Intellectual property in the developing world is a complicated beast. We hail from the country that produces the world’s largest share of copyrighted material. The old ways have been very good to us, so it’s no wonder why we’re leading the charge in finding a way to transfer our old business models and enforcement to new hardware that would be stripped of all its novelty for this transfer to work. This issue is becoming even more complicated by recent attempts to close the digital divide. Efforts to create wider broadband availability for the developing world have opened new markets for our digital products, but it has also made it possible for more people in the developing world to pirate IP. As we have discussed in class, there is little incentive for foreign governments to use limited resources to stop these practices. Emerging super powers like China, Brazil and India are beginning to succumb to the pressure to adopt World Trade Organization standards. This is both because they want to improve relations with the West, but their own media industries are growing large enough that they too have a vested interest in IP enforcement. For my final paper, I would like to evaluate international copyright, with an emphasis on the international relations based around enforcement in the developing world.

I think one of the most interesting features to look at for this project will be the difference between China and other emerging powers. Brazil is one of the largest exporters of soap operas in the world. India has the world-famous Baliwood. China has had great success with its martial arts films with a niche audience in the United States, but China also still has a highly restrictive media environment, especially after the recent crack-down on anyone they deemed a dissenting voice. Researching the difference between China’s rhetoric and that of other developing media producers should be interesting.

Lastly, I would like to look at the media environments in places where American media companies dump their content, meaning they sell it dirt cheap to foreign markets. I know the practice destroys emerging producers by selling at a price they can’t compete with, and the WTO is trying to prevent subsidies from creating competition for Hollywood. It also means there is more demand for their product in places that can’t afford them, bolstering pirates’ business as well.

America’s position in the world has become rather ambiguous. As countries begin to challenge our media hegemony, we will see shifts in our rhetoric and that of the countries that become dominant players, and I would like to research and predict those changes.

Network effects, collective-user value driven websites, and other Web 2.0 initiatives have today, brought us to a place where tasks traditionally performed by an employee or professional is outsourced to a group of users, usually a network of amateurs. For example, WordPress’ engine operates in an open source format that allows users to modify, reorganize, and basically create everything from scratch while still benefiting from the structure. The virtual gaming world, Second Life, also uses the model of mass-collaboration. Statistics suggest that it produces less than one-percent of its own content and instead, allows users to script and customize their experiences themselves [i]. It seems evident that as boundaries become less limiting, and technology becomes more accessible, content production will become the responsibility of external users and resources.

My final paper will treat this topic from a Copyright Law standpoint, where this trend raises some crucial questions.  Firstly, a copyright allocates ownership to an individual, a group of individuals or a company. By doing so, it allows the controlling party to monetize the work. Crowd sourcing does not establish ownership, most systems allow users to continuously edit and improve works without pinpointing its owner. Naturally, many crowd sourced projects work without offering any financial incentives to the contributors. In spite of this, open-source is very much a reality today and is utilized by operating systems such Linux, online knowledge bases such as Wikipedia, mutual funds like Marketocracy and even a motorcycle, Lifan. Video conglomerate, YouTube, instead of purchasing a massive library of videos, went ahead and made it easy for users to upload, share, rate and comment on video clips. Today, there are over hundred million videos viewed everyday.

Analyzing further, copyright law has led to the creation of monetization systems we take for granted. Apart providing a right to sell works, copyright law basically allows owners to set the price of their works and decide the income-split percentages amongst themselves. Essentially, we have arrived at a major gap: While users are becoming more and more accustomed to being a part of the creation process, orthodox copyright understandings are still prevalent. As a result, many media industries seem to be disconnected from their consumers. For example, the record industry’s current position could arguably be a result of this orthodox understanding. While users have include the idea of sharing music through P2P networks and social networks as a part of the overall consumption process, record labels still try and sell CDs for $9.99, or digital downloads for a fixed priced of $0.99 – $1.50.

My paper will, while relying mostly on academic sources, analyze the impact of this gap between copyright induced pricing structures and changing consumption patterns on media industries. This kind of analysis requires a comprehensive understanding of the current copyright law, and my paper will cite not just the actual law, but also examples from court cases related to file-sharing, remix, and mash-ups. Furthermore, since many media industries are struggling to arrive at a sustainable method of monetizing their content, my paper will, by citing successful and unsuccessful business models, hypothesize on possible pricing strategies that could satisfy both traditional copyright understanding and the constant desire of consumers to be a part of the creation process.

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[i] “Crowdsourcing: Riding the Wave of Mass Collaboration.” EMarketer (2008). Print.

“To every cow belongs her calf, therefore to every book belongs its copy”- King Diarmait Mac Cerbhaill ¹

For the final paper, I plan on writing about the evolution of copyright, mainly the history of copyright in the United States. I will discuss some of the early copyright systems (some which were not discussed in class) and how we got to where we are today. I will also discuss the challenges of copyright in the future and how the changing technologies of today are forcing copyright laws to change.

People have been creating literature and art work since the earliest times of the earth (cavemen drew tons of pictures on the walls). My paper will go across the pond over to Europe and look at early forms of copyright. Early on, copyright was based off of moral rights and privileges that authors were believed to be owed for their work.  Copyright started to bloom in its earliest forms in 15^th century Europe, around the same time the printing press was invented. As the number of presses grew, authorities sought to control the publication of books by granting printers a near monopoly on publishing in England. Governments established controls over printers across Europe, requiring them to have official licenses to trade and produce books. The licenses typically gave printers the exclusive right to print particular works for a fixed period of years, and enabled the printer to prevent others from printing the same work during that period.² During the time, legislation such as the 1545 decree of the council of 10, the Licensing Act of 1662, and the Statue of Ann become some of the first copyright legislations enacted.

The early years of copyright in the U.S were similar in development to those of Europe. The two largest similarities were a copyright act based off the Statute of Ann and a high court addressing the question whether or not a natural, common law survived the statute. Unlike Europe however, writers, not booksellers, drove the development of American copyright law. Early controversies in copyright laws were dominated by local and national power; who would enforce copyright. By 1786, 12 of the 13 states (Delaware held out) had enacted copyright statues, all in the form of a comprehensive, general act. ³ The first federal copyright act was the Copyright Act of 1790, which was modeled almost word for word after the Statute of Ann. It granted copyright for a term of 14 years “from the time of recording the title thereof” with a right of renewal for another 14 years if the author survived to the end of the first term. The act covered not only books, but also maps and charts.

The 1790 act has been revised numerous times since its inauguration into the American legal system. Now almost every form of artwork; from music to dramatic works are covered under some form of copyright legislation. ⁴ The Copyright Office became a separate department of the Library of Congress in 1897, and began overseeing the registration and handling of copyrights. ⁵

From there, my paper will go into discussing the current standings on copyright law in the United States, including but not limited to term length, what is copyrightable, and penalties of infringement. The discussion will then shift to the future and how changing technologies are forcing people tor reanalyze copyright law and the direction it’s going in.

There is a lot of flexibility in the topic of my paper; depending of which direction I decide to go with it. The main focus however will be, as mentioned above, the development of U.S copyright law, starting with copyrights earliest forms in Europe and then jumping to the United States around the time of the printing press. From there, the development of copyright law to where we are today and where we are going in the future.

A recent blog post on Techdirt makes an interesting argument about the mentality of entertainment industries when bringing up Hulu. Hulu has been in a struggle with its corporate parents, television companies who view Hulu as a threat mainly because of how successful a service it has become. Entertainment businesses trying to cripple similar services, such as Spotify and Netflix, in order to protect their offerings has already become an established pattern of behavior. The problem argued in this blog post is that these new services are viewed as threats to entertainment companies, when really they should be viewed as “golden geese,” because they help to popularize the content these entertainment businesses are distributing. But if these services provide such an obvious potential for commercial benefit, why do entertainment companies still feel threatened?

The simple answer given in the post is that the entertainment industry likes control. Interestingly, the post continues to explain that in order to accept the coexistence of these services, the entertainment business will first have to reconcile the fact that they are losing control. The entertainment business currently functions as a “gatekeeper”; the problem with this is that this mentality isolates the business when collaboration could be especially fruitful. The opposite of this mentality, described in this post as the “enabler”, sees these services as an important commercial opportunity, a “path to route around your gate.” Because these companies must forfeit a certain amount of control over their field, they naturally see enabling these services to coexist as a limitation or way of shutting down.

However, it is important that these services are able to give back to the entertainment businesses, which Spotify, Hulu, and Netflix are all able to do because they are legal and must follow contracts. But this post also insinuates that illegal methods of “enabling” are just as important to the process of breaking down gates. Either way, “the gates are no longer needed and the fences are down.” This last part is a little hard to buy. I can see how Hulu and Netflix can work because they are required to function within a set of rules; it’s these rules that limit people’s access so that they make the decision to continue supporting entertainment businesses. If we were to support the type of illegal services this blog post describes, would the entertainment businesses still be able to survive? Sure, it would be nice to have no gates, but these gates do have a function; the entertainment businesses are concerned for a legitimate reason, which is earning money after these services help popularize their works.

In 2004, Joe Satriani released his album Is There Love in Space? on Epic Records in the United States. While, guitar music aficionados warmly received the album, it did not do very well on the Billboard charts where it debuted on the eightieth spot. The song has however, received a lot of attention recently but not for entirely positive reasons. Satriani alleged that the pop-rock outfit, Coldplay, had infringed upon one of the tracks on his album, “If I could fly” with their work “Viva la Vida”. Understandably, Satriani’s allegations come as a severe blow to the band’s otherwise pristine reputation.

Issues of Access and “Subconscious Copying”

Satriani’s album, Is there love in space?, was released globally and definitely in the UK where Coldplay is from. Additionally, being active participants of the international music marketplace, the band members must surely know about Joe Satriani who has himself been nominated for multiple Grammy Awards. Satriani has also toured with Deep Purple and Mick Jagger, both of whom are British artists with a massive global appeal[i].  While there is no evidence of there absolute access, it is not unreasonable to assume that Coldplay had heard the complainant’s track before composing “Viva la Vida”.

The importance of access was substantiated in Bright Tunes v Harrisongs, where the district court, after establishing access, found the defendant liable for “subconscious copying”[ii]. Hypothetically, this could have been the case for Coldplay too. While composing the song, their subconscious might have known that the combination between the melody and the harmony had worked before.  Additionally, in the Bright Tunes case, the district Judge cited basic functional musical elements and found the defendant liable. Under this light, Satriani’s case seems like a strong one.

However, the whole concept of subconscious copying seems questionable and incongruent with the intentions of the United States Copyright Law. For one, subconscious copying comes dangerously close to the concept of a work being called an infringer for stealing an idea. Arguably, this thought is flawed because the law does not protect ideas and claiming such an infringement would be unusual and most probably not comprehensive.

I am interested in knowing the class’s thoughts on the idea of “subconscious copying”.

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[i] Satch Is Back!. BBC. 21 June 2006. Web. 13 Dec. 2010. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/content/articles/2006/06/09/joe_satriani_interview_feature.shtml>.

[ii] Bright Tunes v Harrisongs. United States District Court for the Souther District of New York. 1976. Web. 9 Dec. 2010.

Mike Masnick’s blog post , titled “Who Owns the Copyright on a Tattoo?” recently caught my attention. The blog itself was merely posted as a medium for discussion, as Masnick quotes two questions in regard to the subject. The first question in particular reads, “My question is this, if a tattoo artist creates a unique design for a client, then this is tattooed on to the aforementioned client, does the tattoo artist still own any intellectual property rights (namely copyright) over this piece of art?” As far as I can tell, there are a handful of factors to consider when attempting to address this question.

For one, tattoo artists are in effect,  commissioned artists. However, for most, if not all commissioned works, the artist and the client enter into a contractual agreement. From what I’ve learned about license agreements, the artist still maintains all right of the piece of work, but the client can exploit the work for an arranged term and region of usage, give or take some restrictions. Tattoos operate under a different model; having a tattoo myself, I have no recollection of signing an agreement to exploit the finished product.

Also, tattoo artists base their businesses on referrals and reputation. At tattoo conventions, for example, tattoo artists not only exhibit their work on flashes (compilations of generic tattoo images) or by tattooing patrons of the convention, they also gain exposure through previous clientele’s work. More often than not, photographers go around and capture images of random people and their tattoos to feature in magazines and blogs. As much as tattoos serve as an individual’s form of self expression, they also basically serve as a billboard for the artist’s talent. To that extent, I can see how Matthew Reed may have wanted to back up his lawsuit against basketball player Rasheed Wallace.

I think this is a very interesting topic of discussion, and I have to agree with Masnick’s comment that it would have been helpful to have had a legal ruling of the case against Wallace rather than a settlement. What do you guys think?

Just like all other technologies, books are in danger of becoming extinct thanks to the Internet.  Books are expensive, they are heavy, and while some people read them multiple times, for many they are purchased for a one-time use. They can be borrowed from the library for short periods of time.  They can be stolen, physical and if one wanted, digitally.

Google Books has decided to totally disrupt this system. In 2002, Google began the process of scanning public domain books into its search engine. For a small fee, anyone could view these works. But the process has not gone smoothly for Google. Since day one, Google Book has faced multiple lawsuits from various entities.  Judges have argued that Google does not have the right to take work that is public and begin charging a fee for it. Google has made various attempts to find copyright holders and pay royalties when necessary.

Google’s logic for creating Google Books is to give the world access to literature they might not otherwise be able to. This could be for a variety of reasons, whether it be money or because the book is out of print, or the copyright is lost.  Personally, I disagree with all of this. While there should be a motivating factor to locate copyright holders for orphaned works, this is not the way to do it. Google claims they want to give every access to these literary works. If someone can’t spend $10 on a book, how could they afford a computer with Internet? In addition, I do not think Google has the right to charge for access to these works.  Google plans to continue expanding its digital library. Dou you think Google has the right to do this? Do you think they have the right to charge for it?

Source:

http://www.kansascity.com/2011/04/13/2797087/future-of-google-digital-library.html

As we all know, the music industry and record labels are, to put it lightly, in somewhat dire circumstances.  Their profits have fallen since the 80′s/early 90′s and their policies are messy, confusing, and hard to maintain for the artist.  The “single” has significantly lost value, and piracy is at an all time high.  My question is as follows: can the copyright Czar, approved by the Bush administration and supported by the Obama administration, help to sort out the difficulties that the record labels and music business as a whole face?  Can the nation’s first copyright Czar, Victoria A. Espinel, actually sort out our copyright issues?

Well, what has she done so far?  She has gained much approval and support due to her association with the MPAA, the Copyright Alliance, and the United States Chamber of Commerce.  And in 2010, she issued the Joint Strategic Plan, which is proposed to help combat Intellectual Property theft.  The plan was introduced to provide a general idea of the following: to make sure that people do not illegally use copyrighted material, to enforce the law and penalties for such use, to enforce Intellectual Property rights, to aide in the safety of supply chains, to push industries to work together to stop illegal file sharing over the internet, and to make sure purchases are made with knowledgable insight.

In an economy that strives off of creativity and originality, I would hope that such a plan will point the music industry in the right direction, but one can only hope.  So I ask you what you think will happen?  Will this plan affect the music industry in a heavy way, or will it just be another pointless attempt to stop copyright infringement?  I personally hope something changes or else the pattern of artists becoming reliant on branding and product placement will increase, and the the record label as a whole might cease to exist.

(Sources)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/11/15/us-obama-idUSTRE4AD0KX20081115

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Espinel