End of Semester Thoughts on the Blog

I have had a long and sordid history with blogs. My first one was back in '01, which was updated rarely and was written in Dreamweaver and updated to my personal site. I've kept one (or 6) on and off for years. The blogging has outlived Dreamweaver in usefulness. (Yes, I write the code for my sites by hand. Yes, I am a snob about it.)

However, even my collaboratively written blogs did not have this consistent level of activity (and, I am pained to admit, quality), which is very important and very exciting.

Additionally, though others have said it, an advantage of this forum is that those of us who have a hard time talking can come out of their proverbial shell. I can see the advantage of this virtual space for classrooms, even if they are not specifically "endorsed" or a requirement of the professor, just as a place for questions and answers.

Lastly, I've been in kind of a creative weird place lately, and so, when that is the case, I read some poetry or related prose. In this case, I'm re-reading Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet," and I've come across this bit, and his words on copyright are better than mine.

"Finally, as to my own books, I wish I could send you any of them that might give you pleasure. But I am very poor, and my books, as soon as they are published, no longer belong to me. I can't even afford them myself--and, as I would so often like to, give them to those who would be kind to them."
--Rainer Maria Rilke, April 23,1903

turnitin.com does not violate copyright

I thought this was already posted, but maybe not--I might be reading too many things online!

Bottom line:

Judge declares turnitin.com does not violate copyright (The decision was last month, but eschoolnews just recently published this article).

http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/news-by-subject/litigation/?i=53564;_hbguid=606186df-e5c3-438c-906b-a191add1bfe6&d=top-news

YouTube "Muting" Instead of Suspending

Just got this through my RSS feed on YouTube's blog that YouTube is revising its system of "enforcing" copyright infringement and managing misbehavior. YouTube is softening its response to angry users who get their accounts suspended - i think it's all about the benjamins $.

Open Source Licenses

During discussion about open sourcing, some questions regarding licenses and whether or not they effected the saved/produced work (e.g., does some coder own your text, or do you have to give it away, if it's created in their program). I guess I would call these "Resultant Works," unless someone has a better name for them.

1. The short answer is I didn't think so, but some people are more into the open source thing than others. I am not a lawyer.
   
2. The slightly longer short answer is: "No" for most programs that use the GPL (the most common) license. Here is a direct answer from the Free Software Foundation, regarding their GPL license. Here's a documentation license from the same group, since we're not programmers.
3. The long answer is: here is a short list of licenses that can be used. Remember, these are primarily related to code.

More stringent examples and practices exist, such as Debian GNU/Linux free software guidelines. This distribution of Linux is what I have used in the past. It still runs my old iBook, when the power supply works right, that is.

Anyway...

READING RESPONSE: Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig

ARE YOU A GOOD PIRATE OR A BAD PIRATE?

I am not sure what else I can add to the previous reading responses. It is difficult to distill 175 pages into 500 words and be more original than my talented classmates.

The first half of this book is a legal, moral, social, and financial argument built upon case histories written in a story-telling format. The argument Lessig writes about is copyright law and the distinctions that need to be made regarding piracy and property as they relate to free culture. Specifically, he addresses the Internet and our ability not only to store information, but to share information. He argues about the pitfalls of extremism and monopoly in ownership rights. The United States government treats intellectual property similarly to physical property; however, only a select few, who are wealthy and powerful, benefit from the laws enforcing copyright. American culture suffers the stifling of its creativity.

Lessig takes us on a historical journey to support his argument about copyright as it relates to new technologies. He shares stories about the various creators of different inventions: photography, the airplane, AM and FM radio, synchronized sound in film, and the Internet. He examines these events in the context of the legal rights the inventors had juxtaposed with the need for everyone in our culture to share (pirate) and expand upon these inventions for the greater creative good.

As Lessig progresses in his argument, he shares examples of individuals expanding and improving upon existing technologies, which would benefit millions of people while threatening the fattened pocketbooks of the owners or inventors of these technologies. He tries to make distinctions between good pirates and bad pirates. He writes that in some cases, there are clear examples of right and wrong ways to copy and distribute information. However, he warns that some instances of piracy need to be examined more closely. As stated before, sometimes piracy rises out of a need for a culture to take advantage of a new technology in a more democratic way to promote creativity and intellectual growth.

Lessig defines piracy as born of a history of each new medium pirating on the generation of technology before it. He gives examples of these “pirates” as film, recorded music, radio, and cable television. He cites clear examples in each industry of piracy. He later differentiates types of piracy into four categories: those who download music without purchasing it (bad), those who use shared networks to sample music (good), those who share networks to access material no longer sold (good), and those who use shared networks that give access to material without copyright (good). (p. 68-69)

Although I simplify the various types of piracy as good or bad, Lessig takes the definition of piracy and teases it apart. He argues that it is not valid to define piracy as good or bad – that it requires a deep investigation to understand if the laws that protect against piracy are logical.

In the second half of Lessig’s book, as has already been written about in the previous response readings, he examines the nature of property. He states that our tradition is to think of property as something physical – I own the land. It is difficult and often times ridiculous to apply the same laws to intellectual property. He gives an example of a director creating a celluloid homage to Clint Eastwood. The director had to spend an enormous amount of time, one year, to clear and cover all the possible copyright infringements. Each actor that had ever been in any Clint Eastwood film for even a second had to be found and compensated in order for that minute or two of old film to be incorporated into something new without legal consequences. It seems wasteful to spend that much time in obtaining permission and waiting that long to create. Lessig gives another example of a man making a documentary. During filming, he captured a Simpsons broadcast on a television set for about 4 seconds. He was allowed to include that 4-second footage if he was willing to pay an exorbitant $10,000.

Lessig poses that copyright should not be regarded solely as property, but as a balance of incentives to artists and authors with public access to their work. He argues that free culture suffers when creativity requires permission and legal advice.

Anti-piracy lawsuits a drain on record companies

From the Tech Law Prof Blog:

“EMI has struck a deal with the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) for reduced membership rates. The organization represents music labels on an international basis. Venture capitalists took over the label some time back and threatened to leave the organization due to a lack of return on the membership fees, estimated at $250 million. Specifically, the cash that was paying for anti-piracy lawsuits was high compared to the result of not stopping piracy. Apparently EMI was not happy with the symbolism given the cost.”

What, so just throwing money at it doesn’t make it go away? And sooner or later you have to pay the piper?

Why not stop with the lawsuits, and the anti-piracy software, already? Start a positive outreach to the consumer: make a deal, compromise, even if it’s with the devil you think you know. Get over the breakdown of the old system and deal with the new.

copyright video that isn't Disney, sort of

I am not sure how many of you teach younger students, but I found this short video and think it works as a teaching tool. Essentially, it's a compliation of Disney movies that outlines the basics of copyright and fair use (and of course, takes a swipe at Disney).

Whenever I learn something, I try to figure out the best way to relay that information to students in a manner that is easy to understand and delivered in a format that is commonplace for them. While this video is somewhat annoying to adults, I feel it would work well in the classroom because today's students are entranced by flashing images delivered at record speeds.

"A Fair (y) Use Tale" Has a bias or two showing, but that'll make a nice discussion topic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJn_jC4FNDo

material relating to presentation tonight

Vuguru article (NYT)

Piracy article (involving a how-to guide for Miro)

Warner Brothers' China division, in a rare act of intelligence on the part of a major media company, demonstrated significant savvy last year when they began selling cheap, legitimate, high quality DVDs of movies within days of the theatrical release. By pricing the discs at around 12 yuan (approximately US$1.50), Warner is hoping to make cost a non-issue, thus allowing them to compete in one area where they hold the upper hand: Quality. Instead of taking a chance with on a low quality, shaky-camcorder copy of a film, Chinese consumers can get a high quality copy of the movie at a reasonable price, all while enjoying the warm fuzzy feeling that you can get knowing that you've helped to pay for some small portion of a a Hollywood star's private jet. (Source: Surveillance State blog at cnet.com, Sept. 2007)

There were some efforts in Congress to modify the DMCA – Rick Boucher’s Digital Media Consumers' Rights Act (DMCRA) and Zoe Lofgren’s BALANCE Act – neither successful.

Timothy B. Lee (Cato Institute): “The DMCA is anti-competitive. It gives copyright holders — and the technology companies that distribute their content — the legal power to create closed technology platforms and exclude competitors from interoperating with them. Worst of all, DRM technologies are clumsy and ineffective; they inconvenience legitimate users but do little to stop pirates.” (Source: Wikipedia)

List of some recent fair-use legislation

Points from the BALANCE Act (2005) – Zoe Lofgren (CA) et al.
1. Copyright seeks to encourage and reward creative efforts by securing a fair return for an author's labor. Twentieth Century Music Corp. v. Aiken, 422 U.S. 151, 156 (1975). At the same time, `[f]rom the infancy of copyright protection, some opportunity for fair use of copyrighted materials has been thought necessary to fulfill copyright's very purpose, `[t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts . . .' Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569, 575 (1994).
2. `[P]rivate motivation must ultimately serve the cause of promoting broad public availability of literature, music, and the other arts . . . When technological change has rendered its literal terms ambiguous, the Copyright Act must be construed in light of this basic purpose.' Twentieth Century Music Corp., 422 U.S. at 156.
3. On the one hand, digital technology threatens the rights of copyright holders. Perfect digital copies of songs and movies can be publicly transmitted, without authorization, to thousands of people at little or no cost. On the other hand, technological control measures give copyright holders the capacity to limit nonpublic performances and threaten society's interests in the free flow of ideas, information, and commerce.
4. The authors of the DMCA never intended to create such a dramatic shift in the balance. As the report of the Committee of the Judiciary of the House of Representatives accompanying the DMCA stated: `[A]n individual [should] not be able to circumvent in order to gain unauthorized access to a work, but [should] be able to do so in order to make fair use of a work which he or she has acquired lawfully.' House Report 105-551, Part I, Section-by-Section Analysis of section 1201(a)(1).

I like comics; comics are good.

Hi.

If I wasn't already taking on the man in my presentation/paper, I'd seriously be considering using one or both of these blogs as objects for rhetorical analysis. Even if you already have your future plans figured out in this class, you might at least get a laugh out of them.

We'll probably talk next week about the semantics and differences between sampling, remixing, et cetera, so maybe then you can help me figure out how to best describe these things:

Marmaduke Explained [in 500 words or less]

Marmaduke Explained is pretty much like it sounds. The author, Joe Mathlete, offers pithy explanations for the comic semi-regularly. The latest one is really great.


Garfield Minus Garfield


"Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life?" [so say the site's creator--not necessarily the opinion of your humble poster]



Here we have two blogs devoted to comics that necessarily depend on the use of copyrighted material. In the first case, the author is adding to the original content by way of paraphrasing text or otherwise describing images. In the second, the author is merely removing an element [arguably the "heart" of the piece] to make something new. In my view, these are both creative and original in a sense, yet it is pretty much assured that they are using material without permission of the author/copyright holder.

FYI, be careful about passing on M.E. to the kids, please. They can get a bit naughty.

Malvolio's Reading Response for Week 4

It is only partly true that I never know where to begin or even what to say when responding to anything written by Barthes or Foucault. And quite obviously this statement needs to be explained right away. My problem isn’t really that I have nothing to say (quite the contrary), but, instead, that what I have to say is so often derogatory. Generally speaking, my reaction to anything produced by either of them is to observe that they seem to be doing little more than playing semantic and linguistic games in order to disguise the reality that, yes, children, the Emperor is in fact naked. These are not the sorts of comments that tend to endear me to my colleagues, particularly those with poststructuralist interests.

In any case, since I can’t say that my opinions have really changed all that much (unless we want to consider an intensification or sharpening a change), I’m not going to deal with them here – plenty of opportunity for that in class, should anyone be interested. Instead, I prefer to concentrate on Martha Woodmansee, whose scholarship and rigor and freedom from ideological pronouncements is rather refreshing when compared to what I’m afraid I can’t refrain from calling the intellectual posturing of Barthes and Foucault.

Woodmansee’s article is a fine and detailed historical account of the parallel developments in European (and specifically German) conceptions of authorship and copyright. Beginning (almost) with the genuinely useful statement that “the author in its modern sense is a relatively recent invention” (426 in our online edition), she proceeds to delineate both premodern and early modern legal conceptions of authorship as well as the whys and hows by which they gradually – in the German states through the course of the eighteenth century – evolved into the idea of the Author which Barthes and Foucault (not incidentally) are so assiduously trying to kill (don’t ask me why – I’ve never been able to figure out exactly what their problem is with what Foucault rather snottily keeps referring to as “the author function,” especially considering the inescapably monolithic status both have achieved as Authors of their respective Works – but I digress).

The history Woodmansee lays out provides invaluable context for our discussion of the complexities of the authorship/copyright issue in our own time: if the idea of the Author is so comparatively recent, then it follows that the notion of legal protection of authorial ownership of texts is even more recent (and yes, I am aware that I am totally avoiding the question of how precisely we define the idea of "text"). I would add that it is important to recognize that what Woodmansee describes are parallel developments: as the concept of authorial ownership of what Fichte called the “form” of ideas – the particular expression of thoughts and ideas which belongs solely to the individual creator – gradually takes hold, so develop legal protections safeguarding the rights of those creators over the dissemination of their expressions, or of the concrete textual forms of which they are identified as authors. Thus Fichte seems to advocate a concept of authorship not unlike that which we articulated in class last week: one of the key elements allowing a creator to exert some ownership over her ideas is the specific expression or form of those ideas that she alone has been responsible for constructing (and by the by, the use of the feminine pronoun here raises some interesting wrinkles that I'd like to address some time -- namely, how from the seventeenth century onward the participation of women in the creation of texts both through writing and publishing them helped evolve the modern concept of authorship, which I would think raises for feminist critics all sorts of interesting implications re: Foucault and Barthes).

As you’ve probably guessed, I have no particular problem with what for us is a traditional notion of authorship, nor do I question the right of individual authors to control who uses their creations, or how. And as a theater artist I also don't question the right of directors and actors and designers to be identified as authors of their own work, even when that work involves what may conventionally be seen as an infringement of the original author's work (good actors and directors understand that on some level they must rewrite the texts they choose to interpret). In my view, to return to the particular bugaboo with which I began this discussion, Barthes and Foucault, in railing against the tyranny of the Author, have only succeeded in replacing it with the tyranny of the Critic. Woodmansee at least provides solid historical reasons for why we conceive of authorship in the way we do. After all, whatever else they may be, texts are products of the human brain, expressions of human thought, human choice, and human will. Perhaps, as Foucault seems to suggest in one of his more lucid moments, our goal should not be to destroy the idea of the author, but to explore our own changing notions about just who the author is and what exactly it is that she does. This strikes me as far more useful than proclaiming the death of the author, especially considering the extent to which the reports of that death have been so greatly exaggerated.

Anyone for a game of copyright monopoly?

Here's a great article that highlights the class discussion (and more) about copyright:
The Purpose of Copyright

by Lydia Pallas Loren

It's from Open Spaces Quarterly

The article takes you back to the printing press and history of the monopolization of copyright, then moves on to the birth of censorship,etc., all as proof of a change from copyright's inital inception as a creative tool to today's misuse as a financial boon. I'll let you read the rest, but it's an easy-to-digest background for those of us who aren't entirely familiar with copyright in the past or the present and brings up a few fundamental questions to chew on. In the end, this author argues against time extensions for copyright owners.

I particularly like the the link between copyright owners and their ability to act as censor for the material--this is an area I'd like to hear more opinions and facts about.

Classical Authorship - Reader Response

We see a progression of thought from Plato to his most famous student, Aristotle, to the famous rhetorician Quintillian: whether authorship is the “Bacchic transport,” imitation of real life, or imitation of good authors.

Plato, in Ion, speaks of the Muse as similar to a magnet that first inspires poets who then can inspire rhapsodes to recite their work and enthuse an audience (enthuse and inspire both etymologically implying possession by the god): a chain of emotional transference, with a strong focus on cathartic response. Poetry is a religious experience.

For Aristotle, the poet seeks to imitate real life in his work, in degrees of similarity (better than real life, worse than real life, or like real life): the focus is on the lifelikeness of the story itself, not, indeed, the affective quality.

Quintillian directs the orator to study and imitate all the best human authors; he does discuss the emotional reaction to a great oration, but prefers reading orations in order to study them most coolly and rationally.

These three thinkers approach authorship from different perspectives. Plato’s concept of divine inspiration by the Muse sidesteps the question of intellectual copyright altogether: it belongs (if to anyone) to the gods, and is shared with certain humans, who then transmit it in their turn. Aristotle’s approach deals with the mechanics of imitation: medium, manner, and objects. This is not a question of plagiarism: Aristotle points out that Sophocles and Homer are imitators of the same kind (tragedy), and on a broader scale like Aristophanes (imitation of persons). Quintillian takes it further by specifically prescribing study and imitation of the best authors.

So, for Plato, the “author” receives a divine gift; no other receives exactly the same, as Ion can speak eloquently of Homer but “dozes off” when other poets are mentioned. An author has a specialty. This suggests that plagiarism is actually not possible, although that is complicated by Plato’s chain, which is a web of sharing freely the gifts of the gods, mass possession the goal. If the entire audience is moved and affected by the recital of the rhapsode, the transference of this emotion has transmitted the gift of the gods (at least temporarily). Does this or doesn’t it complicate Plato’s concept of divine inspiration (i.e., how dangerous is the Muse that had to be cast out of the Republic – the power to sway mobs by emotion rather than reason)?

Aristotle sees authors as discrete units. They may imitate the manner of Homer in using a narrator, or imitate the genre (tragedy, drama), but that kind of imitation would hardly be considered plagiarism by anyone today. Authorship for Aristotle means the production of realistic (or more or less “realistic”) character, emotion, movement – in short, the lived human experience. Authors work differently, some depicting men as nobler than in real life, others as viler.

Imitation does not mean an exact copy, however; as Quintillian points out (like jb, I think this is one of the central points here), you should not imitate only one author, for all copies are inherently inferior to the originals (recalling the concept of ideal forms). Like Cicero, who, “after he devoted himself wholly to imitate the Greeks . . . embodied in his style the energy of Demosthenes, the copiousness of Plato, and the sweetness of Isocrates,” so you can draw from many sources yet create your own utter newness, cf. Joyce’s Ulysses.

Note
If you want to look a little further, here’s a blog on the subject of authorship in antiquity which I found thought-provoking:
http://blog.lib.umn.edu/kenne329/antiquity/cat_greek.html

"CyberLaw and You: What New-Media Professionals Must Know"

Last semester, I attended an STC Chicago (The Chicago Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication) meeting held in Oak Park, Illinois. The guest speaker was Christopher Julliet, an attorney in Ann Arbor, MI: "Chris focuses his law practice on business, Internet, electronic commerce and estate planning." (stc-chicago.org)

He defined copyright, trademarks, etc. in plain language and gave a very interesting presentation. I remember thinking: How does Walt Disney get away with keeping the rights to Mickey Mouse when they allegedly copied the character in the first place?

He also shared a story about a woman who was at a party taking pictures and apparently shot a great photo of some famous coach (name and sport escapes me now). The woman wanted to put that photo onto postcards and send them out as Christmas cards (or something of that nature), but Chris, the attorney, advised her not to go down that road. The battle would be uphill!

Read Chris' article, "CyberLaw and You: What New-Media Professionals Must Know." It's from 2002, but I think it's still relevant, and I hope you find it interesting.

Pirate's Dilemma

The following is from a little site about The Pirate's Dilemma.

The Pirate’s Dilemma tells the story of how youth culture drives innovation and is changing the way the world works. It offers understanding and insight for a time when piracy is just another business model, the remix is our most powerful marketing tool and anyone with a computer is capable of reaching more people than a multi-national corporation.

| View | Upload your own

I'm persuaded by this argument, mostly because I'm easily persuaded by flashy videos that paint the big companies as villains and pirate anti-heroes as hip, awesome people with tech savvy--I think I've seen that movie.

But there is more there, the companies aren't villains, they're just stupid. There's nothing bad, they just don't know what to do. Companies appear to be not helping themselves, either, especially when you have buffoonery such as Ford saying it owns pictures you took of their cars. (Resolved: CafePress' error).

As the slideshow points out (I haven't read the book), sometimes lawsuits are the way to go. But there are a lot of pirates in the world. Can they sue everyone?

What happens when the third world starts computing? When they start using this technology through the lens of their culture?

There are companies that offer stop-gap fixes to the piracy problem (see: MediaDefender, and then Hacking into MediaDefender via Digg), but they are not winning.

Industries that insist on suing and harming their customers will fall, as others have before, now they just make a louder noise.

How does this relate, then, back to authorship? Do I own my remixes & mashups? Even the use of the word "my" there is kind of suspect.

I assembled this Christmas card last year. I used photos from all over the Internet. The one of Vlad there is an old painting. The tree is from some fake Christmas tree dealer (don't even remember). The guy? I think that's something I cropped out of a video game. I'm not even sure any more. The font is something default in Windows, I think.

So, who made that thing? Is it piracy?