The official Finnish translation of the international Creative Commons 4.0 license family has been published. The translation is the first translation worldwide of the new license family. The English license texts have been translated into Finnish in the copyright advice project of the University of the Arts, Helsinki, and financed by the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture. The Finnish translation was done by Attorney-at-law, Partner Martin von Willebrand, Associate Henri Tanskanen and Authorized Translator Liisa Laakso-Tammisto / IDE Oy Translation Agency. The translation work has been directed by Copyright Attorney Maria Rehbinder of the University of the Arts, Helsinki, and cooperation with the Creative Commons organization has been coordinated by Researcher Tarmo Toikkanen of Aalto University.
From the left: Maria Rehbinder, Martin von Willebrand, Tarmo Toikkanen, Henri Tanskanen and Liisa Laakso-Tammisto. Photo by Mikko Säteri, CC BY 4.0
”The Creative Commons licenses expedite and facilitate the sharing and further utilization of various materials protected by copyright and database rights.” says Maria Rehbinder. “These licenses have become a worldwide standard, and an important focus area in the drafting of this new license family has also been the applicability of the licenses to making available public sector data, and utilization in science and education.”
”The goal of the European Union is that, with certain exceptions due to legislatory reasons, all public sector data would be available for re-utilization for commercial and non-commercial purposes.”, Maria Rehbinder explains. “This can be achieved by making databases available with the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license. The new license family takes into account the special characteristics of different legal systems, such as the sui generis protection of databases within the EU. Translation of the licenses also supports the Finnish Ministry of Finance’s open data project, which is intended to enhance competitiveness, and the CC BY 4.0 license is also planned to be used in the JHS-Public Administration Recommendations for making public sector databases available.”
“Making public sector databases available through a well-known and recognized license provides security for enterprises to start exploring new business opportunities that become available”, says Partner Martin von Willebrand, who directed the translation work at HH Partners. “The new Creative Commons licenses are excellent in supporting enterprises that are planning to strategically open their own content or databases.”
The new CC 4.0 license family has been drafted through a cooperative process between lawyers and copyright experts from more than 70 legal systems. The goal of the development has been to achieve as extensive worldwide applicability of the same international license text as possible. In line with the international character of the license group, the Finnish license texts are translations of the original license texts in English, and separate localized licenses have not been drafted.
“The translation is the result of a comprehensive drafting process, which has included a comments round for interest groups and to the wider public”, states Maria Rehbinder. “It has been rewarding and educating to discuss with Henri and Martin the different translation alternatives, and the mutual weighing of the sources of law which our choices are founded on, and on the other hand to discuss with Liisa the language planning requirements. The goal of the EU Commission is to achieve the benefits of openness to employment and economic growth, and the wording of the translation has been chosen in such a way that it would be familiar to enterprises through other license agreements. The expertise of Martin and Henri regarding license agreements is evident in the end-result.”
“We are especially glad to have received positive feedback from Creative Commons on the translation process in Finland”, rejoices Martin von Willebrand. “A big thanks goes to Henri Tanskanen of HH Partners, who has performed most of the translation work. The uncompromising attitude of Henri and his comprehensive expertise on copyright and related rights, as well as on open licensing, has been clearly evident to Creative Commons as well. The supporting material drafted by us is now also being used as an example for other translation processes.”
More information on the project is available from Martin von Willebrand.
Other Sources
The International Creative Commons News Item
