[License-review] [License-discuss] CC0 incompliant with OSD on patents, [was: MXM compared to CC0 ]

[Alexander Terekhov]

On Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 10:53 PM, John Cowan <cowan at mercury.ccil.org> wrote:
[...]
> I think this language is much too strong.  It's true that there is no
> treaty or statutory language allowing abandonment, ...

Certainly there is statutory language, e.g.:

http://www.copyright.gov/reports/exsum.html

"Waiver of Moral Rights in Visual Artworks

Executive Summary

 Introduction

 The Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990 (VARA) directed the Copyright
Office to conduct a study to assess for Congress the impact of the
waiver provisions contained in that legislation.

 On December 1, 1992, the Copyright Office submitted to Congress an
Interim Report summarizing the responses to its earlier Request for
Information and outlining other proposed inquiries and avenues of
research it would undertake on this question. This final report
represents the completed Office study responsive to Congress' request.

I. THE VISUAL ARTISTS RIGHTS ACT OF 1990

 In 1990, Congress for the first time legislated limited moral rights
of attribution and integrity to authors of narrowly defined works of
visual arts. These rights, following the model suggested in the
international Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and
Artistic Works, mirror rights granted to authors by most
industrialized nations of the world. They guarantee to authors of
so-called fine arts and exhibition photographs the right to claim or
disclaim authorship in a work; limited rights to prevent distortion,
mutilation, or modification of a work; and the right, under some
circumstances, to prevent destruction of a work that is incorporated
into a building.

 After hearing testimony from artists' representatives, commercial
users and other interested parties, Congress determined that the
artists' rights should not be absolute, but that they should be
tempered by commercial realities, provided that provisions were
enacted to insulate authors from being unduly influenced to give away
their new-found rights. Thus, the legislation provides for waiver of
these moral rights, but only by a signed, written agreement specifying
the work and the precise uses to which a waiver applies. ..."

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/106A

"Transfer and Waiver.—

(1) The rights conferred by subsection (a) may not be transferred, but
those rights may be waived if the author expressly agrees to such
waiver in a written instrument signed by the author. Such instrument
shall specifically identify the work, and uses of that work, to which
the waiver applies, and the waiver shall apply only to the work and
uses so identified. In the case of a joint work prepared by two or
more authors, a waiver of rights under this paragraph made by one such
author waives such rights for all such authors.

(2) Ownership of the rights conferred by subsection (a) with respect
to a work of visual art is distinct from ownership of any copy of that
work, or of a copyright or any exclusive right under a copyright in
that work. Transfer of ownership of any copy of a work of visual art,
or of a copyright or any exclusive right under a copyright, shall not
constitute a waiver of the rights conferred by subsection (a). Except
as may otherwise be agreed by the author in a written instrument
signed by the author, a waiver of the rights conferred by subsection
(a) with respect to a work of visual art shall not constitute a
transfer of ownership of any copy of that work, or of ownership of a
copyright or of any exclusive right under a copyright in that work."