An interesting and articulate piece regarding the real world impacts of copyright on “remix” creators was recently posted. The talk was given in Portland in January by Andy Baio, a writer and coder who had some particularly interesting experiences involving litigation initiated by the photographer Steven Meisel. All of which relates directly to one of the key questions in the course – whether even reforming fair dealing/use would be enough or whether something akin to a “Right to Create” needs to be established?
Still, the Torment crowd-funding record is sure to be short lived, especially if the game is a commercial success. In that case, both developers and crowd-funders are likely to jump in with even deeper commitments to other large-scale games in development.
Promised in our last class to do an index to the Resources section of this site. It is now up and reachable through the main tab on the far right – now renamed “Resources (Index)”. Below that tab other tabs open up which contain the content referenced. Gradually over time, will try to add comments adding context to each resource and explain their relevance to the course.
Among the new posts in Resources is the Ai Weiwei Gangham Style video referenced during the class (under the “International” subtab).
Finally and importantly, Prof. William Fisher’s Copyright Spring 2013: Event 4 on Appropriation Art which took place a few hours after our last class took up one of our key conversations almost where we left off. In particular the points made (especially by Ken) relating to the nature of creative works built on previous works. The Appropriation Art event focused in particular on the well known example of Shepard Fairey’s Obama “Hope” poster lawsuit with AP. It wrestles with challenging aspects of copyright law and frequently harkens to many of the themes of our course.
Video is under Resources – Copyright & IP. Also below for additional convenience:
Our terrific camera-person Saeed suggested that some in the class might be interested in attending Digi BC’s free “State of the Video Game Industry Town Hall – Part 2: The Future” on April 16 @ 6 P.M. at The Hive. Details in the link below: Digital Media News & Events from DigiBC.
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