name: Irene de Groot subject: Copyright In The Next Century time: 12.30 - 14.00 (Paradiso Hall) date: Friday 19 january 1996 |
| The death of copyright? As most of us already know, copyright initially was an instrument of state control. It gave kings the possibility to perform censorship, and in the mean time, it protected the national commercial market. The first copiers, not surprising, were seen as a big danger for books. Already then, according to Tjebbe van Tijen (International Institute for Social History, Amsterdam) there existed a misconception of what technology would do in time. Accompanied by a lot of slides, he explained that authors in the academic field find themselves in a schizophrenic position. On the one hand they want their books and articles to be read as much as possible, for the sake and development of science. On the other hand, they wouldn't mind if their work resulted in some money. Furthermore, Van Tijen seemed to stress that the rebellious work of many authors, like for example Gyorgy Konrad, would never have been successful if it would not have been distributed illegally. Kloosterman, also from the International Institute for Social History, disagrees with the suggested objective of patents and copyrights (that is, stimulating creativity) as well. Creativity does not result from financial incentives. Rather, copyright is harmful as it obstructs many texts from being discussed. Both Bernard Timberg and Sut Jhally directly experienced the negative effects of copyright. In performing 'montage critique' (taking existing images, cutting them and putting them together in your own way) they make films that are basically meant for educational purposes. For example, Sut Jhally made a film (Dream Worlds II) about the female presentation in television clips, for which he used many MTV images. Both the copyright of MTV and of the record companies were said to be violated by this film. The law has four criteria to decide whether the copyright law is exceeded or not: the amount and the substantiality of use, the character of the use (news versus entertainment), and whether the 'original' market is being damaged. Especially because of the educational character of their work, Timberg and Jhally argue that copyright misses its aims: creativity is rather suppressed than stimulated. In summary, all of the speakers in this session so far, to a lesser or larger degree, concentrated on the negative, limiting effects of copyright. However, although the future can not be discussed without interpreting the past and present, the former is quite absent in the presentations of the four speakers, in spite of the session's title. It is not until John Barlow gets the miec, that the crucial thing is spoken out: with the internet, copyright is going to die very quickly. According to him, we have to regard our immaterial creations as a relationship rather than as property. It is something that happens in the space between minds. In addition, Van Tijen points at the pleasure that reciting somebody elses poem at a meal can bring. We should be happy about traceless multiplication of our culture!
Irene de Groot (igro@xs4all.nl) |
