Mar. 24, 2015 | By Alec
If you’ve plucked a few 3D printable files from the web over the past few years, you will have doubtlessly come across references to copyright issues. How often have you seen things like ‘released under a Creative Commons licence’ or hints about a General Public License? If files are freely accessible it hardly matters, but it might be a good idea to explore the concept a bit further if you sometimes post your own designs on the web as well. Who owns it once it’s up there?
Fortunately, Michael Weinberg from over at Public Knowledge has just released an excellent whitepaper that will help you come to grips with the complex crossroads of copyright and 3D printed objects. For those of you who’ve never heard of Michael or the Public Knowledge organization before, they specialize in providing knowledge about communication, copyright and the internet, and are an excellent source for more information about what your rights on the web actually are.
Michael Weinberg's article is entitled 3 Steps for Licensing Your 3D Printed Stuff and provides an excellent overview of the contours of a copyright law that has grown into a absurd monstrosity over the last few decades. After all, it was written years before the concept of internet was even around, so it’s hardly surprising to see it being distorted into something that is incomprehensible to the ordinary man.
And that is exactly where this paper comes in helpful. As Michael introduces it: It should come as no surprise that many people turn to copyright law to answer these ownership and control questions. Indeed, one of the unexpected side effects of the past generation’s growth of software and the internet has been a collective, informal public education in copyright and copyright licensing. In light of this history, it is only natural that 3D creators’ instincts lead them to the General Public License (GPL), Creative Commons (CC) licenses, and other similar licenses to determine how others can—and cannot—use their creations.’
But this is, as Michael will explain, not always correct. From a standpoint of property law, code, designs, photographs and so on are something different than physical objects, and it can be helpful to find a license that suits the object you’re seeking to protect. ‘Some physical objects are protected by copyright, but many others are not. Additionally, the copyright in the digital files that represent those physical objects can require an entirely different copyright analysis than the one for the objects themselves,’ Michael writes.
This paper is therefore an excellent analysis of copyright for both physical objects and for the digital files. ‘Understanding what you are licensing is key to choosing the right license. Simply put, this is because you cannot license what you do not legally control in the first place. There is no point in considering licenses that ultimately do not have the power to address whatever behavior you’re aiming to control,’ Michael writes.
While this twenty-page article covers a lot of ground in detail, Michael also presents us with the basic approach for getting a copyright license that suits you:
1. Figure out which elements of your object or object file are eligible for copyright protection
2. Understand what copyright does — and does not — allow you to control
3. Choose your license
All steps are thoroughly explored, and can definitely help you to find around this complex side of the 3D printing hobby. Logically, Michael tends to gravitate towards GPL and CC licenses due to their open source nature, but increasing your knowledge of what you’re actually doing has never hurt anyone. You can find the article here.
Posted in 3D Printing Technology
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