LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: Denise Tzumli <denise@aarli.com.au>
  To  : linux sa <linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au>
  Date: Thu, 29 Nov 2001 10:17:40 +1030

Article: Why Copyright Laws Hurt Culture

I know this isn't exactly on the topic of Linux, but having witnessed
the astute political savvy going on with the discussion re approaching
the IT minister I thought some of you may be interested. Indeed I sould
suggest that a copyy of the letter could also go  to the IPR list.

The Commission on Intellectual Property Rights [cipr.org.uk] has been
set up by the UK government to look at issues of patenting, copyright
and similar issues (biopiracy) and they keep a discussion list going on
nominated topics. They are in fact looking for contributions from a wide
variety of sources and the only voices for shareware type solutions seem
to be coming from India and other underdeveloped countries.

If you are politically inclined you may find this interesting or
important enough to contribute to.


Denise
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Wired News :Why Copyright Laws Hurt Culture
Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2001 23:47:48 -0800 (PST)
From: jsavirimuthu@aol.com
Reply-To: iprcommission@topica.com
To: CIPR <iprcommission@topica.com>

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A note from jsavirimuthu:

   Dear IPR Moderator
   I trust this might be of interest in expanding the discourse thus
far.
   
   Joseph Savirimuthu

============================================================

 From Wired News, available online at:
http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,48625,00.html

Why Copyright Laws Hurt Culture  
By Karlin Lillington  

2:00 a.m. Nov. 27, 2001 PST 
DUBLIN, Ireland -- American copyright laws have gotten so out of hand
that they are causing the death of culture and the loss of the world's
intellectual history, according to Stanford technology law professor
Lawrence Lessig.  

Copyright has bloated from providing 14 years of protection a century
ago to 70 years beyond the creator's death now, he said, and has become
a tool of large corporations eager to indefinitely prolong their control
of a market. Irving Berlin's songs, for example, will not go off
copyright for 140 years, he said.  

But a war is being waged against copyright "hoarders" in the corporate
world by new technologies -- such as peer-to-peer communication programs
-- that allow copyright to be circumvented, he said.   



See also:
P2P Fans Predict Rebound 
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RIAA Wants to Hack Your PC 
Discover more Net Culture 
Everybody's got issues in Politics 







The idea that copyright exists for the benefit of artists, musicians,
writers or programmers, he argues, is now laughable. New laws such as
the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act are "not speaking for those
who create, but those who hold massive amounts of copyright," Lessig
said. 

Lessig was in Dublin to speak at the Darklight Digital Film Festival. 


Copyright laws in the United States are placing the control of
material into an increasingly "fixed and concentrated" group of
corporate hands, he said. Five record companies now control 85 percent
of music distribution, for example.  

Because copyright law now also precludes "derivative use" of copyright
material, people cannot develop new material based on copyrighted work
without permission. Lessig said this radically changes how human culture
will evolve, since "the property owner has control over how that
subsequent culture is built."  

This restriction also stymies technological innovation, as developers
cannot follow the long-established practice of taking existing code and
enhancing it to produce something new, he said.  

Because companies in industries such as music, publishing and film
routinely demand that artists hand over copyright on their creative
work, "kids don't own their own culture," said Electronic Frontier
Foundation founder John Perry Barlow, who also attended the conference. 

"The period of copyright primacy is going to end up as a huge hole in
the cultural record."  

Lessig said a major problem is the fact that copyrighted material
simply vanishes because corporations aren't interested in keeping all
that they copyright commercially available. Such material "falls into a
black hole where no one will have access to it," he said.  

Belfast film producer Paul Largan of media company Bandigital said
organizations that fund digital filmmakers demand the copyright to the
work -- but they may never show the artists' film again after an initial
screening. "Copyright is key," he said, or a work just dies.  

Another threat to the availability of cultural material such as older
films, books and music is that it can be difficult or impossible to
establish who owns the rights to a work if the company that once owned
it goes out of business. "If a corporation goes bankrupt, we're going to
lose access to our culture," Lessig said.  

But digital and Internet technologies have the potential to create a
more diverse and open culture, he believes.  

"Digital production and the Internet could change all this, so that
creative action and the distribution of these arts could be achieved in
a much more diversified way than before," Lessig said. This would allow
for a "production of culture that doesn't depend on a narrow set of
images of what culture should be."  

A more open business model in which artists have greater control over
their productions would create "diverse, competitive industries" rather
than centralized, monopolistic companies, he said.   

New technologies such as peer-to-peer-based communication and
file-exchange programs could force a new look at copyright laws and
profoundly change the methods of distribution, Barlow and Lessig both
said.  

Irish native and Freenet inventor Ian Clarke said he hopes Freenet
will help artists distribute their works and find an audience and market
for them. But he acknowledged the program could be threatened like
Napster, Gnutella and FastTrack.  

"I do believe that through technology, the freedom to communicate can
be guaranteed," Clarke said. "It's certainly possible that Freenet could
be banned. The question is whether that's enforceable."  

But Lessig said using such programs only to get around existing
copyright law did not offer any true freedom for artists. "Freedom is
only real when it's a real alternative" -- not a subversive tactic
facing "the perpetual terrorism of lawsuits," he said. 

He said Freenet will come under legal attack "when it gets big
enough."  

Lessig added he doubts the system will change, because corporations
hold enormous power and will do whatever they can to protect "the
survival of the dinosaurs over the coming of the mammals," he said.  

But he also despairs that the younger generation that understands and
uses digital technology is apolitical and indifferent. Libertarian
"netizens" are also often "politically pathetic," he said. 

"They don't believe they should waste their time, so they don't get
involved." 

Europe has also been "passive," he warned, allowing the United States
to set the agenda on global copyright law.  

He said his first book, Code, was written to try to convince Net users
that "you've got to get enraged or it will be gone from under you."   

Related Wired Links:  

Aimster the Latest to Chime In  
Nov. 14, 2001 

P2P Fans Predict Rebound  
Nov. 8, 2001 

File Trading Instantly Is Easier  
Nov. 2, 2001 

Napster Wants License to License  
Oct. 30, 2001 

RIAA Wants to Hack Your PC  
Oct. 15, 2001 

Law Prof Cajoles Dmitry Allies  
Aug. 29, 2001 

Copyright (C) 1994-2001 Wired Digital Inc. All rights reserved. 

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