[Upd-discuss] Re: Ethical Public Domain: Debate of Questionable Practices

[Andrius Kulikauskas]

Richard Stallman wrote:
>     Also, please, could your one-page statement be in the Public Domain?
>
> Why do you prefer that?
>
> I don't like to permit modified versions of my statements of opinion.
> So I generally release them under something like the CC Noderivs license.
> (I recommend the same practice to others.)
>   

Richard,

Thank you for your question.  I will share my response more broadly.  
This will encourage our debates!

My own interest in the Public Domain is as a foundation for online 
social networking.  I founded the Minciu Sodas laboratory 
http://www.ms.lt in 1998 for serving and organizing independent 
thinkers.  All of our venues have been "Public Domain except as noted 
otherwise".  We have had about 1,000 authors participate. 
http://www.ms.lt/authors.php
We have written some 30,000 letters http://www.ms.lt/news.php 4,000 wiki 
pages http://www.worknets.org and have an active online chat room with 
an archive http://www.worknets.org/archive/  all in the Public Domain.  
In a similar spirit, this year in Kenya we organized a Pyramid of Peace 
http://www.pyramidofpeace.net with more than 100 peacemakers 
on-the-ground to whom we distribute thousands of dollars worth of phone 
credit under condition that they let us publicly post their telephone 
numbers on the Internet.

I provide free services to our participants who "work for free" by 
working openly in the Public Domain on their endeavors.  The result is 
that we filter in for sharing, self-directed people and we filter out 
for those who are selfish and destructive.  This for me is the real 
value of the Public Domain, it is a litmus test for those who wish to 
contribute to a commons and care for it.  In this way we have network of 
self-directed people who have grown to work together and are ready for 
mobilization to help a client who provides direction and funding and 
wants momentum and is willing that we meet them halfway as we each 
pursue our own projects.  An example is the 2,000 stories that we 
collected for My Food Story http://www.myfoodstory.com for Greg Wolff of 
Unamesa Assocation http://www.unamesa.org

Code likes to clump, but content likes to crumble.  Richard, if you 
write a one-page statement, there is likely a sentence or paragraph that 
may stand out that I or others may like to use.  Or your work may 
provide the basis for a wiki page that evolves further.  By placing your 
work in the Public Domain you agree to participate in such a culture.  
Your decision either way shows your aptitude for such collective work.  
Is it worth investing energy to reach out to you?  Or should I devote 
myself to working with Fred Kayiwa in Uganda who is willing to work in 
the Public Domain?  For me the answer is clear and lets me reach out to 
include all based on their aptitude for giving, which is to say, give to 
the givers.  If he has energy, then he can reach out to you.  At some 
point we hope to include you, but the ones who are most giving are the 
ones who are most central.  I myself have given thousands of letters to 
the Public Domain and all of my creative work.

We are organizing an Ethical Public Domain which fosters a culture that 
is ethical rather than legal.  Code is happy to clump and have thousands 
of programs in one distribution.  But content likes to crumble and 
wishes for a free trade zone of ideas.  The basic requirements of 
copyright and copyleft hinder the use of one's own best judgement.  Any 
license requires a work to be delineated, the license to be specified 
and tracked, the steward of that work to be identified, and then 
permissions to be requested!  This is an impractical burden for an 
organizer like me who is  fostering a new culture.  And it is a failure 
to encourage a free give and take of each other's ideas that allows us 
to play out the culture that we would like to share.  Rather than depend 
on the force of the legal system and a justice system which I have no 
interest or opportunity to participate in, I wish to engage others in an 
ethical system and culture system that we can create together.

Richard, Micheal and all, I would be happy to share your own positions 
on this question, under whatever license, at our workshop Ethical Public 
Domain.  This would make for a great debate and discussion.

Andrius

Andrius Kulikauskas
Minciu Sodas
http://www.ms.lt
ms@ms.lt
+370 699 30003
Vilnius, Lithuania