The Myth of Public Domain

The copyright act has been extended to 95 years. That means that anything created today will not hypothetically be in the public domain until the baby born today is dead. What culture is that child missing out on?
In the book Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig, he talks extensively of the public domain. If such a thing exists there is no easy way to find it. Eric Eldred strove to create an Internet site to bring the works of Nathanial Hawthorne alive for his daughters. His public site has become http://www.eldritchpress.org/ He ran into trouble when works that were meant to pass into the public domain didn’t, which means that he cannot legally add them to his archive.
I was struck that there is no list of copyright owners. This is amazing. How does one prove that they have the copyright at all? I’m reminded of another example in the book of Alex Alben, who wanted to create a documentary of all the movies that Clint Eastwood had ever been in interspersed with interview from Eastwood and those who knew and worked with him. To use the clips, he had to get permission from everyone in the clips. All told it took him and a team more than two years to get the rights to the clips.
I use this example, because to be able to legally use the copyrighted works of anyone, you have to get their permission. Sounds simple, but how do you find that copyright owner? There is no list! If you were able to find the copyright owner, there is no guarantee that is the current copyright owner.
I have found a few things on the Internet that in the public domain. Yet, there is no relevance to me. I mean, if I find a movie that was created in 1923, what would cause me to take the time to watch it? I think there has to be a unifying force that gives these works a central source. I mean for example, if you want to search the web, you go to Goggle. Can’t there be something similar for the public domain? Something to give these works a historical significance. Also, if I like that work, there should be a way to be connected to other works that are either similar or related. Where is the YouTube of the public domain?
I fear with most things, the laws have to be set for the lowest common denominator. Laws are not for those that work within the system, but those who would seek to exploit it. In Eldred v. Ashcroft, Eldred and Lessig attempted to get the Supreme Court to set a limit on copyright extensions. They failed by a margin of 7-2. According to Lessig because they attempted to give legal arguments instead of showing the court why it was important to release works into the public domain.
As I sit here listening to my public domain classical Internet web station, I can’t help but think how rewarding having those tunes have been to me over the semester. What works are kept from being restored and achieved because it is too expensive to avoid legal ramifications? What else am I missing?

Snow White as Creativity

In Paul Saffo’s article, “The Place of Originality in the Information Age, Saffo discusses technology and originality. How the machine has reproduced work with a precision and speed never before seen. Machines are taking us into an “age of infinite recall”

Human culture has been shaped by a dance of two opposing forces: memory and forgetfulness. Memory gives us context while forgetfulness provides an opening for invention and originality. Successful creativity occurs when the two are balanced and originality is set within the larger context of tradition.

In an age of infinite recall, any information can be traced back to its origin with machine like precision with paths of duplication diagrammed to perfection. According to Saffo, this is a myth, “origin is not a point but a continuum, and the process of originality is much more linked than we imagine.”

“Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” (1937) is Disney’s first full-length animated feature. It is hardly the first telling of this story. The Internet Movie Database (IMD.com) shows more than thirty separate examples of Snow White. Now some of these could just be the title, but they range from 1917 to 2007, most recently perhaps in Shrek the Third. Here is an Internet example of the Snow White story as told through Betty Boop. (http://www.archive.org/details/bb_snow_white)

The site http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~kvander/snowwhitetext.html has a version from 1898, while http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0709.html have a slightly different version from 1812.

Snow White is listed as a Aarne Thompson type 709 folktale. The Aarne Thompson scale tries to collect stories by the elements in them

The indexed AT motifs are limited mainly to European and European-derived tales that are known to have been told by mouth at the time they were published. … AT-numbers may be used to (1) identify tale types, (2) isolate motifs, (3) locate cultural variants.

(http://oaks.nvg.org/folktale-types.html)

This fits I think into what Saffo was saying about creativity. The Grimm brothers aren’t the original creators of the tale, they are just the creators of their variations. I say variations because details change between them, such as the mother becoming a stepmother and how the apple was dislodged from Snow White’s throat, bring her back to life.

As Professor Edwards pointed out in lecture, creativity comes into play when you add something of yourself to the project. The authors have done that here. The story has been spread over cultures, and been around for more than 100 years. The continuum of creativity continues.

I know that when it comes to characters, the first version is the one I remember the most. It takes a lot for that second version to become more popular. I remember that one of the writers on Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings said she was sad in a way because their version of the characters might take away from the version readers had created in their minds.

This might cause some people to call a movie remake a “knock-off.” What is the difference between a homage and a rip-off? Is just semantics, or giving credit where credit is due?

Authors who are writing a story may look at other author’s work because they need to learn how others have written themselves out of corners. I think that creativity comes into play when the author looks at a situation in a unique way.

The great authors and movie-makers can break the rules, because they know how to uniquely bend the rules. They understand the tradition that has come before them. I find myself looking at my own work in the same course as a resource on how to perform a certain task.

As far as originality, there are apparently only a few original plots. The Internet Public Library lists one, up to 36 plots. (http://www.ipl.org/div/farq/plotFARQ.html)

As a New Media professional, I hope, in this time of infinite recall, we can use it as a resource, not for personal gain against other artists, but as a way to make our projects better. Surely, we can be recognized for our creativity without infringing on the art of others.

Scott Snibbe

On October 24, 2007, Scott Snibbe gave a presentation entitled “Body, Space, and Cinema.” Many of the projects discussed here can be seen at http://www.snibbe.com/

Snibbe is known for his interactive art, which strives to teach people “body first.” Many of his pieces revolve around how a group of people interacts, and how that interaction can change with feedback.

For example, one of his first pieces called “Boundary Functions” creates lines on a custom floor of personal space. The piece is only activated when two or more people are on the floor at the same time. As they move around the floor lines are drawn between them. The area that is outline is the users’ personal space.

Scott noticed that it changed people’s behavior. For example, when people see a line, they want to step on it. He also found that people around the world interacted with the piece differently. In Japan people would get very close to each other. In New York, people walked on the floor and stood still.

Scott started his art in software. He wanted to create programs that followed the rules of nature, but were unlike anything seen in nature. For example, he created software that created a gravitational attraction to points on the screen or as Scott said, “draw with stars.”

He also created a piece of software that used the mouse to lay down trails of ants. The program also had a pheromone section. When the pheromone is removed, the ants scatter.

I was impressed how he was able to use his art to illustrate complex concepts. For example, he created a screensaver called “Emptiness is Form that when from a field of points that slowly resolves itself into Buddha. He also created an interactive piece that illustrates the puzzle of the duck in the bottle, which asked the question where does the inside of the bottle end and the space outside the bottle begin?

A program called “Motion Sketch” has the user create abstract shapes, but more importantly, the program records the movements the user does with the created shapes and plays it back repeatedly.

Using feedback is a common theme in Snibbe’s art especially pieces simple called the “Screen Series.” The basic setup is a person’s shadow projected on a large screen creating an interactive experience.

In “Compliant” and “Shy” the user’s shadow causes a square of white-light to move around the screen and in some cases leave the screen entirely.

In “Concentration” the light of screen is concentrated in a halo around only one person in a group of shadow. The light can be transferred by touching another person or “stolen” by reaching deeply into the person’s shadow. This level of interactivity causes behavior in people that normally wouldn’t be so extroverted.

In “Deep Walls,” the movements of multiple users are recorded and played back in a sixteen square grid. This creates an interaction with people who are no longer present. The idea is expanded in a piece called “Cause and Effect” where the shadow of the user displaces the recorded shadows of other users.

The user is then added to the background display. The shadows that the user was interacting with are not recreated. As Snibbe writes on his website “‘Cause and Effect’ “is a common translation for the Buddhist term Karma, which dictates that all human experiences, however minute, are the result of their own prior actions.” This is another example of his art illustrating a complex topic.

Over all I found the talk very interesting. I’m glad I was able to see artwork I wouldn’t normally be exposed to. Also, I think it’s important to be exposed to creative individuals who have found their calling in the field. It is comforting and hopeful to see that since I haven’t found my place in the field yet.