kennet...@gmail.com
(m) +65 9456 9057
(b) deadpoetscave.com
(p) flickr.com/photos/acroamatic/sets

[Ivy Lee]

Hi Ivan

I would like to know how to use the CC Singapore licence to apply it in my blog. Can I cc the whole blog, or must I apply it per posting? How does it work?

rgds
Ivy

[Giorgos Cheliotis]

I believe you are right Kenneth, but as the international precedent for CC is positive and copyright laws are more or less harmonized around the world, it is reasonable to expect that CC licenses would also be recognized by local courts. 

In any case, commercial users of CC material are likely (and I would advise them) to double-check with the authors whose work they are reusing before taking something to market. CC after all only concerns copyright, but there are other laws one can violate when using somebody's work: for example, if I take a CC-licensed photo of a particular person and use that to promote a cause or product that this person does not want to be associated with, I may be violating laws for the protection of the image and repute of that person. So, personally, especially if I were a commercial user, I would double-check with the creators and any parties whose rights under law might be of relevance, even if the CC license terms would already give me a green light with respect to copyright. 

In short: lawyers will still be needed in some cases, the advantage of CC is that it gives a lot of space for many of us to work with material we find online, and it can also help commercial users spot material which creators are keen to see reused even commercially - but in these latter cases getting some legal advice on the intended use of the works would be good. 

Note: I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice

[Ivan Chew]

Hi Ivy,

You can choose an appropriate license here:
http://creativecommons.org/license/
Copy the HTML code provided (after you complete the steps) and paste
it to your blog or blog post.

If you want to apply the CC license for all blog posts, you can post
the HTML code to the blog sidebar.
I'd think that if you only wish to release some blog posts under a CC
license, then only display the license for that particular post and
not on your blog sidebar.

For me, I chose to apply to all posts. But some of my blog posts may
have images that don't belong to me. So I took the extra step to add
additional info to the generic text generated:
"Unless otherwise stated, this work by Ivan Chew is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Singapore License. AS LONG AS YOU
ATTRIBUTE MY WORK TO ME (Ivan Chew, RamblingLibrarian.blogspot.com),
you are FREE to COPY, SHARE, MODIFY, or SELL (yes, SELL!) content from
this blog. And you do not need to pay me anything from what you do
with the content(if you do, I'd be very grateful but that's not really
required of the license). Do remember to ATTRIBUTE whatever you use
here, to me. For permissions beyond the scope of this license, please
contact me via RamblingLibrarian.blogspot.com or at
Rambling...@gmail.com"

In contrast, this CC-adopter (Phoebe Lim) is a whole lot more succinct!!!
http://creativecommonssingapore.wordpress.com/2009/03/22/cc-sg-adopter-wwwhomemade-chinese-soupscom/

Hope this helps
ivan

[Ivy Lee]

Thanks Ivan, this is very helpful.

[Koh Choon Lin]

Hi all

1. I would like to ask if the CC BY-SA or the GNU GFDL licenses would
currently be more recognized in the Singapore court?

2. Is there any advantage to use one over the other, granted they are
both compatible?

Regards
Koh Choon Lin

[Harish Pillay]

> 1. I would like to ask if the CC BY-SA or the GNU GFDL licenses would
> currently be more recognized in the Singapore court?

It should be recognized, except that I don't think it has been tested yet.
There really is no reason for it NOT to be recognized though for they
take their legal status because of the Copyright Act.

> 2. Is there any advantage to use one over the other, granted they are
> both compatible?

CC is really for non-computer-software stuff while GFDL is in response
to documentation for software. Both are acceptable though.

Regards.
--
Harish Pillay h.pi...@ieee.org gpg id: 746809E3
fingerprint: F7F5 5CCD 25B9 FC25 303E 3DA2 0F80 27DB 7468 09E3

[Kenneth G Pinto]

Hmmm, methinks the "is CC recognized in SG" should be dealt with in an FAQ on the CC-SG blog... =)

Kenneth

[Harish Pillay]

> Hmmm, methinks the "is CC recognized in SG" should be dealt with in an FAQ
> on the CC-SG blog... =)

I guess it would be useful, so +1.

[Ivan Chew]

Hi Kenneth & Harish,
I've been thinking about that, i.e. compile FAQs.

Need some inputs though:
1) I feel we should point to the CC FAQs rather than compile our own
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/FFAQ
What do you think?

2) Can someone help point me (or collate) the Questions to be
considered for FAQ? I sort of lost track a bit.
If not, it's ok, I'll find time to look through the discussion threads.

3) Depending on the questions and responses, we may need a disclaimer
e.g. responses to FAQ does not constitute legal advice. Do you think
we need that?

thanks
ivan

[Giorgos Cheliotis]

Haven't given this much thought to be honest, but it might be useful
to include some SG-specific FAQ's together with a prominent link to
the CC FAQs. By SG-specific I mean things like what is CC-SG, or is CC
recognized in SG, or why people should use the SG licenses, how they
are different from other CC licenses, etc. Also, perhaps answers to
questions that occur more frequently with Singapore users - e.g. you
know one of my favorites is: where do I apply for a CC license? :)