Sunday, October 23, 2005
Ning Content Agreement.
So I checked it out, and it's some kind of platform for making it easy to develop social software... yeah I know, I'm not sure what that means either. But I noticed they had a 'battle' type application, and you can clone this application and edit it to make your own.
I immediately thought it would be excellent to have a BifSniff Battle application!!! You know, like Webcomic Battle but with ONLY BifSniff cartoons in it...
It would be something like the girl battle application or the beer battle, only I edited the app to only allow me to upload so it would only be BifSniff stuff.
So I applied for Ning developer status, and waited and waited for it to come through as they are 'throttling' the addition of developers while they are in start up phase.
But to my delight it arrived today. So I dashed in, cloned the battle app and set up BifSniff Battle. However if you visit BifSniff Battle you will be disappointed. There is nothing there.
'Why, oh why?' I hear you crying out in frustration... well, it's because of the user agreement and how it handles content:
Your Content remains yours. Full stop. We claim no ownership interest in the Content you provide on Applications running on the Ning Playground. However, we also want to encourage sharing of Content between Users and Applications across the Ning Playground. To this end, by uploading Content to an Application, you grant to Ning and all other Users and Developers a Creative Commons Attribution License or SImilar License to your Content.
If you want to license your Content under a license different from the Creative Commons Attribution License, you can, as long as you comply with this paragraph. Your Content license must be a “Similar License,” where it: (1) permits everyone to copy, distribute, display, and perform the Content and create derivative works of the Content, for both commercial and noncommercial purposes and (2) imposes no restrictions or conditions on the licensee, except that the license may require reasonable attribution of the copyright owner, may require the licensee to identify the license terms to others, and may include a disclaimer of warranties. If you want your Content to be licensed under a Similar License, you have to explicitly state the license terms at the end of your Content entry.
I have made the problematic bit bold.
Commercial use? No restrictions? Whaaaat?
Ok, open source and creative commons licenses are all very well. Admirable even. I'm all for it. But isn't this a bridge too far?
I mean... Ning isn't open source itself. If it was I could understand their wanting to perpetuate this spirit of openness and selflessness. But it isn't. As far as I know anyhoo. Ning is a commercial venture which fully intends to figure out how to make money from their social experiment.
I think this may well prove to be a shortfall for Ning unless they change the license. Copy, distribute and share are one thing, but commercial use? No way.
Even copy, distribute and share should be optional in my opinion, and I imagine a lot of creative people will feel the same. Photographers, artists, musicians... all people who might have fantastic uses for Ning - especially as it develops into an easier interface and provides more options.
But I don't see any way these creative minds will put time and effort into developing creative uses of the Ning platform only to find they have given away the rights for others to use their work commercially. AND have Ning make a buck from it.
In fact it's so insane, please tell me I'm wrong. Please tell me I misunderstood the license and that creators are not giving away commercial rights to their content on Ning!
Or at least someone explain to me why this license is required.
I hope they change this user agreement, until they do any of my work, including the BifSniff cartoons will definitely be kept away from Ning.
And Ning would have been a better, brighter place with a BifSniff Battle - don't you think?
2 Comments:
Frank,
You're right. The Ning Playground would be a better, brighter place with a BifSniff Battle. Hopefully, in the coming weeks we'll have some options in place to make this dream a reality. :-)
The short answer to why we structured the user agreement this way is that for the free version of the Ning Playground we wanted to encourage as much sharing between users, developers, and applications as possible. We thought it was important to kick this sharing off under the broadest terms, even if it limited what people felt comfortable contributing upfront.
From your post and critique of the user agreement, however, it sounds like we may have overshot our goal.
While we plan to roll out options over the coming weeks to deliver the licensing terms you’re asking for, I would also highlight:
1. It’s free service.
For at least a small subset of people, we hope what we offer with this free service makes sharing code and content worth it. We know this trade will not be right for everyone or for every situation, but hopefully it will work for some.
2. We’re sharing content and code under the same terms.
The 20+ Example Apps, 15+ PHP Components/Shared Libraries, and Developer Resources we’ve put out there (and will continue to add to), are all licensed under the same content and code terms you highlight above.
3. We support a broad set of open standards and formats to make getting in and out of the Ning Playground as easy as possible.
These standards include: PHP, HTML, JSTL, RSS, Atom, REST, SOAP, OPML, XSPF, SFTP.
4. We’re not asking for special treatment. You are sharing code and content with everyone, not just us.
We really appreciate you checking us out and giving us your feedback. If you have other thoughts or if there is anything else with which I can be helpful, feel free to email me at (my name) at ning.com.
Gina
Co-founder, Ning
Thanks Gina!
Your response is greatly appreciated, and very encouraging.
I look forward to changes regarding content in the user agreement.
I really believe that it is more likely that creative uses of Ning will come about more easily if people feel their content is protected to some degree.
If a musician, for example, were to think of a creative use of Ning he/she might be open to the sharing and distribution of his work - but were it to be remixed and commercially released by someone else with no kickback to the original musician - that might be a problem!
I *think* if Ning protects from this kind of scenario people will be willing to share much more interesting content.
I would also just like to clarify the following a little:
"We’re sharing content and code under the same terms."
Well, yes, but Ning itself is not open source right?
However, this post dealt with my disappointment with Ning regarding the user agreement and as such it did not highlight any of the positive thoughts I have about Ning.
I do think Ning is an interesting concept and if all goes well it could be a very valuable resource.
Certainly it would be faster and more cost effective for me to develop a battle app on Ning than to deploy a php solution myself.
I would certainly encourage people to have a poke around and see what might be possible, just to be aware of the current limitations of the user agreement.
Thanks again for replying. Best of luck!
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