Contemporary Copyright Theory

Including its effects on society and the economy.

• Lawrence Lessig professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of the Creative Commons
  • How the Law Is Strangling Creativity (video)
  • Wall Street Journal Op-Ed Piece (a must read!)
  • A review of Lessig's 2008 Auckland talk
  • Lawrence Lessig's book "Remix - Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy"
• Against Intellectual Monopoly by noted economists by Michele Boldrin and David K. Levine (book link)
• Cory Doctorow
• Richard Stallman Essays
• The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind by James Boyle, Professor of Law at Duke Law School
• Michael Geist
• Jonathan Zittrain's The Future of the Internet--And How to Stop It

Think this list could do with improvement? Contact Us and suggest a link.

Free Speech and Art harmed by extremist Copyright

• Illegal Art.Net famous for their Deconstructing Beck album. Here's an an interview with the founder.
• Apple Confuses Free Speech With Copyright Infringement.
• The Church of Scientology Fights Critics with 4000 copyright infringement requests. What was copied? Quotes from "their bible" .
• Should some numbers be owned? Should copying owned numbers be illegal? In 2001, researcher Phil Carmody made a discovery: a 1811 digit prime number that was allegedly illegal in America. There are yet more Illegal Numbers.
• Allegedly Illegal Artwork based on DVD decrypting.
• Chilling Effects: Copyright Takedown Archive

Alternatives to 'All Rights Reserved'

While negotiating rights with a copyright holder is always possible a permission-based culture doesn't scale. Negotiating permissions can take weeks and involve contracts and licenses (not to mention expensive lawyers).

Instead, if you do wish to allow people to distribute or remix your art then you can license it in ways that encourage that. The Creative Commons is by far the most popular and be sure to check out their local chapter, Creative Commons New Zealand. They describe their goal as,

"Creative Commons aims to establish a fair middle way between the extremes of copyright control and the uncontrolled exploitation of intellectual property. It provides a range of copyright licenses, freely available for public use, which allow those creating intellectual property – including authors, artists, educators and scientists – to mark their work with the freedoms they want it to carry."

They've got point-n-click systems for licensing your music, video, and any art, and if you have any questions they'll be only too happy to help.

Others

• Free Documentation License
• GPL (for software)