[Clipart] [Open Clip Art Library] clker.com - part 3

[Nicu Buculei]

Greg Bulmash wrote:
> By your lights, since the OCAL work is public domain and I'm providing
> value to my users, I should feel no debt to OCAL for all the work its
> contributors put into making it possible to have this huge collection
> of clip art that helps me have a better, more profitable site.

It was a conscious decision we made in the early days when opted for PD. 
We understood some profiteers can take advantage by our work.
This is a quote from the PD dedication:

"Dedicator recognizes that, once placed in the public domain, the Work 
may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, used, modified, 
built upon, or otherwise exploited by anyone for any purpose, commercial 
or non-commercial, and in any way, including by methods that have not 
yet been invented or conceived."

> I believe that when a community creates so much value and you avail
> yourself of it to such a large extent, you owe a karmic debt to the
> community.  That's why I've uploaded a number of images, worked on
> couple of wiki pages, and donated a little cash to "getting back
> online" effort last year.  I'm not dedicating my life to it, but I've
> given back to the community that gave so much to me.

And your contribution is appreciated. Even more as you are making it by 
free will and not by requirement.

> I wouldn't consider a casual user a leech, but someone who uses a huge
> chunk of the library and makes money from it can afford to donate some
> or time back to continuing to improve the library.

The "leech" term has a strong negative connotation. Can we call someone 
a leech when he use our work according with our licenses?
Arguably, some people contributes only to get as much exposure for their 
work as they can, in such case anything giving more exposure is useful. 
(and yes, we appreciate linking back and crediting)

> He has no legal obligation to do so, but so what?  Neither is any
> other contributor.

Indeed, but if he has no legal obligation, calling names is not nice.

-- 
nicu :: http://nicubunu.ro :: http://nicubunu.blogspot.com
Open Clip Art Library: http://www.openclipart.org
my cool Fedora wallpapers: http://fedora.nicubunu.ro/wallpapers/
my clipart collection: http://clipart.nicubunu.ro/