å Sunday, September 27th, 2015

Copyleft

“Copyleft” is the practice of making a program or work free and requiring that all works derived from it also remain free to the public. The GNU General Public License was originally written by Richard Stallman as a way to ensure freedom of users to redistribute and modify copies of software. In his 1985 GNU manifesto he wrote, “GNU is not in the public domain. Everyone will be permitted to modify and redistribute GNU, but no distributor will be allowed to restrict its further redistribution. That is to say, proprietary modifications will not be allowed. I want to make sure that all versions of GNU remain free.” His reasoning was that he wanted to encourage free software to spread for the betterment of society.

Copyright law is used by an author to prohibit unauthorized reproduction, adaptation or use of the work. GNU or Copyleft licensing agreements use existing copyright laws but they ensure that the work remains free and available. Copyleft, while originally designed for software, can also cover documents and art. Under copyleft license, the author can give every person who receives the work the permission to redistribute and modify it, with the accompanying requirement that any resulting copies or adaptations are also bound by the same licensing agreement.

Taylor states “it does not advance limits on profitability or promote fair compensation” (168). While recognition from peers is an incentive, there is no financial compensation to the artist. Filmmaker Jem Cohen emphasizes “respect for labor” where it is reasonable for an artist to receive fair compensation for his work. Copyleft and the free culture movement do not allow for that. Cohen believes that we need to value the work of the artist and recognize the work that went into it to create an environment of mutual respect and support between the artist and the audience.

Group Members:

Deborah Markewich

Janelle Figueroa

Angeline Henriquez

Digital Media and Society

September 27, 2015

Cultural Ownership

In chapter 5 “The Double Anchor” Taylor talks about traditional concepts of cultural ownership and how these notions are being challenged by digital media. Traditional ideas of cultural ownership emphasizes exclusive possession, meaning cultural works could only be used in their original form and context. However, Taylor states that this idea of cultural ownership is “fanciful” in this digital media era. “Online creative works are decontextualize, remixed, and mashed up. We surf, and skim, passing along songs instead of albums, quotes instead of essays, clips instead of films.” (p.145). Once an artist’s work enters the cyberspace, he/she has little control over it, thus the term “ownership” becomes very illusive.

However, upon discussing these definitions of cultural ownership as traditional versus non-traditional, my classmate Joyce and I talked about how the line between the two can get blurry. By Taylor’s definition, non-traditional ownership means that an artists’ work can be taken out of context, and that he has no control over how it circulates, but it so can happen without the aid of digital media. For example, if you read a work of literature and then lend the same physical copy to a friend, that friend might understand it in completely different ways than you did because that friend filters it through the lens of their own experiences and prior knowledge. And so if that friend then lends that same copy to a third person, their introduction and summary of the same book to this third person can differ greatly from what you understood the text was about, therefore affecting how the third person will understand it; again, the artists has no control over how their work circulates. Maybe they never really had control over it and digital media is just magnifying this occurrence.

Because digital media has prompted us to think more about ownership, laws surrounding this matter have become more rigid than ever. “Cultural commons are being cordoned off by private interest” (p.145) Taylor states, highlighting the contrast between the original intent of copyright laws, which was to serve as an incentive for the production of literary goods by recompensing writers and publishers, and the rigid structure that it has become today.

Group Members

Joyce Julio

Angeline Henriquez