The 16th and 17th episode of EXIF and Beyond has been released.
These episodes feature an interview with Jeff Sedlik, President and CEO of the PLUS Coalition (usePLUS.org), current Professor of Photography at the Art Center College of Design and also a past president of the Advertising Photographers of America (APA).
Discussed is the Picture Licensing Universal System (PLUS). Although relatively young by comparison to other photographic standards bodies, PLUS is tackling tough contemporary issues facing photographers. Both episodes are packed with valuable information every photographers should be aware of.
Part I of the interview covers PLUS Standards including the PLUS Glossary, License Generator, PLUS – IDs and the differentiators between PLUS, IPTC, and Creative Commons.
Part II of the interview covers machine readability, pending Orphan Works Copyright legislation, metadata, the PLUS Artist & Licensor Registry and the future of PLUS .
Download the latest episodes:
EXIF and Beyond: Jeff Sedlik Interview Part I and II
For the non-iTune listeners a streaming version of this podcast can be accessed here.
Technorati Tags: EXIF and Beyond, podcast, interview, Jeff Sedlik, PLUS, Picture Licensing Universal System, PLUS Coalition, IPTC, Creative Commons, usePLUS, standards, Orphans Work
In the May/June edition of Digital Photo Pro I have an article featured on Creative Commons that was spawned from my EXIF and Beyond podcast interview with Professor Lawrence Lessig. Look for it at your local book store. In the mean time the online version of this article has just been released and I invite you to take a look.
Creative Commons - Digital Photo Pro
Technorati Tags: Creative Commons, Lessig, Digital Photo Pro, article, Jim Goldstein, Jim M. Goldstein, EXIF and Beyond, podcast
As you may know I’m not a big proponent of using Creative Commons licensing for my photographic work (see Creative Commons: A Great Concept, I’ll Never Employ), but I do recognize it has value in some contexts (see EXIF and Beyond: Lawrence Lessig Interview). A recent development caught my eye that highlights one of the weaknesses of the Creative Commons model. That weakness is that the system of Creative Commons licensing is only as good or reliable as those that use it properly. If those using Creative Commons licensed images that don’t follow the license, the honors based system breaks down and becomes useless if not a detriment to the photographer releasing their work under it.
The latest story exemplifying this weakness comes from Corey Doctorow improperly using Creative Commons licensed photographs by Aaron Landry on the Boing Boing web site. To date Corey Doctorow has been a staunch advocate of Creative Commons and has written on the subject several times, often being referenced on the Creative Commons blog. If one of Creative Commons most staunch supporters doesn’t use it properly then what is the likelihood the average person will?
An Example of Creative Commons Not Working - Aaron Landry
Of course the next question raised based on Aaron’s licensing terms is Boing Boing a commercial site? Is the placement of advertising on the site enough to warrant identifying it as a commercial site and thus making commercial use of his photography? Joshua Benton shares an interesting experience in trying to determine the Creative Commons perspective to a similar question he raised sometime ago. Unfortunately Creative Commons clarifies little on what is considered “Commercial Purposes”. This exposes yet another weakness of Creative Commons… an organization working to better define and protect image use, but still stuck in limbo on making the call or just unwilling to make the call on certain definitions. How is this an improvement over the ambiguity of copyright use and legal definition we see in our legal system?
Technorati Tags: Creative Commons, Aaron Landry, Boing Boing, photo, photography, licensing
