Digital Technology Manifesto

I think most people would agree that a substantial amount of music, movies, and other consumer materials (programs, writings, etc.) is downloaded and uploaded via the internet freely with no regard for the actual laws that govern such practices. It doesn’t surprise me at all that this happens so often.  I grew up doing it like this, and I find myself surprised when I come across someone who doesn’t. I believe the problem is that the law is too easy to break, and too hard to enforce.  When massive amounts of people are breaking the law it becomes too much for law enforcement to deal with.

Digital technology has enabled communication on a completely new level. Information of all kinds of forms is available at everyone’s fingertips. The controversy, however, lies in original content and how it is distributed, paid for, and licensed in this new environment. Before the digital era, managing copyrighted material and its usage was fairly easy. Now that reproduction and distribution of digital content can be done in seconds by anyone with a computer, the system needs to be seriously adapted, if not changed entirely. As myself a creator of original works, I believe that credit should be given where credit is due. I would also ideally like to see a legal and/or corporate system to govern this that is not so heavily influenced by money. This lecture given by Lawrence Lessig at the iCommons Summit in Sapporo, Japan on July 30, 2008 explains the need for some kind of changed system to be in place in the new public digital world.

I believe the easiest way to start this process would be to build upon the old system at least partially.  It is still important for original work to be protected in certain regards. If we are serious about this though, we are going to have to make more significant changes.  Say a musician wants his music to be heard his fans and not used for corporate gain. What if we gave original creators the power to decide how the law applies to their own works? This is where I believe that the Creative Commons organization discussed in the video has the right idea. As an artist, writer, etc. with Creative Commons you decide how others are allowed to use, copy, edit, or distribute your work. An important key is that the license information you provide also travels with the content.  As everything is digital, the artist need only display a logo and a link to the full license information somewhere near their music, pictures or videos.  Since this is only a step in the right direction, more changes will have to be made for this issue to be completely diffused.

The current laws that govern “fair use” of original ideas are helpful as guidelines but really have no function to draw a line that designates lawful from unlawful.  I’m sure anyone can think of plenty of ways that someone can “use” digital content.  The actual wording includes several examples: criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.  It then goes on to explain that there are pretty much unlimited ways to interpret the law.  I think this is bogus, and it’s not resolving any of the issues related.  “Fair use” should be specific to the content, and it should be whatever the creator says it is.

In accordance with my personal opinions on this issue:

• I will respect any rules or laws governing original content that I believe to be successfully adapting to the public digital world.

• I will employ these same rules or laws to govern my own original content when I release it into the public digital world.

• I will encourage any ideas that might be helpful to adapting the rules and laws that govern attribution and licensing in the public digital world.

-          Sam Schieffelin