On Context-Based Licensing

There was a time when the Copyright Clearance Center provided a valuable if fairly mundane service. Those days are long gone. Just like the granting of rights has evolved to keep up with technology and the needs of the end user, so too has CCC, evolved one may say, to assist rights-holders reach the markets that will help optimze their return. Part of this evolution is educational in nature.

"Although [techonology] can help rights-holders deliver the right content and licensing at the right time and place, how does one know what the right time and place is unless one understands what motivates customers? That’s context-based licensing," writes CCC CEO Tracey Armstrong in her recent October 2010 Learned Publishing article, Context-Based Licensing: Technology and Content Working Together.

Context-based licensing is where everything begins. It is about understanding what readers really want. Where and how do they want to access information? In what formats do they want that material? How do they prefer to share information? And how can they spend the least amount of time and energy getting permission to share copyrighted material? The answers to those questions will likely vary depending on each individual audience within a publisher’s market.

Armstrong suggests concrete steps that publishers and content users can take to move forward. [JH]