The Creative Commons future

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It appears, Obama is poised to let this stuff become the norm.

http://venturebeat.com/2007/11/13/exclu ... y-officer/

Lessig seems to play a crucial role in this as he is the head of Creative Commons.

What do you guys make of this?

[bickle]

All good stuff and Lessig is a brilliant guy who's right about most of this stuff. We've been overprotecting IP to favor big corporate interests forever; it's not going to end soon, but things may be improving a lot w/ a tech-savvy dem administration and Congress.

Of course, not sure how "poised" Obama is to do this right now - this article is a year old.

[JWL]

I think as a movement CC, or at least the sentiment behind it, is here to stay. Whether or not CC can continue to function and grow, well, time will tell.

Let's also not forget that VP-Elect Joe Biden has a long history on these issues, too. And, I'm afraid, he's not on the right side of this debate.

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The Creative Commons mantra can be read here in Lessig's book:

http://www.amazon.com/Remix-Making-Comm ... 223&sr=1-1

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From Charlie Rose a few days ago:

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/9618

[;ivlunsdystf]

Very interesting. I am partway through the Charlie Rose and enjoying it immensely. What a novelty to have a president who cops to knowing what the internet is/does, too. I had almost taken it for granted that this would never happen after living thru the past 7.8 years.

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I am in the middle reading his book and I am NOT sold on this stuff.

[;ivlunsdystf]

I am in the middle reading his book and I am NOT sold on this stuff.

Please elaborate. What do you not like specifically. So we can have an interesting discussion.

EDIT - to be forthright, what I personally liked about his Charlie Rose appearance was this: 1. He contends that the current copyright situation along with the preponderance of downloading options has made an entire (fairly young) generation into scofflaws; 2. He points out that in the world of writing and books it is totally okay and accepted to cite and quote other authors, but if you do that with video and/or music you are committing a crime; this doesn't seem right to him; 3. He espouses remixing and mashing-up as potentially things that can add value for the copyright holder rather than stealing revenue, if the system is set up correctly - and gives the example of people making interesting compilations and other re-edits of Charlie Rose's shows, which Charlie Rose himself also enjoys.

So, what don't you like? (I haven't read the book; plan to)

[ubertar]

The only thing I don't like about creative commons is the idea I would have to register something with them in order to allow others certain right regarding my work. A creative work, under the current system, is automatically copyrighted as soon as it is created, and the author has the full rights to do with as he/she pleases. The problem CC is trying to solve is that it doesn't get enforced that way. I've had radio stations who wouldn't play my stuff unless I got a CC license. CC is not an official entity... it's just a way of formalizing rights we already have. We don't need an organization for this, we just need the system to work with the laws already on the books. If, for example, I want people to be able to download a song for their own, non-commercial use, but not for any commercial use, all I should need to do is post that in the notes section of the mp3, and/or on the download page. No special "license" necessary. I think CC is redundant, and the danger of it is that people think that without a CC "license", you don't have these rights. You do.

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I am in the middle reading his book and I am NOT sold on this stuff.

Please elaborate. What do you not like specifically. So we can have an interesting discussion.

I'm going to start posting the really annoying stuff of his:

"If you want to respect Yo Yo Ma, try playing cello. If you want to understand how great great music is, try performing it with a collection of amateurs." Lessig tried to justify this through John Philip Sousa's complaints on the cultural emptiness that mechanical music would create. Describing how a technology would change our relationship to culture.

It simply makes no sense. He goes on to elaborate that with pre-recorded music people moved away from playing instruments and seems to say that because of that we are removed from 'culture' so therefore we have less amateurs 'playing' music on instruments. I would argue this very same thing is happening today in his purported 'Remix' society, Pro Tools and other software programs have removed people from actually becoming musicians and learning an instrument. Guitar Hero and Rock Band do the same. Both very, very bad for future musicians. Does being a blazing Guitar Hero player translate into being an amazing musician? Nope. Do people love music even more because of it? Does making music available to them to cut up free off charge make society like music more? Nope.

[JGriffin]

Does being a blazing Guitar Hero player translate into being an amazing musician? Nope. Do people love music even more because of it? Does making music available to them to cut up free off charge make society like music more? Nope.

I disagree.

I remember growing up in the 1970s, before MTV, before the internet, when the only time you could see music on TV was Saturday Night Live, Soundstage, and Don Kirshner's Rock Concert. Seeing musicians on television was a big deal. Muzak was all over the place because shops couldn't play the radio legally. People didn't carry their music with them wherever they went--not to the same extent the iPod generation does, anyway.

In short, music was not as big a part of the societal tapestry as it is now. Not as ubiquitous, not as easy to access. So, in a way, we valued it more. We sat down to listen to albums. We paid attention at concerts instead of just yapping to our friends. We stopped everything to look at a broadcast of "Soundstage." There was an investment of attention, an involvement in music that I don't see today because, well, it's everywhere. It's totally soaked in and there's no avoiding it.

So there's nothing special about music for most people. It's road rumble, traffic noise, fridge buzz. The shit we tune out in our day-to-day existence.

Now, though, we have these two gimmicks-- the Guitar Hero and the remix-me tracks, which put the music front and center in an experience and demand people's attention and participation in the music. And (at least in the case of Guitar Hero) people are responding in a huge way to it. It's as though music suddenly started to exist again for some folks. And especially given the recent uproar over the idea that the Guitar Hero version of the Metallica record sounds better than the version they put on CD, I think people actually ARE caring more about music as a result of Guitar Hero. Partly because it puts music in a front-and-center place in their lives for the first time in a long time.

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Now, though, we have these two gimmicks-- the Guitar Hero and the remix-me tracks, which put the music front and center in an experience and demand people's attention and participation in the music. And (at least in the case of Guitar Hero) people are responding in a huge way to it. It's as though music suddenly started to exist again for some folks. And especially given the recent uproar over the idea that the Guitar Hero version of the Metallica record sounds better than the version they put on CD, I think people actually ARE caring more about music as a result of Guitar Hero. Partly because it puts music in a front-and-center place in their lives for the first time in a long time.

We have less musicians and more people 'pretending' for free. This has reduced the industry to a level that is continuously eroding in productivity. This does not serve to make music more of a 'commodity'- that would happen through rareity.

It does nothing more than cheapen what music there is and this can be seen by the direction the industry is heading. The last 10-15 years have bourn this out.

[bickle]

I agree generally with DWLB. Lessig's point is that digital technology is allowing people to be creative in new ways, and that this is a big change from the more passive approach to media that we've seen in the last century. I think that's undeniable, especially in a community like Tape Op, where most of us rely on computers to allow us to be creative in ways we never could have afforded before.

And, Ubertar: it may be that the prevalence of CC makes some people think it's "official," but that's not the fault of CC. It's just designed to make it easy for you to do just what you want to do. In fact, doing as you suggest - just putting a note on your site saying "you're free to download and copy my songs for noncommercial use," would work just fine. It's just that there would be loopholes an enterprising content thief could use, or whatever - since you're not an IP lawyer, you wouldn't know all the ins and outs of protecting your rights. CC is just designed to give you a well-lawyered basis from which to make your own decisions about how to protect your rights (or not).

Lessig, by the way, is a big proponent of getting lawyers out of the game as much as possible, and a big opponent of the total control of the music industry by major labels.

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I agree generally with DWLB. Lessig's point is that digital technology is allowing people to be creative in new ways, and that this is a big change from the more passive approach to media that we've seen in the last century. I think that's undeniable, especially in a community like Tape Op, where most of us rely on computers to allow us to be creative in ways we never could have afforded before..

I mean, I love data back-up- that's some creative shit!

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Lessig, by the way, is a big proponent of getting lawyers out of the game as much as possible, and a big opponent of the total control of the music industry by major labels.

He may, but I've not got to that in the book yet.

What he embraces is amateur culture as an ends in itself which is a truly academic phenomenon. I think of the level of competency in the 'real world' in Los Angeles or New York in the music industry and I look at the level of competence in an academic setting and I see a huge disparity. Something is not a success simply because of amateur input. Because amateurs did the creation does not make it good or valid. He seems obsessed with the amateur being an end without having to obligatorily be judged as having created something 'good' or 'bad'. Isn't making 'good' art a goal? Wouldn't the most ardently driven amateur be devastated by a judgment that their art is 'bad'?

If so, then I maintain, being an amateur immersed in this culture of Creative Commons is no amateur to strive to be.