Jorge Cortell, from the Polytechnic University of Valencia, gave a lunchtime talk today entitled "Free culture for all: a sustainable, real example." Jorge is Creative Commons's new project lead for Spain; his talk was an eloquent description of the "free culture" perspective on copyright issues. Armed with data from last year's LAN party in Valencia -- apparently the world's largest -- he made some pretty aggressive claims and proposals for the future of copyright.
My notes are attached inside.
Free culture for all: a sustainable, real example - Sep. 20, 2004 - Jorge Cortell, PhD Polytechnic University of Valencia (Spain) Creative Commons lead (Spain) - - Concept, not law, of intellectual property - Be prepared -- will challenge a lot of assumptions - Just because it's law, doesn't mean it's fair - What is intellectual property? - 2 basic components - From the intellect Stemming from creativity and originality - Communicated in some way "Fixed" or expressed in some way - What is property? - antagonistic If I have your car, you don't - excludable If you lock your car, I can't get in - IP: contradiction in terms? Ideas are neither excludable nor antagonistic. "Apples are not ideas." Property metaphor for ideas is flawed. - Paradigm shift For a long time, "intellectual property" was tied to real property -- the music is on the record, to such an extent that the record is thought of as equal to the music. Digitization changes this. - Hopefully, our thinking about this will change Selling culture and limiting access to it by law has real problems. - Philosophical question of "itness" My son is not MINE . . . the expression refers to his position in a community. He is only, however, is OWN. - applying "itness" to intellectual works An idea/piece of culture doesn't belong to anyone, but it is part of a distinct community - Research - Biggest LAN party in the world, annually in Valencia Researched practices there . . . downloading, burning, uploading - substantial proportion of people are uploading 33 % of activity is uploading (49% downloading) - legal activity in Spain Spain has a "private copy" exception to copyright . . . P2P networks are perfectly legal so long as any sharing is for personal, not-for-profit use. - Legal P2P . . . but Spain continues to have robust markets for IP Spain has the 8th highest rate of "piracy" in the world (selling on the street) But numbers indicate that CD buying, record label profits are above the mean worldwide At least to date, P2P is not affecting the industry - many reasons for downloading Education, Collection, Distribution, Work . . . and Leisure (largest single category) 20% of sharers were sharing works they had authored 30% of the shared files were not accessible through non-P2P means Only 6% of shared software was commercial And 5% was Creative Commons material . . . though CC is not yet operating in Spain - Current situation - debate is becoming a war Labels suing consumers FBI's name is being invoked, even for infringement w/o monetary gain
- "lawyer terrorism"
Lots of horror stories about lawyers seeking royalties
DMCA anticircumvention -- Bertelsmann suit against
keyboard makers (shift key DRM)
Lawsuits for sampling
- plagiarism
Examples of plagiarism from Disney (copying Tezuka's
"Emperor of the Jungle" in 1965) . . . yet Disney is
suing to prevent distribution of Tezuka's film in U.S.
Madonna video taking from Guy Bourdin photos
- big money in the recording industry
Yet artists can make more money in concerts than they can
from recording royalties
- and the recording industry uses misleading numbers
They are showing record profits . . . very little
evidence that they are being hurt by P2P
- software industry is implicated as well
Overprotective, making research difficult/impossible
Security holes that are becoming too difficult to fill
- overpatenting
Patents are making research more difficult . . . and
interfering with competitive markets.
- damage to culture & the public domain
Over-protection of copyright is exerting substantial
costs on public domain and culture
And we keep reupping the protection . . . tracks to the
age of Mickey Mouse
Culture is becoming inaccessible
- Sustainable and viable alternatives
- Open source and open code
- New licensing options
- Alternative business models
- Slides, etc. @ http://jorge.cortell.net/
- QUESTIONS
- What will happen to the content industries? Do they have to die?
They are nervous . . . but they were nervous about the VCR,
and it turned into a big moneymaker.
They should not take unilateral action . . . if they conclude
that their role is unnecessary, they should be sincere and
exit the market. - What is the right copyright term?
Best thing we could do would be to get rid of copyright
entirely . . . this is a radical idea, many people will not
agree.
Or, we could reduce copyright protection to 5 or 10 years,
which is enough time to make a lot of money off of a work. - What was the purpose of this LAN party?
Much of what was being done could have been done from a
remote environment . . . but the appeal is in gathering
physically. People get very excited and have a good time. - Does this proposal apply to all types of work more or less
equally? E.g., movies cost a tremendous amount to make, and an
OSS model won't work.
True. Music is somewhat easier on this front. Technology is
making some kinds of movies more possible. But for the
big-budget movies, money comes from lots of sources other
than the movie itself. Merchandising, etc. (though these are
also copyrighted). But movies can still make a lot of money
by offering an in-theater experience. - More details on Spanish private copy exception to copyright?
Spanish law distinguishes moral and economic rights. Economic
rights are exactly the same as the law here, with the
exception of private copy exception. Says nothing about
number of copies, covers any work except software and does
not cover anything for profit.
- What will happen to the content industries? Do they have to die?