An infringement claim can be easy to assert – the
plaintiff just shows ownership of a valid copyright, and the
copying of his or her work. But in some cases the defense can be
even easier. At least it was in Drauglis v. Kappa Map Group, LLC, in
the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
The plaintiff photographer proved that the defendant had copied
plaintiff's photograph. "But that is not where the dispute
in this case lies," the court noted. The plaintiff had posted
the photo on an Internet photo sharing site under a Creative
Commons license. So the only issue in the case turned out to be
whether the defendant's use fell within the terms of the
license.
Creative Commons licenses are increasingly common, because they
are so easy to use. A photographer can license under Creative
Commons simply by using the CC symbols and links. Many
photo-sharing sites, like Flickr, make it easy for photographers to
automatically license their photos through CC. Art
