Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Discussion on Lawrence Lessig

Disney's creativity built upon the work of others... Well, what isn't? Knowledge has always been built upon knowledge; ideas aren't created in a vacuum. Author right to say key to success was brilliance of differences. Intellectual property hard to define and even harder to defend. Over-protection of intellectual property would stagnate the creation of new ideas, even if one would prefer to call it "mickey-mouse creativity" or whatever. Didn't much care for this chapter. Author wrote a lot and seemed to say very little.

"By limiting the rights musicians have, by partially pirating their creative work, the record producers, and the public, benefit." But without this allowance of a 'limited piracy' the spread of the musician's music would be severely disrupted, and how can that be considered a good thing for the artist?

And is the radio station really taking something for nothing? The recording artist, when covering a song, takes something from the composer (although of course the composer is compensated) in the hope that his performance will spread notoriety for his ability to perform. To me, that seems like a pretty fair price to pay considering this artist, for this song, needed simply to add some minor changes to a completely composed piece. I don't agree with the author when he says the radio stations get something for nothing; with two barriers to play a song, there would be no radio whatsoever, at least not a radio we'd actually care to listen to. It'd most likely be the same few songs repeated over and over again.

I think the legislation passed in regards to intellectual media has been successful in giving both sides gain for intellectual property. There must always be a producer and a distributor and an audience of any good or service. Cut one part of that chain out and everybody suffers. Hurray for intelligent legislation.

-Jacob

2 comments:

deb said...

I don't totally agree that the legislation passed in regards to intellectual media has been successful. I have read lots of articles about artists from other countries which have been played on US radios without their permission, and without their recognition. I think the legislation has been somewhat successful, but there are quite a few loopholes, and I think the point of this piece was that these loopholes allow for creativity.

taofd said...

It's no surprise, or even new news to know that the record companies gain a huge percent of the profit, leaving most artists (not well known) flat on their back financially.

There is a lot of debate right now what is an appropriate course of action, but I definitely disagree with the solution involving placing more constraints on copyright and intellectual management, etc. When you calculate all the costs, it is probably more costly to engage in numerous lawsuits, etc, fighting fans and legitimate corporations at the same time. I say: Build up a healthy, happy fan base, allow free distribution... heck publish your work under the GPL even, and enjoy your viral advertising.