No subject

1) We should open up a discussion to establish some basic guidelines
of what we want to see out of fair use and the line over which we
don't think companies/organizations/institutions should cross. This'd
make not only our position clear, but act as a basis for action when
someone tries to shrink fair use further.

2) Eventually, it would be great if we made publicly available a list
of artists that Free Culture will take action to protect/retaliate for
if they are targeted. i.e. you mess with these folks, we're going to
mess with you.

Both of these seem like perfect issues to address on the second day of
the conference in October. Thoughts? Would people be interested in
that?

Best,
Tim

On Sun, Aug 10, 2008 at 6:53 PM, Brian Rowe <brian at freedomforip.org> wrote:
> I would support Students for Free Culture working actively to protect and
> expand fair use.  Fair use is the 1st amendment in the copyright act and
> should be a powerful tool for artist, innovators and those working in the
> public interest to utilize.  Internationally fair use is also becoming an
> interesting issue.  With Israel adopting fair use and Japan considering it
> we could be active in trying to expand its reach domestically and
> globally.
>
> On a related note:
>
> Mockingbirds are the true artists of the bird kingdom. Which is to say,
> although they're born with a song of their own, an innate riff that happens
> to be one of the most versatile of all ornithological expressions,
> mockingbirds aren't content to merely play the hand that is dealt them. Like
> all artists, they are out to rearrange reality. Innovative, willful, daring,
> not bound by the rules to which others may blindly adhere, the mockingbird
> collects snatches of birdsong from this tree and that field, appropriates
> them, places them in new and unexpected contexts, recreates the world from
> the world. For example, a mockingbird in South Carolina was heard to bend
> the songs of thirty-two different kinds of birds into a ten-minute
> performance, a virtuoso display that served no practical purpose, falling,
> therefore, into the realm of pure art.
>
> - Tom Robbins, Skinny Legs and All, 1990
>
> Having read that, can you honestly feel that the law ought to ban outright
> artists like Girl Talk and sound advice? We are strangling the innovative,
> willful, daring mockingbirds of our time.
>
> Posted originally by sarah davies at Civil Disobedient
>
> -Brian Rowe
>
> On Sun, Aug 10, 2008 at 6:11 PM, Raphael Krut-Landau <raffi at jhu.edu> wrote:
>>
>> I third that motion, and I found another New York Times item about
>> derivative music:
>>
>> http://measureformeasure.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/rip-off-artist/
>>
>> It's a personal reflection by a musician (Jeffrey Lewis) on his
>> discovery that many of his songs draw heavily, if unintentionally,
>> from other works.
>>
>> "Despite knowing all this, as a supposedly "creative" artist I am
>> often shocked to discover that a song I've written has been a blatant
>> unconscious rip-off of somebody else's song, either in its structure,
>> or lyrics, etc; if I'm lucky the other person's song is not
>> particularly popular or recognizable!"
>>
>> It has some lovely philosophical gestures that reminded me of Lessig's
>> old slideshow talk about copyleft:
>>
>> "All aspects of creativity are basically reconstituted bits and pieces
>> of things we've seen, heard and experienced, finely or not-so-finely
>> chopped and served in a form that hopefully blends the ingredients
>> into something 'new.' "
>>
>> Raffi
>>
>> On Sat, Aug 9, 2008 at 5:13 PM, Parker Higgins <parkerhiggins at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > And also, in case you missed it (I forget which mailing list I'm on sent
>> > it
>> > to me), there was that girltalk article in the NY Times just a few days
>> > ago:
>> >
>> >
>> > http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/07/arts/music/07girl.html?scp=1&sq=girl%20talk&st=cse&pagewanted=all
>> >
>> > I second the album being incredible...
>> >
>> > Parker
>> >
>> > On Sat, Aug 9, 2008 at 8:15 AM, FreeCulture.org - Students for Free
>> > Culture
>> > <webleader+rss-bot at freeculture.org> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Writes Frank Tobia on our blog:
>> >>
>> >> I've been listening to the [new Girl Talk album][1], and I must say
>> >> that
>> >> it is effing brilliant. For the uninitiated, [Girl Talk][2] is an
>> >> engineer-turned-artist named Gregg Gillis who creates music by remixing
>> >> samples of others' songs without getting permission first. If you
>> >> haven't heard his stuff, stop what you're doing right now and visit
>> >> [his
>> >> MySpace page][3] for a listen.
>> >>
>> >> Girl Talk is claiming his creations fall under [fair use][4], which
>> >> defines exceptions to the exclusivity of copyright. If he didn't invoke
>> >> fair use, creating his album would have been prohibitively expensive at
>> >> the very least. More likely, the barriers to entry would have kept him
>> >> from ever creating it in the first place. And let me tell you, that
>> >> would be a damn shame. As I probably don't have to remind everyone,
>> >> there's something wrong when this kind of creativity could be illegal.
>> >>
>> >> Fair use needs to protect creative artists, and it needs to protect
>> >> transformative works.  Law should take into account social norms and
>> >> the
>> >> public interest; if people find this type of art to be valuable, then
>> >> that should factor into related legal deliberations. Likewise, Students
>> >> for Free Culture should take a strong stand on fair use. We should
>> >> discuss what areas of fair use are important to advocate for. We should
>> >> think about raising hell if Girl Talk gets hit with a lawsuit.
>> >>
>> >> [![][5]][5]
>> >>
>> >>   [1]: http://74.124.198.47/illegal-
>> >> art.net/__girl__talk___feed__the__anima.ls___/
>> >>
>> >>   [2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girl_Talk_(musician)
>> >>
>> >>   [3]: http://www.myspace.com/girltalk
>> >>
>> >>   [4]: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
>> >>
>> >>   [5]: http://freeculture.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/fair-use.jpg
>> >>
>> >> URL: http://freeculture.org/blog/2008/08/09/girl-talk-and-fair-use/
>> >> _______________________________________________
>> >> Discuss mailing list
>> >> Discuss at freeculture.org
>> >> http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
>> > Discuss mailing list
>> > Discuss at freeculture.org
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>> >
>> >
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>
>
>
> --
> Brian Rowe
> Legal Intern
> Creative Commons
> brian at creativecommons.org
> (206) 335-8577 (Cell)
>
> Access To Justice Technology Principles
> www.ATJWeb.org
>
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