Lawrence Lessig who is at the centre of the Creative Commons movement and opposed to the ways in which current copyright law constrains creative use of past creations has an interesting presentation 'Free Culture' online (delivered in 2002) - interesting, not least for his use of Powerpoint. One of his refrains is
'Creativity and innovation always builds on the past'
which is hard to argue with. But the important question is, What follows from this? Lessig wants to open up free access to past creation. He is, rightly, concerned about the ways in which large corporations can restrict access to the very sources of creativity. He has selected extreme examples to make his case...
A different conclusion, however, might be: we need to find ways to encourage and, even more importantly, fund creativity in the present if we want creativity in the future. In the case of the printed word, copyright legislation has performed this role effectively, making it possible to be a professional writer, and giving the publishing industry incentives for promoting the works of writers. True, the extension of postmortem copyright to 70 years is hard to defend on moral or pragmatic grounds, but copyright legislation relating to the printed word, both in its primary and secondary uses, has been a major stimulus to creativity...without a source of income (and writers often get by on very little - see the latest survey on this 'What Are Words Worth?' commissioned by ALCS) few people will have the time to write. What we need is the balance between availability and possible income.
'Creativity' and 'Freedom' are emotive words. 'Copyright' and 'Fair Recompense' in contrast sound a bit boring. It's probably time that those of us who recognise that copyright can be part of the solution start expressing ourselves in terms of creativity and freedom too - freedom to earn a living from writing, freedom to insist on the integrity of one's work, on the paternity to be recognised...We also need to make people more aware that as writers we don't need just the raw materials of creativity (including access to the work of past creators) but also income. Which isn't of course to say that current copyright legislation doesn't need to adapt to the age of the Internet - of course it does...
See also the webcast of The Copyright Debate: Fair Trade or Foul Play, chaired by John Humphrys.
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