Opinion piece: Why Singapore should consider Creative Commons
This was written by Singaporean blogger, Bernard Leong, in June 2007 — before the announcement of CC-Singapore.
Excerpt:
So, why is it important the Singapore government needs to look at Creative Commons? I have a few reasons to offer:
- Encourages More Innovation and Creativity: Although Singapore is positioning itself to be a hub that champions the protection of intellectual property, we also faced an inherent problem of lacking creativity within our community…
- It’s a win-win situation with the establishment: In the Creative Commons world, the establishment does not need to so tied with enforcing stringent intellectual property laws of copyright…
- Moving towards a Web 2.0 mindset: The issue at the moment is that despite there exist small communities in the web 2.0 world, the majority are not…
Bernard’s full post, here.
Creative Commons Singapore 
Thanks for the mention. I hope to do a follow up piece on reviewing CC ported licences in Singapore.
I took a quick look at the article and it appears to be thoughtfully written. I’m happy to see the first sparks of interest in CC in Singapore and I think that many more will start adopting the licenses as time goes by. Just two points I wanted to add:
1. Creative Commons does indeed provide an alternative to the “All Rights Reserved” restrictions of copyright law, for all those cases where creators may feel that it is better to share a bit more openly. But CC critically depends on the existence and enforcement of copyright law – the law gives you all the intellectual property rights it can give and then you as the author can decide whether you want to share more openly by using a CC license for your work. If someone uses your work in a way which violates the CC license terms (and this use does not fall under certain exceptions to copyright, see “fair use” or “fair dealing”), then you can take legal action against that person on the grounds of copyright infringement. So, to reiterate, CC needs copyright, complements it and I would argue, makes it more suitable for the digital age.
2. Asking the government to seriously consider CC is all well and fine and in fact, some parts of government are very aware of CC as far as I know. Pushing for government to adopt CC or elements of the philosophy behind CC in its initiatives will be valuable. But CC is not something that depends on government support. Copyright law gives authors the right to manage their rights as they see fit and CC is just another tool for authors/creators. It is up to the people of Singapore to embrace CC for their own personal works and at their workplace. For example, I work at NUS and I license some of my teaching material and research presentations under CC.