Eric Miller on 26 Jul 2000 20:36:52 -0000 |
[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]
RE: <nettime> Terror in Tune Town |
ooh, this is starting to get good. [sic] First off--Mr. Fisher makes a great point here, and one that I must acknowledge as valid and relevant. My arguments partially rested on an assumption that current IP and copyright law are our assumed baseline for managing the rights of the content creators/owners as well as the consumers. If we step back and say "this system is potentially no longer applicable/relevant" than the debate certainly changes. So barring revolution (or a truly liberal Congress/international consensus, which seems equally likely) I'm not sure that we'd be able to realistically achieve a radical restructuring of our current legal framework. But that's beside the point...I think we could all agree that there must be a better way to handle this. Also, I'll grant that the notion of "property" being applied to thought/intellectual labor is a hard one to swallow. But I'd propose that this capitalistic philosophy is the most pragmatic in light of human nature and behavior. To paraphrase..."Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others." Churchill, right? Apply it to free-market capitalism as well as democracy. Anyone got a better system? Let's hear it. I've been called here on my "grey area" argument...not to use it as an escape hatch here or anything, but I don't think that there's consensus in the artistic community (let alone in the business/legal realm) on what constitutes "fair usage". For example, many people have questioned hip-hop artists and pop musicians (Beck in particular) who appropriate other musical elements to create their work. At what point does it cross a line? Ask ten different musicians, you'll get ten different answers. And usage/format/style also plays a role...many people support what Negativland does, but there's been a huge stink over Kenny G's recent verbatim lifting of a Louis Armstrong recording. So in the end the answer seems to be "it depends". One specific response to Pat (dloska@aol.com) who writes "They [Napster] have created a market with an infinite supply." I'd differ with you on this point...the supply may seem infinite, but the resource (the artists) is finite. the individual distribution nodes for Napster, though, have the effect of increasing available content sources exponentially in relation to the original resource. Okay, after all this, what's my point? Setting semantics/philosophy/politics aside for a moment...I still believe that we don't treat artists fairly if they don't have the right to determine the use/distribution/profit from their work. At least to a certain extent that allows them to maintain the integrity of their product. Regardless of what the technology can do, or what the law says, I firmly believe that letting the masses appropriate the labor of the individual without consent is a violation of that individual's rights. Furthermore, it dilutes the integrity of their work, and can have the net effect of discouraging them from pursuing or distributing their work. And that's everyone's loss. Eric # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net