I don’t have a lot of time, with the American holiday here right now - but in short, please take a moment and read my CZ userpage. Note that all of my adult life my main passion has been education in the developing world–and that passion has actually taken me there for some years, and is likely to move me there again shortly. Note also that I am pro CC-by-nc-sa for CZ, along with the right of CZ to relicense that to commercial reusers with pocketbooks. So, what, am I nuts? No, not at all. It’s just that I want CZ to be able to have the freedom to really do things http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,1377.msg11823.html#msg11823 along the lines of “free as in education.”

On one hand, being somewhat familiar with business practices in one Third-world country (Ethiopia), I don’t think the restrictions a “Non-Commercial” clause place would deter any intelligent entrepreneur in that part of the world from using the material. Not only would this hypothetical person be familiar with the saying, “It is easier to ask forgiveness than to ask permission”, he faces far more difficult barriers from the environment of his own country & fellowmen.

On the other hand, there is clear & widespread abuse of material both with and without a “Non-Commerical” clause in the First World in the form of school kids plagiarizing content for their school work. While I doubt anyone truly cares about people in the first group heavily borrowing (to use a euphemism) content from Wikipedia, Citizendium, & elsewhere to improve their lives, none of us condone or desire people in the second to likewise heavily borrow that content.

I doubt there is anyway either the GFDL or CC licenses could be rewritten to discourage plagiarism, so I guess we have to endure schoolteachers & college faculty impressing on their students not to use these online resources.

Geoff

Well, you’re mistaken about my intention, I’m here to tell you, David. I’m a better source of information about what my intentions are than you are, I’m sure you’ll agree.

I don’t really need your advice, David. I just wanted to correct your error.

If you want a debate without your expressed view (as founder and leader) and continued emphasis of this expressed view being taken as the way you intend to go, you should probably make a post where you detail the arguments in opposition to those you have seemed to push so far. A comment here probably isn’t sufficient.

I fully agree that the free culture includes many dogmatic pains in the arse, and without Stallman’s virtue of at least frequently being right.