Copyright or Copyleft?

Copyleft or Copyright?

In Rip a remix Manifesto by Brett Gaylor we get too look into the ever present problem of copyright in terms of digital media. We all know file sharing sites like napster that have been closed down or some sites like Newsleecher who are in legal disputes with TV studios and media companies. With more and more people choosing to watch TV shows online, even illegally downloading them using torrents, does it have a majorly damaging impact on the industry? In terms of music downloading will the artists suffer if we choose not to pay for their albums?

With thousands of mash up videos already existing on YouTube can moderators keep up and remove them all? Once removed you only have to look as far as YouTomb to find the videos that have been removed. It’s an MIT site that promotes creative freedom and believes that once something has entered the public domain it can be used by others as they wish. In terms of right and wrong we have a big grey area here to address.

In regards to the music industry most artists don’t make their money from album sales. They get a small fraction of it but the majority of the funds go to the record label that has either given them a loan to produce and album, or a deal where in their album sales and downloads go completely to the label. Artists make their money from touring and performing which is after all what they what they have always done. Is it wrong to illegally download an album? Personally I don’t know, but what I do know is that if I to pay for all the music I use on my radio show I would be flat broke. You can’t honestly tell me it costs near enough 8.00GBP to make a CD.

With people receiving massive fines and sometimes even prison sentences for illegal downloads you really have to wonder if THAT is right. Some organizations such as Creative Commons are trying to stop this from happening to people by issuing licences to sample. They have taken issue with ‘intellectual property’ (copyrighting of ideas) and are seen as a copyleft movement. I believe in creative freedom and find it a shame that the only legal defence some people have for using a piece of music in a movie or documentary is ‘fair use’. I also think that ‘intellectual property’ does more harm than good. How can you patent an idea? If money is the only reason you want to keep a certain idea from other people using it and possibly developing it and making it better, then you should be just as guilty as the people who are ‘ripping your idea off’. On this issue I stand with the copyleft movement. Where do you stand?