Justin Cone's "Building on the past" video

Justin Cone's "Building on the past" video demonstrates how CC works, but also carries the message "Share now. Shape tomorrow" .

By sharing we allow people to experiment and explore. We encourage a more richly creative tomorrow. If we lock all past creations down and don't allow people to share them and use them to create new things, we stifle people's ability to develop both creativity and thought. Tomorrow is likely to be much less innovative. 

I think this is simple phrase "Share now. Shape tomorrow" is actually very powerful. It instructs us to not just think of ourselves and of now, but instead to think of community and how our community might look in the future.

Creative Commons allows us to do a bit of both if you've created something that you feel is special and don't want people to modify it, you can specify that. If you're happy to share but don't want people to make money off it you can specify that. If you're happy to share it completely, but don't want people to have to ask your permission each time they do, you can specify that.

Video 2. Who are you?

Using Creative Commons has obviously changed Justin's view of copyright sharing over time. 

As well as stating the more obvious reasons for wanting to use CC :

It makes creative life easier because you're not in danger of getting in legal trouble; not always having to ask permission

He also notes that as an author, it gives you options of how your creation lives. When you complete or publish a project you can ask yourself "Is this the end of my project? Or is it the beginning?" By giving it a specific type of CC license you can influence how it will continue its story.

Justin initially gave the video a CC license that did not allow commercial use, but later changed it to one that is more liberal. I hadn't realised how easy it was to change a CC license so this was interesting information. It also relieves the pressure on an author if you know that you're not stuck with the license you assign your work for all time for better for worse. If you change your mind (and you might have very good reasons for doing this) you can change the license.