I think the worst part about this whole copyright law situation is the time period allowed to keep a copyright. You get 70 years after your death and I think that’s too long. I’m pretty sure everyone in the world knows the “Happy Birthday” song and somehow that is still copyrighted. So, someone out there is making money every time that song is referenced or used in any capacity. Umm, who else thinks that is ridiculous besides me? Do you feel like it’s only a matter of time before people stop making films or creating TV shows because they are afraid of being sued for copyright infringement? I definitely feel that way but I’d love to hear what your take is on the situation. Do you think the fair use act we have today is actually fair? If your answer is no, what do you think needs to change in order to make things fair?
Friday, February 6, 2009
Is fair use ACTUALLY fair??
The answer to that question is quite simply, NO. Copyright laws are hurting the human need for creating works of art that stimulate one’s imagination. I was reading the comic book that Jennifer Jenkins and her colleagues wrote about intellectual property and I just don’t think it’s right or fair for someone to sabotage a perfectly good scene of a documentary and request money because a 4 ½ second clip of “The Simpsons” happened to be on the television where they were filming the scene. I think I can semi-understand if the director intentionally showed a clip of the show for the scene, but that’s not what happened. So, instead of being able to freely create and imagine new things and new viewpoints, Americans are forced to cut scenes because of unintentional slip-ups. In my opinion, that is just ludicrous! Do Americans need to stop and think about everything they do or say to prevent possibly being hit up for money? Do you think it’s fair that for saying phrases like “Everybody Dance Now” in a scene could wind up costing you $5,000 dollars? Okay, I understand that’s a song but come on…that is such a basic statement that I think it should be considered fair use! Right?!?!? The actor did not break out in a dance or sing the lyrics to the song at the top of his lungs. He simply stated a phrase that wound up costing a lot of money to keep the scene in the documentary (which they ultimately decided to cut because of cost issues).
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Although I agree that some copyrights are ridiculous, such as the Happy Birthday song, but I don't think people will stop making film or creating shows because of copyright infringement. Protecting your own ideas and ensuring that you get credit for what you put your hard work into is also something Americans love. I think this just proves that some of our laws are outdated, but I don't think we can just throw them out the window.
ReplyDeleteI think that while some situations are ridiculous, like the Happy Birthday song example, copyrights are important incentives for creativity and I really doubt people will just stop making shows or films altogether as you've suggested. There are always problems with systems like this, and we tend to hear more about these problems than situations where the system has worked. It's just a fact that people will always try to work the system - and the Happy Birthday people did it pretty well. But I agree with Saba - I think the bigger issue is that these laws are outdated, not that they are useless and ridiculous to begin with.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the problem with many of these laws is the fact that they are attempts to address a constantly evolving situation, and are perpetually one step behind. One such instance is that of "sampling" in hip hop. When it first began, artists were at a loss as to how to protect their music from the practice, or at least to find a way to get some type of compensation. However, once a system was set up by which rappers had to get clearance in order to sample records, they began to find ways to reproduce the original sound with synthesizers, altering the original just enough to avoid paying the original artist. Until we are able to anticipate some of these problems, many of the copyright laws will be a poor fit for the situation on the ground.
ReplyDeleteAnother question is how can anticipate these problems? It always seems that we are one step (and for some people, several hundreds of steps) behind the latest technological/internet phenomenon. Constantly pushing the limits is the norm and this is exactly the problem, there are no defined limits and ncredibly intelligent people keep pushing the boundaries. When is an innovation helping us progress and when is an innovation abusing our rights, for example, Google Latitude. You can find where anyone is at any time. Stalker friendly much?
ReplyDeleteI agree that it is ridiculous to keep a copyright 70 years after your death. While you are alive, I definitely think you have the right to a copyright for your own intellectual properties. However, I think the laws over copyrights after your die should be altered. Isn't the point of a copyright to allow YOU to benefit from your intellectual property? But yet you can pass the copyright laws down to someone in your will? That doesn't make much sense to me. I think that somehow these laws need to be altered, like changing the period you are allowed to keep a copyright to 10-20 years after your death.
ReplyDeleteI am interested to know if other countries are as hardcore on copyright laws as the U.S. is. To me, it seems to be an American mentality to sue anyone you can for as much as possible.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the fact that the current copyright law are not as flexible as they should be in today's dynamic society. For example, YouTube-ers infringe on copyright law everyday as they make their home-made videos with assorted movie clips and songs. There have been a handful of singers who have been discovered on YouTube, who just sit in front of their computer and sing along to other people's songs. For example, Esmee Denters is a singer from the Netherlands who was discovered by Justin Timberlake because she was great at singing other people's songs (Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston, etc). She now tours with him and got a record deal yet she isn't being sued for stealing others' songs. Copyright laws are inconsistent with modern technology, theory, and practice so the idea of 'fair use' should definitely be reevaluated.
I think the biggest issue with copyright law right now is the duration of a copyright. 70+ years of copyright protection is a very long time to have exclusive rights to something. That being said, it is a very difficult balance to strike. The 'author' of a work certainly deserves fair compensation for their idea, but it's hard to say how long they deserve to own that idea. I'm not even sure that a specific time period is an adequate way to determine copyright length. Some intellectual properties have gone many years before they generate any sizeable revenue for the author. Would it be fair if someone's work made them very little money while it was copyrighted, then became a gold mine after the copyright expired?
ReplyDeleteCopyright Law is certainly not a problem. Creative expression is a freedom garaunteed to the American people. You would be hard-pressed to find laws in many countries that allow anyone other than the government to profit from an original work. Such is the point of capitalism. Moreover, in my opinion, fair use certainly is fair. The ability to create exceptions that allow people to legally, and without cost, use someone else's work only spurns more creative progress. These exceptions must be carved out so that copyrighted materials can be used for educational, research, and other academic purposes. It only makes sense to have copyright laws. If we didn't there would be very little incentive to push the envelope and the progress of our country would cease to move with the rest of the modern world.
ReplyDeleteThe 70+ year protection clause seems a bit excessive, especially because the intent of the law is to protect the work's creator so he or she can benefit from their labor. The law was not written to provide an umbrella of protection for spouses, children or future generations. However, I think it is also important to examine another reason for copyright law- to spur innovation. The extended period of copyright protection spurs innovation because consumers cannot rely on the free and unregulated use of previously made material. It's a silly example, but if the Happy Birthday song didn't have copyright protection, you would get the same unoriginal song at every birthday dinner. Applied to other expressions of art, the strong copyright protection is a catalyst for new creative works.
ReplyDeleteI believe that the 4.5 second clip from The Simpsons shown on a tv show can be charged to that director. When I watch tv shows I don't only look at what the actors are doing, but many times I am scanning over the background. And if there is a tv in the scene, I get curious as to what they are "airing" on tv inside the show...basically what did the director pick to show going on in the background of his scene. For example, on the show "Pimp my Ride", I watch to see what they are displaying on the new monitors that they installed to the person's car. Usually it is a music video of Xzibit, who is the host of the show. I know sometimes it can be annoying to have to be careful what you are airing on a tv during another tv show, but many people do notice.
ReplyDeleteI like what JL said above about copyright protection spurring new development. I hadn't really thought about it that was, but protection of intellectual property definitely does encourage originality in two ways. In addition to promoting monetary incentives to produce, it increases the variety of creativity by forcing innovation.
ReplyDeleteI disagree that fair use is not fair. I feel that the main use for the fair use law comes in education. If we had to pay for every single item that we are required to read, all of society would be hurt because there would be a lot fewer people obtaining educations. I also believe that a lot of fair use material is so common in today's education system that if it would be used illegally even if were not legal to use it freely.
ReplyDeleteThe Happy Birthday remains a good example of Fair Use issues. Companies avoid becoming household names, focusing on their products remaining as nouns, not adjectives. Some pieces of information become cultural statements. Why hasn't the Happy Birthday song become one? In foreign language courses, that is one of the first few songs you learn in their languages, but why must ours be owned when it is now a piece of culture? I do agree that for some items, seventy years post mortem is excessive, but yet, how do we draw the line? I'm not sure it's that easy.
ReplyDeleteI know that 70 years seems like an extremely long period of time, but we are just hitting our 20's...so what do we know about age! Imagine if you created something brilliant and in a few years someone else could claim it.
ReplyDeleteThink about the 4 factors of fair use: 1)the purpose and character of the use 2)the nature of the copyrighted work 3)the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole and 4)the effect of the use upon the potential market or value.
These factors allow people to still create great works, but force originality and expansion off current copyrighted work.
Reviewing the 4 factors of fair use is the core of the issues we are discussing. They can be applied to almost any scenario. I think that if a person's actions are genuinely for the good of the community then fair use should not be an issue. For example, the text talks about how professors must go about using copyright material in their classrooms. In almost every case I can imagine, the four factors are for the good of the community and a positive impact on students. As long as the professor gives credit where it is due, there should be no problem. Using the materials probably increases the market value of them because they are in front of more eyes. I argue that fair use principles are necessary, but must be adapted for individual scenarios.
ReplyDeleteJust wanted to say thanks to everyone who has made comments for my blog posting. Y'all have made some excellent points and I have enjoyed reading them. I was trying to choose something controversial so I am glad that I stirred up a conversation. I want you all to know that the view I gave is clearly one-sided and I was not necessarily hating on the copyright laws. For the most part, I agree that we should have them, but I disagree with some of the stipulations of the laws (like how long you can the copyright after you die, for example).
ReplyDeleteAman, I really like where you were going with the hip-hop music thought. Artists definitely are using synthesizers or changing up a beat or two to change a sound so they don't have to pay the original artist and I am not sure that's fair. Sometimes I think the remixes are great (like how Kanye West used a sample from Daft Punk for his song "Stronger") and others do not necessarily sound great but they are memorable. For example when Vanilla Ice ripped off Queen and David Bowie's "Under Pressure" beat. I am not sure if Vanilla Ice ever ended up paying them off for agreeing not to sue, but either way it's definitely sampling gone wrong haha. Overall, I just feel like the music industry needs to have much stronger stipulations against illegally using someone else's music. However, I am not sure how they can actually regulate it. I mean how can you really determine if someone is sampling your music without your consent if the name of the song is changed or there is a note missing or added to make it sound different? There's no precise rules and I think that's the problem because it gives artists too much of a leeway to use what they want without having any consequences.
I think that we’re lucky to have the fair use doctrine as a part our set of intellectual property laws. However, the fair use laws in effect today are so vague and outdated that they do the system no justice whatsoever. I understand why it’s difficult to set laws about how long a clip can be or how much of a photograph can be altered before it’s considered a fair use, but there has to be a better way than letting a judge decide on a case-by-case basis. The point of the concept of fair use existing at all is to protect copyrighted works and their valuable access to the public simultaneously. But if you don’t know if your use is a legal fair use, you’ll likely be deterred from trying out of fear of facing/losing prosecution, thus undermining the point of fair use access in the first place. There need to be set rules (i.e. you can use ANYTHING in a classroom setting as long as you don’t distribute hard copies or you can’t ever use more than 1/5 of a song’s lyrics or music) so that people will feel free to use content fairly without being afraid of prosecution.
ReplyDeleteLike many students have summed up in their responses, I have to say that I think copyright laws are very important and necessary in the world we live in today. Yes, the lifetime + 70 years rule may seem a bit excessive (as Jon stated earlier), but I think there are perfectly good examples that can back up the legitimacy and necessity of these legalities. For instance, when Elvis Presley died, it was only fair for his estate and the rights to everything that made him famous be inherited by his daughter. Even though he is dead, his legend and the copyright laws protecting his creations should be shielded. So yes, if I had a copyright on a scribble in my notebook, I think life + 70 years would be excessive. But these stipulations must apply evenly to all scenarios.
ReplyDelete"Do you feel like it’s only a matter of time before people stop making films or creating TV shows because they are afraid of being sued for copyright infringement? "
ReplyDelete-->I do not feel like production will cease ever. Even with the writer's strike, there came an overhaul of non-scripted reality television shows and games. I do feel that the law does tighten the parameters of production, but if you feel that the film will be a hit then paying a nominal fee in comparison to the films net gross may be a great investment, especially if it adds a certain element that the audience may find appealing, whether through relatedness or through some aspect widely recognized and accepted. I will say that this can hurt independent film projects and low budget productions, but at the same time film is a craft. And with arts, skills, and crafts, creativity matters greatly and though some obvious things that could be added bonuses may need to be omitted, the pressure for different levels of thinking and creativity will undoubtedly yield valuable work (at least in theory!).
"Do you think the fair use act we have today is actually fair? If your answer is no, what do you think needs to change in order to make things fair?"
--> I think 70 years after death is a little excessive. Do creators really need to pay the college tuition of 5 of the original creator's succeeding generations?
I think its hard to determine if something is fair or isn't fair because no matter how strict you make it someone isn't going to be happy. If you don't make it strict then the creators of these pieces won't be happy. I think copyright law has done a great job in the past to keep everything fair and allowing it to be used for certain things like education etc. is an legit reason. Talked about in another post that I strongly agreed with is that sometimes many creators wouldn't care if in many years someone used it to make something even greater and more beneficial. How could a better copy right law be enforced to make both the creator and society happy?
ReplyDeleteProduction of TV shows, films and other media outlets will never cease. The structure of such industries will evolve, just as other industries; however, it is ridiculous to think such industries will become obsolete. Copyrighted material that is necessary for the overall quality of the media is worth a small fee. There may be some industries hurt, such as the abovementioned effects on independent films; however, limitations could be loosened to incorporate such cases. Creativity will never cease and while the creators deserve credit for their works, it is important to remember that creative work initiates further creativity. It is incomprehensible to imagine where we would be without many past creative efforts. Movies would not be what they are today if techniques invented by early producers were not available for further mastery. Fair use is important to protect the original creators; however such tight regulations run the risk of limiting future creativity.
ReplyDeleteI agree that companies seem to get a little ridiculous especially in the example given. Unintentional slip-ups should not be prosecuted, but unfortunately there is always going to be someone to ruin it for everyone. If we allow these small slip-ups someone is going to try to push the limit, and it isn't fair for the creator.
ReplyDelete