---
title: Content licensing
author: Issa Rice
created: 2015-01-02
date: 2015-01-02
---


This page considers how restrictive one should be about the sharing
and modification of one's content.

gwern, for instance, likes CC0: “I believe the public domain license
reduces [FUD](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FUD "Wikipedia: FUD") and
[dead-weight loss](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dead-weight%20loss "Wikipedia: dead-weight loss"), encourages copying
([LOCKSS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LOCKSS "Wikipedia: LOCKSS")),
gives back (however little) to [Free
Software](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free%20Software "Wikipedia: Free
Software")/[Free Content](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free%20Content "Wikipedia: Free Content"), and costs me nothing.”

In a footnote he elaborates:

> \[Public domain\] increases economic efficiency through - if nothing else - making
> works easier to find. [Tim
> O’Reilly](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim%20O%27Reilly "Wikipedia: Tim O’Reilly")
> says that [“Obscurity is a far greater threat to authors and creative
> artists than piracy.”](https://web.archive.org/web/20150321160006/http://www.openp2p.com/lpt/a/3015) If that is so,
> then that means that difficulty of finding works reduces the welfare of
> artists *and* consumers, because both forgo a beneficial trade (the
> artist loses any revenue and the consumer loses any enjoyment). Even
> small increases in inconvenience make [big
> differences](http://www.gwern.net/In%20Defense%20Of%20Inclusionism#new-regimes).

Some sites like the [Subject Wiki](http://subwiki.org/wiki/Main_Page) use CC-BY-SA, and others use CC-BY.
Any stricter license prevents remixing, not that there is anything wrong with that.

Richard Stallman [says](https://stallman.org/articles/online-education.html):

> In my view, nonfree licenses that permit sharing are ok for works of
> art/entertainment, or that present some party's viewpoint (such as this
> article itself). Those works aren't meant for doing a practical job, so
> the argument about the users' control does not apply. Thus, I do not
> object if they are published with the CC-BY-NC-ND license, which allows
> only noncommercial redistribution of exact copies.

# CC-BY versus public domain

What is the difference between CC-BY and CC0, in terms of what one should choose?
One argument that they don't make much difference is that any respectable person would give attribution anyway---so even given the full privilege of public domain works, one would still essentially use it like CC-BY.
Another idea is that (like myself) most people won't go after others even if their copyright (or copyleft) claims are ignored by other parties.