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[David M.Berry <d.berry AT sussex.ac.uk>]

This is in Music Week this week...

Thoughts comments?

David

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Music Week 31st Jan-3rd Feb

There has been a lot of talk about a new idea for copyright from across the Atlantic from the US. We are told this is an idea that will revolutionise both culture and commerce on the internet and will create a new huge ‘public domain’ of ideas from which will spread a new renaissance. Sounds good? Not if you are involved in the music business.

Originated by Stamford law professor Laurence Lessig, Creative Commons is a new series of licences that creators can attach to their work for internet distribution. But where is the commerce element? The answer is there isn’t any – the creator puts the work up for free and the only real right which he or she tries to enforce is the right to have their name attached to the work.

OK, I’ve pressed up 200 copies of my band’s demo and we’re looking for a deal, so I’m giving them away to everyone and I’ll stick a Creative Commons licence on them for our webpage and then when we get a deal we’ll cancel the licence, get an advance from ‘Super Publishing inc’ and put out the album.

Sorry, no. A Creative Commons licence is not just for Christmas, it’s forever. You and the band will never earn one penny in publishing royalties from your creation.

Worse still, in 2012 when President Jeb Bush is running for re-election, he is going to use your anthem for world peace in his adverts to demonstrate how the world needs saving from snivelling pinkos like you and there is nothing you can do about it. Period.

Prof. Lessig has not done enough research. His licences have some sort of value in the world of Academia, where a creator’s sole aim is to distribute his ideas as widely as possible without any money changing hands. For the world of music they are a pointless and damaging distraction which undermine the concept of copyright and create huge difficulties for music writers now and in the future. Worst of all, they play into the hands of the big Telcos and ISPs who are all too happy to give away our music when they can.

David Ferguson is chairman of the British Academy of Songwriters and Composers