Author's intent regarding licenses, sharing, attribution, etc. (Patreon)

Greetings patrons and visitors,

I wanted to address something I have been increasingly asked about when it comes to the licensing of the work and files published here on the Ghostbusters Gear Patreon.

There have been a few recent instances where my friends in the builder community have reached out to alert me that they have seen advertised services with the Ghostbusters Gear content. Others have reported that they have seen alternative resources containing unmodified 'exclusive' files originally published here.

In this context, I thought it best to share my intent as the author here with regards to Creative Commons licensing, content use, sharing, etc.

The Creative Commons License

To date, the content here - including 3D printable files and guides - has been published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike license. This goes for the 'public' posts as well as the posts that are 'exclusive' behind the patron subscriber paywall. The intent of this license selection is that I want visitors to feel free to use these files to make their own stuff and help friends in their community.

The one major restriction of this license is that the content here should not be used for commercial purposes. As the author I take this as meaning...

• You can make this stuff for yourself (obvious!) 
• You can make this stuff to help your friends or your fellow Ghostbusters franchise.
• You can make the stuff to support a charitable cause - such as in a raffle or giveaway.
• You should not use this content to make prints 'for sale' in places like eBay, Etsy, or other online store. This includes completed builds, parts, or kits, etc.
• You should not offer 'for profit' commission build services  based on this content - especially regular advertised commission services.

How do I give proper credit or attribution to Ghostbusters Gear?

The Creative Commons license used for these files requires attribution to the original author if you share or modify the work published here. In my view, a proper 'baseline' credit would look something like this:

[CONTENT TITLE]

This material is copyright (C) 2022 Nathan Miller https://www.patreon.com/ghostbustersgear

This content is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike International License.

No warrantees or endorsements by the original author are given under this license. This shared content may contain edits or alterations from the original content.  

The original published files for this content can be found at: [POST URL]

What about 'Exclusive' Posts?

Indeed, the Creative Commons license makes the idea of 'exclusive' posts a bit of a tricky for me and Patrons. While there are posts here that are "public" (no subscription necessary), a major benefit to becoming a patron is gaining access to all of the 'exclusive' posts. Exclusive content is clearly marked and tagged on the post. It is also licensed under the same Creative Commons license as the 'public' posts. I do this because I want subscribing patrons to have the same flexibility to work with this content with few restrictions.

But there is a risk here - the Creative Commons license does technically allow a subscriber to take 'exclusive' unmodified content and republish it somewhere else as a public resource. This redistributed content could effectively bypass the need for others to subscribe to this Patreon.

Is this allowable by the Creative Commons license? Yes. Do I consider this this kind of action to be taken in good faith and respecting the health of this Patreon? No - I do not believe so. I certainly do not endorse such an action. 

Many of you already understand that I rely on the good will and faith of Patrons to honor the 'exclusivity' of certain posts. The content here is extremely affordable to access ($5). If you - as a visitor or patron - encounter someone asking for access to the 'exclusive' content, my preference as the author is to simply point them to the original post here!

In summary

The Creative Commons license provides visitors and patrons with a great deal of flexibility to use and modify the content published here for non-commercial purposes. The license also carries a known risk for allowing 'exclusive' unmodified content to be redistributed in manners which I do not endorse. My first preference is for good word of mouth to lead interested builders to this Patreon first.

Patreon earnings go directly towards continuing to invest time and effort into making new and improved content. It also goes to supporting charitable causes that continue to grow as part of the Ghostbusters Gear mission.

Thank you all for reading my 'TED talk' - I hope it is helpful in contextualizing the intent of using Creative Commons for content licensing and the effect it has on operating this Patreon!

I hope you are all staying safe and well in your part of the world.

Best regards,

-Nate