Today, I was reading Seth Godin’s blog on protecting your ideas in the digital age. I thought it would be all about how to protect my brilliant blog posts. It wasn’t. Sure, he detailed the difference between trademark, copyright and patents, but he wasn’t advocating that folks run out and copyright every good idea. In fact, it was just the opposite. The moral of Seth’s story? Don’t protect your ideas – spread them.
The digital age has conditioned to spread our ideas, creative work and opinions all over the web. From personal blogs to Facebook, everyone give their take on cultural events (think Tiger Woods getting his ass beaten by Elin) or the politics of Afghanistan war. For bloggers, it’s essential that ideas are spread.
So, how do you protect or (un)protect your ideas? How do you give permission for your work to be used in the development of new projects and ideas while still retaining some control over how your ideas are shared?
Enter Creative Commons, a non-profit organization that gives you the tools to grant copyright permissions to your creative work. Under the creative commons copyright, ideas can be re-used, re-purposed and legally shared without having to ask the creator’s permission. Think of it this way: instead of “all rights reserved,” creative commons is the equivalent of “some rights reserved.” They’ll even provide the HTML code once you choose a license. Pretty nifty, eh?
So, that’s the information – do with it what you will!
~bloom
Great article. This is something I have always wondered about. Thanks for sharing and informing!
Absolutely! It’s something that I have wondered about, too! I really like the concept.
Don’t forget that the best way of giving away your ideas is with your name attached to them. Sure, seeing people take your ideas up is great, it gives you a lovely warm and fuzzy feeling, but wouldn’t it be better if every time someone used the idea they thought of you.
That’s why, of course, people give away ebooks with their website address as a footer and so on….
Simon
Simon – I couldn’t agree with you more. I think that in order to keep the karmic flow moving in the right direction, you should give credit whenever you use someone else’s information. That’s just the right thing to do.
ooooohhhh good blog, gurl! I was wondering how people were protecting their goods. So, it’s ok to use their ideas if you give them credit? Thanks for edumacating me! lol
yes! in fact, many people say to use their stuff even if they DON’T get credit. in the blogosphere, free is very attractive as a way to get your ideas out there faster. interesting, eh? thanks a lot! T