[cc-community] anarchist take on copyright and CC

Matthew J. Agnello matt.agnello at gmail.com
Fri Mar 28 02:40:14 EDT 2008


>>> How is this comic and paper licensed?
>>
>> How do you interpret what it says on the final page?
>
> I would say that makes a whole lot of nonsense.


Heh. I don't think the point is to make sense from a rule-based  
standpoint. (If you don't care about the law, then it doesn't apply to  
you, so the last page doesn't matter.) Although, the irony that the CC  
license is non-commercial (i.e., a rule) is kinda funny to me.

Other than that, I think the paper has some serious weaknesses. It  
gives a crash course in the basics of copyright law and an interesting  
perspective of Creative Commons -- this is the first anarchist  
perspective of CC I've read, although I know this certainly isn't the  
ONLY way an anarchist could look at it. The weakness comes in that  
there is no argument, supporting evidence, or conclusion. "Don't let  
the law scare you" isn't so much a conclusion as a statement of values  
about the law. It also has some inaccuracies. The reason copyright law  
is as it is today has nothing to do with US policy, as the last  
paragraph implies. It's all about international treaties[1], which  
started in other countries[2] and were later adopted by the US. The  
paper's tone also tends toward cliche and alienates people who may be  
okay with capitalism (whether or not they like big business) or may  
ascribe to some other political philosophy.

I'd say a better treatment of copyright, the spread of information,  
and anarchism would be Siva Vaidhyanathan's The Anarchist in the  
Library. I bought it at Red Emma's in Baltimore (volunteer-run  
anarchist coffee shop), and it's what got me interested in these  
issues to begin with. A little ranty, but I think it has some good  
substance about copyright issues and how people and organizations  
acting of their own free will can produce substantive results. It also  
stays away from the anti-corporate cliches, or at least tries to back  
them up.

My .02.

// Matt

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_parties_to_international_copyright_treaties
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berne_Convention_for_the_Protection_of_Literary_and_Artistic_Works

----------
Matt Agnello
< matt.agnello at gmail.com >





On Mar 27, 2008, at 7:04 PM, drew Roberts wrote:

> On Thursday 27 March 2008 21:49:58 Robert Atwood wrote:
>> Mark Rauterkus wrote:
>>> On Thu, Mar 27, 2008 at 2:32 PM, Lloyd <cc at phizz.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>>> Jessica Coates wrote:
>>>>> For those who haven't seen it before - a very cute anarchist  
>>>>> take on
>>>>> CC. Accompanied by a serious paper.
>>>>> http://www.tangledwilderness.org/pdfs/copyright-web.pdf
>>>
>>> How is this comic and paper licensed?
>>
>> How do you interpret what it says on the final page?
>
> I would say that makes a whole lot of nonsense.
>>
>> (quote)
>>               Please redistribute (non-comercially).
>> To those with respect for the concept of intellectual property, this
>> document is under the Creative
>> Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States  
>> License.
>
>> Everyone else, of course, is free.
>
> So, what, those who don't have respect for the concept of intellectual
> property are free and free to disregard the request to redistribute
> (non-comercially) and can just go ahead and redistribute  
> commercially instead
> right?
>
> Somehow I don't think copyright law is goinig to work like that  
> despite what
> they write...
>
> We might be better off if it did, but I don't think it does.
>>
>> (/quote)
>
> all the best,
>
> drew
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> cc-community mailing list
> cc-community at lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/cc-community

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