One of the recommended but not required books for this course is Bound by Law, a graphic novel that deals with copyright law. If you haven't read this yet, I strongly urge you to do so soon. Why? Because copyright law is central to your video projects.
In the introductory videos that people posted on the YouTube channel, a couple of people added soundtracks to their videos. You get bonus points for creativity but the music was copyrighted. That means that someone (the songwriter, the singer, or more likely, the company that bought the rights to that music) owns that song. You cannot use it unless you pay them for the right to use it. Period.
Have you noticed how videos sometimes disappear off of YouTube? Many times, this is because the copyright holder has requested (or, demanded) that YouTube remove the video for "copyright violation."
This also applies to images. Think that you want to add an image that you grabbed off the web to your video? Think again. Most likely, that image is copyrighted.
Now, I'm guessing most everyone has "ripped" music - that is, downloaded it without paying for it. That's called "piracy" and, yes indeed, it's illegal.
So, on the one side, we have people who are arguing for "copyright enforcement" (no stealing!) and on the other side we have people who are saying, "but it's on the Internet and we can download it, it should be free!" (pirates!).
That's where "creative commons" comes in. This is the creation of Larry Lessig, a law professor and scholar on copyright among other things, who argues that we need a commonsense approach to copyright law. I'll talk more about creative commons in another post. For now, watch this brief talk by Lessig (19 minutes or so), about copyright:
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
It was interesting to hear Larry Lessig’s insight on what he has named “Remix culture”, the taking and recreating of content which (importantly noted) is NOT piracy.
I also agree with his statement that the young generation rejects the notion of what copyrighting is supposed to do, and believes the law is to be ignored and fought at every opportunity. I know many people (including myself) who have, for lack of a better word, pirated songs from Napster, downloaded new release movies, etc.
I thought it was extremely insightful when he mentioned that technique has been democratized – that anyone who has access to a computer can create spoofs such as the re-editing of the anime show, the Jesus Christ musical, and the “Endless Love” between former President Bush and former Prime Minister Tony Blair. However, although these spoofs are in good (?) fun, one must wonder what kind of statement these videos trying to make?
Lessig says that the tools of creativity have become tools of speech – how kids think, what they speak, and essentially, what kids are. To call this the “literacy of this generation” is a bold statement, but one which rings very true.
it just superb information and like your blog.
- Hire Dedicated Resources
Post a Comment