LearnHub

I would say not commerically. But I wouldn’t mind someone building upon it or using it in a classroom.

Well, I think I would prefer that my lessons be used on this site only, unless someone approached me. I’m giving them as free content, but only because on the web, most information is free, and should be free. However, were someone to teach this in a class, I would be annoyed, unless they told me first. I like it when people use my work, because it tells me I did a good job. I dislike it when people don’t tell me first, because then I don’t know that people like my work, and they might well be taking credit for it.

I hope that people continue to add their thoughts to this thread… It gives more guidance to the thinking and concerns of educators regarding sharing and open education. To put a little fuel into the debate, I’ll offer short responses to the two thoughts previously shared.

First, with regard to the non-commercial (NC) restriction, I would ask why it is so important to prevent your work from being used in what might seem to be a commercial manner? Is it that you intend to earn money from direct sale of your work? If that is indeed the highest purpose of your efforts, then using the NC term makes a lot of sense… it clearly signals to people that you reserve the right to make money from sales. On the other hand, is it just that you don’t like the idea that others might make money in the process of using and disseminating your work? Why not? If someone else contributes their time, expertise, and resources to disseminate your work more widely (all with attribution back to you), and manages to make some money along the way, how is this bad? Also, no one can ever take away your original work… that work will always remain available and open in the manner you specified, regardless of any derivative works, commercial interests, etc. If someone comes up with a clever idea to make some cash, you also always have the right to create a competing product! The NC term can reduce the value of your work in unexpected ways. First, there is the issue of confusion around the NC term itself… it is not clear what exactly is or is not a non-commercial use. At the moment, the best guideline centers on “intent”, where activities “primarily intended” to derive income from using your work would be forbidden. But this is a difficult thing to qualify. For example, for-profit schools are probably not allowed to use your work. Ad-supported web sites…? Even non-profit institutions usually charge fees for students to take classes, which could easily be construed to be deriving income for the purpose of supplying NC-licensed materials. The list goes on. These unfortunate ramifications of the NC term are particularly pronounced in areas that most need your excellent materials, such as under-resourced school districts, developing countries, etc.

Regarding use of your materials without permission, if you truly don’t want anyone to use your materials without asking, you should not put them on the internet, in this site or any other, really. It is unclear why giving explicit permission is of any benefit, however. Users of your materials are required to attribute them to you. If you specify that attribution must include a link back to the original materials, or to your personal home page, or whatever, then you can use one of many web-tracking tools to get automated counts of the number of such attributions that exist, and where they are located. In other words, you get all of the benefit of knowing whether people like your work without the time and effort of trying to manage that process. The more openly you license your work, the more likely these benefits will accrue.

Anyway, that’s my two cents, but this is a vast and diverse area in both personalities and issues, so as I said, I hope that people will continue to offer their opinions regarding licensing, etc. It’s very useful.

I think my rule of thumb would be, as long as the person who is publishing that content isn’t making tons of money off my work, and as long as he or she gives me due credit, then I wouldn’t mind. I think it depends on the circumstance. After all, I do use other the ideas and content of other people in order to produce my own works.

Your work also shouldn’t be misconstrued to suggest something other than what you intended, either. I think learning for the sake of learning is a beautiful thing, and legalities shouldn’t impose on the freedoms of the mind.

I wouldn’t mind sharing a publication or a course for free, so long as a) no one else was making a profit off of it and b) no one else was taking credit for the material, or making significant changes to the content. It would be fine if they wished to comment on what I’d authored, but unless I were contributing to a wiki, I would expect that the material I produce remain intact and unedited.

Btw., an increasing number of authors and scholars are making their knowledge available freely on the web, by posting free eBooks and college lectures and courses online. Here are two articles that summarize what’s available:

How to Get a Free Education

How to Get Free Books for College

As far as I am concerned I will be happy to share my work free of cost with as many people as possible. But again at the same time one should respect the other’s work by giving credit to the original creator of the content.