The big education news at the end of last year was that the Saylor Foundation came to the rescue of Flat World's once open textbooks (Saylor announcement). Who? What? I hear you cry.
Flat World, until late last year offered a slew of free-to-use digital textbooks. In November the company made a change to take its once Creative Commons licensed texts from that license to one by which the company could make money (Techdirt coverage). While some educators responded with dismay, the Saylor Foundation kicked in in some way, it's not exactly clear how, to keep the open texts open and free. Flat World still offers, and Saylor encourages use of, printed ($) versions of the texts.
My sense is few readers had heard of either Flat World or the foundation, so let me get right to why readers of this blog, geography and GIS educators, would care about this seemingly obscure news. Flat World, and now Saylor, offers a long list of free to use textbooks. One of them is a detailed, PhD-written regional geography text, World Regional Geography (large PDF) by Dr. Royal Berglee from Morehead State University in Kentucky. It's got concise chapters, introduces key geographic principles, surveys regions, has maps and charts, and on quick review, passes muster with me. The main things I found to be missing: a table of contents and an index.
Showing posts with label creative commons. Show all posts
Showing posts with label creative commons. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Ten Things You Need to Know About Reusing Web Content
Disclosure: I’m not a lawyer, nor do I have any specific expertise on these matters. I've compiled what I’ve learned over the years as an editor of online magazines and an instructor of online courses. I encourage you to take detailed questions to the experts in your own organization.
1) Copyright
Copyright refers to the right to control copying and other use of content that you create. On the Web, It might be text, graphics, music, video or something else. Even if you do not explicitly state that you claim a copyright, in the U.S. at least, you are considered to hold it for your own works. (See: Copyright on Wikipedia)
2) Creative Commons
Creative Commons (CC) is a type of license that sits on top of copyright. The variety of licenses explain the conditions under which the content can be used and how the content must be attributed. Content creators select the license that fits their needs and make a statement to that effect on the website, typically with a link to the text of the license. (See for example, the bottom of the Creative Commons home page!)
3) Attributing Content with a Creative Commons License
When republished or enhancing CC content, it can be unclear how to properly attribute an article or an image. I found this blog post on the topic quite helpful. I prefer to err on the side of providing more information about the source rather than less.
4) Crediting Source of Discovery
Bloggers and others who create on the Web often read about a news story or issue form another blog, a tweet, a Facebook post or via e-mail from a friend. It’s best practice when writing about the topic to cite not only any sources you reference or quote, but also to credit the publication or person that “tipped you off” to it. There are a variety of ways to do this: “H/T to John Smith” means hat tip to John Smith. To credit a tweet, a blogger might write: “via @johnsmith.” Podcasters can put such credits in the show notes or offer a verbal “shout out” or “thank you” to John Smith in the audio itself. There is no formal procedures for this sort of attribution, but one blogger has proposed a Curators Code.
5) Public Domain
Content in the public domain is free from intellectual property rights, most often, that means free from copyright. The creator may have removed the copyright, or it might have expired or be impossible to enforce. Most U.S. federal government website content is public domain as are many older documents and pieces of music. If content is in the public domain, so far as I understand, you need not attribute it from a legal standpoint. That said, I consider it best practice to attribute such content. In geography and GIS writing and teaching I often use maps from USGS or imagery from NASA, and attribute them.
6) Fair Use
Fair Use is a doctrine in the United States that grants an exception to copyright to use small pieces of works for specific purposes such as "commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching, library archiving and scholarship." There are four factors used to determine if the use is fair or not. They are noted in the United State Code. This discussion and checklist from Columbia is a useful guide to the topic.
7) Permission
Any and all copyright or licensing requirements can magically disappear when the content creator/owner gives explicit permission to use it in a specific way. That permission may be given without a fee or there may be a fee. When a creator/owner grants permission, he or she may ask that you provide some type of attribution. If not, it’s best practice to make it clear permission has been obtained with language like this: “Reprinted with permission of the New York Times” with a link to the original article.
8) Adding a License to Your Content
If you create content, it’s up to you how you want to share it. You can be quite strict and hold a copyright and insist that everyone come to you for permission (and/or pay a licensing fee) to use the work. Or, you can share your creative work under one of the Creative Commons licenses and detail how the content can be used (only for non-commercial use, for example) and attributed. Or, you can put the content in the public domain. Those are just three ways to license content; there are other ways, too. Which ever you select, be sure it’s clear on your website which of these options you have selected.
9) When You or Someone Else Slips Up
Now and then someone will mess up and use your content without permission or without following the license you specified. And, you might use someone else’s content without permission or without the correct attribution.
What should you do if someone misuses your content? My advice is to respectfully let them know. My experience has been that more than 90% of the time they were not aware they needed to ask to use copyrighted material! (That's in part why I am writing this post.)
What if you receive an e-mail noting you misused someone else’s content? Check to see if in fact you did, and if so, apologize and offer to make it right either by removing the content, adding attribution or paying a fee.
10) Pass Along Best Practices
Many who read this blog are educators. We are role models for one another and for our students. We have a certain responsibility to lead by example. That means taking intellectual property rights seriously and trying to follow best practices when sharing content on the Web. I’ve been convinced lately that we need to teach one another as well as our students how these rights work and how to use them in practice. (If you missed it, see: Tales from the Web Literacy Files: Geo Edition)
1) Copyright
Copyright refers to the right to control copying and other use of content that you create. On the Web, It might be text, graphics, music, video or something else. Even if you do not explicitly state that you claim a copyright, in the U.S. at least, you are considered to hold it for your own works. (See: Copyright on Wikipedia)
2) Creative Commons
Creative Commons (CC) is a type of license that sits on top of copyright. The variety of licenses explain the conditions under which the content can be used and how the content must be attributed. Content creators select the license that fits their needs and make a statement to that effect on the website, typically with a link to the text of the license. (See for example, the bottom of the Creative Commons home page!)
3) Attributing Content with a Creative Commons License
When republished or enhancing CC content, it can be unclear how to properly attribute an article or an image. I found this blog post on the topic quite helpful. I prefer to err on the side of providing more information about the source rather than less.
4) Crediting Source of Discovery
Bloggers and others who create on the Web often read about a news story or issue form another blog, a tweet, a Facebook post or via e-mail from a friend. It’s best practice when writing about the topic to cite not only any sources you reference or quote, but also to credit the publication or person that “tipped you off” to it. There are a variety of ways to do this: “H/T to John Smith” means hat tip to John Smith. To credit a tweet, a blogger might write: “via @johnsmith.” Podcasters can put such credits in the show notes or offer a verbal “shout out” or “thank you” to John Smith in the audio itself. There is no formal procedures for this sort of attribution, but one blogger has proposed a Curators Code.
5) Public Domain
Content in the public domain is free from intellectual property rights, most often, that means free from copyright. The creator may have removed the copyright, or it might have expired or be impossible to enforce. Most U.S. federal government website content is public domain as are many older documents and pieces of music. If content is in the public domain, so far as I understand, you need not attribute it from a legal standpoint. That said, I consider it best practice to attribute such content. In geography and GIS writing and teaching I often use maps from USGS or imagery from NASA, and attribute them.
6) Fair Use
Fair Use is a doctrine in the United States that grants an exception to copyright to use small pieces of works for specific purposes such as "commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching, library archiving and scholarship." There are four factors used to determine if the use is fair or not. They are noted in the United State Code. This discussion and checklist from Columbia is a useful guide to the topic.
7) Permission
Any and all copyright or licensing requirements can magically disappear when the content creator/owner gives explicit permission to use it in a specific way. That permission may be given without a fee or there may be a fee. When a creator/owner grants permission, he or she may ask that you provide some type of attribution. If not, it’s best practice to make it clear permission has been obtained with language like this: “Reprinted with permission of the New York Times” with a link to the original article.
8) Adding a License to Your Content
If you create content, it’s up to you how you want to share it. You can be quite strict and hold a copyright and insist that everyone come to you for permission (and/or pay a licensing fee) to use the work. Or, you can share your creative work under one of the Creative Commons licenses and detail how the content can be used (only for non-commercial use, for example) and attributed. Or, you can put the content in the public domain. Those are just three ways to license content; there are other ways, too. Which ever you select, be sure it’s clear on your website which of these options you have selected.
9) When You or Someone Else Slips Up
Now and then someone will mess up and use your content without permission or without following the license you specified. And, you might use someone else’s content without permission or without the correct attribution.
What should you do if someone misuses your content? My advice is to respectfully let them know. My experience has been that more than 90% of the time they were not aware they needed to ask to use copyrighted material! (That's in part why I am writing this post.)
What if you receive an e-mail noting you misused someone else’s content? Check to see if in fact you did, and if so, apologize and offer to make it right either by removing the content, adding attribution or paying a fee.
10) Pass Along Best Practices
Many who read this blog are educators. We are role models for one another and for our students. We have a certain responsibility to lead by example. That means taking intellectual property rights seriously and trying to follow best practices when sharing content on the Web. I’ve been convinced lately that we need to teach one another as well as our students how these rights work and how to use them in practice. (If you missed it, see: Tales from the Web Literacy Files: Geo Edition)
Labels:
cc,
copyright,
creative commons,
public domain,
reuse,
Web
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Tales from the Web Literacy Files: Geo Edition
Last week I sent a GIS news site a tip on a story since it was the sort of thing it might cover. The topic was in fact covered in the next issue. I was pleased to help, but disappointed to see no suggestion of where the publication heard about the story. Many media sites, from one person blogs to CNN, use H/T ("hat tip") or via ("via @adenas") to give credit to those who pass along such tips. There's even a movement to formalize this behavior with a Curator's Code (Wired UK).
Early this week I saw a link on Twitter for an educational geography resource on tornadoes. The tweet commended the analysis, so I was curious to read it. It turns out, the content was republished from Wikipedia. That's acceptable. However, the attribution was incomplete. There was no way a reader would know the content was not original, nor was the Creative Commons license used on Wikipedia respected. (Here's a blog post on how to do Creative Commons attribution by Molly Kleinman for those who need to read up on the topic.)
Finally, just yesterday a GIS news site pointed me to a new website with resources to encourage students and those in the job market to consider a career in geospatial technology. Those behind the website had the best of intentions and wanted to offer the content under a Creative Commons license. However, instead of stating that intention with a link to a specific license, the site developer simply put a link to the Creative Commons organization. (Here's the page about what the different licenses offer.)
To be clear, the websites and content I'm discussing were published by professionals in our field, not students. Somehow these individuals, and likely many of their peers, have not learned or taught themselves about these Web literacy and etiquette issues. I'm hoping renewed interest in all things open, both in and outside of geospatial technologies, will afford more opportunities to highlight best practices in these areas.
Early this week I saw a link on Twitter for an educational geography resource on tornadoes. The tweet commended the analysis, so I was curious to read it. It turns out, the content was republished from Wikipedia. That's acceptable. However, the attribution was incomplete. There was no way a reader would know the content was not original, nor was the Creative Commons license used on Wikipedia respected. (Here's a blog post on how to do Creative Commons attribution by Molly Kleinman for those who need to read up on the topic.)
Finally, just yesterday a GIS news site pointed me to a new website with resources to encourage students and those in the job market to consider a career in geospatial technology. Those behind the website had the best of intentions and wanted to offer the content under a Creative Commons license. However, instead of stating that intention with a link to a specific license, the site developer simply put a link to the Creative Commons organization. (Here's the page about what the different licenses offer.)
To be clear, the websites and content I'm discussing were published by professionals in our field, not students. Somehow these individuals, and likely many of their peers, have not learned or taught themselves about these Web literacy and etiquette issues. I'm hoping renewed interest in all things open, both in and outside of geospatial technologies, will afford more opportunities to highlight best practices in these areas.
Labels:
attribution,
creative commons,
curation,
web literacy
Monday, August 27, 2012
Does Esri Going OER with its Ed Materials Matter?
I was pleased to see Esri make a formal statement about its commitment to open licensing of educational (not training) materials developed by its Ed Team. The company is retaining copyright, but offering ways to use and recast the content via a Creative Commons license. (If that doesn’t make sense, I recommend this short video that helps explain how copyright and Creative Commons licensing work together.) The move didn’t surprise me since it’s something Esri Director of Education David DiBiase championed during his tenure at Penn State.
The announcement got me thinking about how and frankly if OER geography resources are being used and/or re-used. I can’t say for sure that any material from my two OER courses at Penn State has been explicitly used, but I’ve seen evidence that suggests it has.
DiBiase and his Penn State colleagues put together what I consider a quite comprehensive text book for the first course in Penn State’s GIS Certificate program. It’s called the Nature of Geographic Information and it’s been available under an open license for years. I went looking on the Web to see if any educators use it in their online or residence teaching. I found references from the University of Massachusetts and Princeton. I can’t say outside of the Penn State community I’ve ever spoken to an educator who used it. I know only a subset of educators seek existing OER resources or consider building their own. I still see online conversations among educators trying to identify the best textbook for GIS from the commercial publishers. I'm not sure I've seen a discussion that included OER materials.
What are the implications of Penn State and Esri’s efforts to open up their educational resources? The question is timely in part because Audrey Watters, the education writer, is just beginning a project to explore OER content. Her first post on topic appeared last week on her Hack Education blog. (She’s prolific and I confess that I keep up by listening to her weekly podcast.)
Watters shared her takeaways, after looking at the types of OER content available at OER Commons:
Next, I want to consider the PDF issue Watters notes. Esri offers quite a lot of material in PDF, though that did not come up in the advisory board discussions, best I can recall. I do see complaints from those trying to use raw data presented in PDF to make maps and we in the media (I work for an online geospatial publication) complain about press releases delivered in this form. For those who don’t use PDF much or don’t think about its limitations: the format was designed to make documents look pretty across platforms, not make their contents usable. Use of PDF in my mind pretty much flies in the face of the OER re-use/re-mix vision.
Now back to my initial question: What are the implications of Penn State and Esri’s efforts to open up their educational resources for geography/GIS education? My gut says it’s a good idea and probably “the right thing to do.” Further, I expect virtually all educators would vote in favor of such licensing. I'm not sure how many would open up their own work to such licensing. But those observations beg the question: Do geography/GIS educators know about or currently use OER materials that are already available?
I return to the question because of a well-told story of a focus group some years ago discussing MP3 players. When asked if they’d prefer a pink one or a black one, nearly all the panelists said “pink.” At the door, on the way out after the session, was a table full of pink and black devices. Attendees were invited to take one home as part of their compensation. They all took black ones. (Note: My pink 2nd gen iPod shuffle is giving me the eye just now...)
I plan to return to this topic of OER geospatial/GIS materials in the coming days and weeks.
The announcement got me thinking about how and frankly if OER geography resources are being used and/or re-used. I can’t say for sure that any material from my two OER courses at Penn State has been explicitly used, but I’ve seen evidence that suggests it has.
DiBiase and his Penn State colleagues put together what I consider a quite comprehensive text book for the first course in Penn State’s GIS Certificate program. It’s called the Nature of Geographic Information and it’s been available under an open license for years. I went looking on the Web to see if any educators use it in their online or residence teaching. I found references from the University of Massachusetts and Princeton. I can’t say outside of the Penn State community I’ve ever spoken to an educator who used it. I know only a subset of educators seek existing OER resources or consider building their own. I still see online conversations among educators trying to identify the best textbook for GIS from the commercial publishers. I'm not sure I've seen a discussion that included OER materials.
What are the implications of Penn State and Esri’s efforts to open up their educational resources? The question is timely in part because Audrey Watters, the education writer, is just beginning a project to explore OER content. Her first post on topic appeared last week on her Hack Education blog. (She’s prolific and I confess that I keep up by listening to her weekly podcast.)
Watters shared her takeaways, after looking at the types of OER content available at OER Commons:
It isn't just that the topics skew STEM. It's the dearth of primary-level materials. It's the amount of test-prep (often AP-test-prep) content. It's the preponderance of PDFs. And even with somewhat clearer language regarding licensing ("no strings attached" and "read the fine print" as opposed to Creative Commons' terminology), the continuing confusion surrounding copyright affordances for classroom usage.First I want to tackle the dearth of primary-leve materials. Esri’s Educational Advisory Board identified the opposite in its review of the companies ArcLessons. (Disclosure: I’m on that Board.) The consensus was more intermediate and advanced material was needed. I for one see intro GIS material popping up all over the place. The latest source to cross my desk: Step-by-Step from the Scholars Lab. (I do want to point out that these lessons are peer reviewed, something that is not true of all open lessons. They are also available under and open license.) Does the geospatial/GIS education community really need more tutorials about how to geocode spreadsheets? I’m not sure. If we do, is it because there are not enough OER materials? Or did the Scholars Lab lesson appear because educators wanted a peer reviewed resource? Or for some other reason?
Next, I want to consider the PDF issue Watters notes. Esri offers quite a lot of material in PDF, though that did not come up in the advisory board discussions, best I can recall. I do see complaints from those trying to use raw data presented in PDF to make maps and we in the media (I work for an online geospatial publication) complain about press releases delivered in this form. For those who don’t use PDF much or don’t think about its limitations: the format was designed to make documents look pretty across platforms, not make their contents usable. Use of PDF in my mind pretty much flies in the face of the OER re-use/re-mix vision.
Now back to my initial question: What are the implications of Penn State and Esri’s efforts to open up their educational resources for geography/GIS education? My gut says it’s a good idea and probably “the right thing to do.” Further, I expect virtually all educators would vote in favor of such licensing. I'm not sure how many would open up their own work to such licensing. But those observations beg the question: Do geography/GIS educators know about or currently use OER materials that are already available?
I return to the question because of a well-told story of a focus group some years ago discussing MP3 players. When asked if they’d prefer a pink one or a black one, nearly all the panelists said “pink.” At the door, on the way out after the session, was a table full of pink and black devices. Attendees were invited to take one home as part of their compensation. They all took black ones. (Note: My pink 2nd gen iPod shuffle is giving me the eye just now...)
I plan to return to this topic of OER geospatial/GIS materials in the coming days and weeks.
Labels:
creative commons,
esri,
GIS,
oer,
penn state
Thursday, February 2, 2012
ShareMap.Org: CC Mapping for Wikipedia and Beyond
Last week Jakub Kaniewski, co-founder of ShareMap.org contacted me about the site. He described it as a "free Web GIS mapping engine focused mainly on two things - Wikipedia and Education."
I can certainly see a focus on Wikipedia; there is quite a bit of discussion on how to create a map for that site. There's also, I'm pleased to report, quite a bit of attention paid to the licensing of the maps created. The data used is all either public domain (PD) or Creative Commons (CC) and includes OpenStreetMap, World Wind and Natural Earth. There are also background map options from Yahoo and Bing. Check out the gallery for some of the publicly shared maps.
There are map creation and labeling tools, so that you can "draw on" the maps. There are tools to export the vector data to KML or SVG and the like. What's missing, I think, for use in education here in the United States, is the ability to bring in one's own data. That might be in a shapefile, KML or spreadsheet. That, in my mind, is what educators want students at all levels to be able to do. That's why Google Fusion Tables and Esri's ArcGIS Online is so attractive to educators.
It's interesting to note that the site is hosted in Poland and uses as its base of comparison the U.S. CIA World Factbook maps. From the FAQ:
I can certainly see a focus on Wikipedia; there is quite a bit of discussion on how to create a map for that site. There's also, I'm pleased to report, quite a bit of attention paid to the licensing of the maps created. The data used is all either public domain (PD) or Creative Commons (CC) and includes OpenStreetMap, World Wind and Natural Earth. There are also background map options from Yahoo and Bing. Check out the gallery for some of the publicly shared maps.
There are map creation and labeling tools, so that you can "draw on" the maps. There are tools to export the vector data to KML or SVG and the like. What's missing, I think, for use in education here in the United States, is the ability to bring in one's own data. That might be in a shapefile, KML or spreadsheet. That, in my mind, is what educators want students at all levels to be able to do. That's why Google Fusion Tables and Esri's ArcGIS Online is so attractive to educators.
It's interesting to note that the site is hosted in Poland and uses as its base of comparison the U.S. CIA World Factbook maps. From the FAQ:
What kind of map can be made with ShareMap.org?In simple w – in every place where you use CIA fact book and want to customize it consider using ShareMap maps. It has two advantages over CIA maps – SVG format and easy customization.Jakob is looking for feedback on the app from users and educators. I hope you can help him out.
Labels:
creative commons,
online mapping,
open data,
public domain,
SVG
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