Wired News: We're Creative Commonists, Bill

Everyone is jumping all over Bill Gate's remark during his interview that is featured in news.com. The comment from the Wired.com news article was to say that this demonstrates that Bill is a bit out of the loop when it comes to the notion of copyright, or as some like to call it 'copyleft'. The problem is that Bill fails to understand anything but the status quo and really the status quo for intellectual property is being erased, not by the communists, but by individuals and companies who are demanding a total change of the copyright system. The megamedia corporations of which Microsoft is a part of want to change copyright into property. According to traditional law, property is sacred and belongs forever to the owner. Copyright exists only for a limited period of time, a period that lawmakers are trying to change so that it is better for the lobbyists.
At present, when the copyright is complete, the intellectual property becomes part of the public domain that all of us can enjoy without restriction. The megamedia corporations want to lock up their culture forever, if they had their wish.
Which system do you want to live under, one dominated by a few corporations who only care about making money, or one in which culture and media are truly free. If we learned anything, the megacorps only care about their bottom line. It all started with the music industry and while they claim to act in the best interest of the artist, they are only interested in their bottom line. They want the artist to remain in a situation of indentured slavery, selling their creativity for a few bucks.
An extremely good book on the subject is Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig. If you visit his website freeculture.org. It gives a good background to the whole issue of free culture and how the megacorps are attempting to stifle this culture. You can about the time the RIAA sued Girl Scouts for singing campfire songs. If you go into the site you can download legal copies of the book and in various file types as well, from .pdf to .lit for those of us who own Pocket PC's. I'm about a third of the way through and it is a fascinating read.
Everything, including Bill's comments are based upon the Creative Commons, which is a method of protection and freedom for, as the site says, authors and artists. If you are a creative type it may be an interest to you it offers protection and the ability of others to build upon your creativity. It allows the creator to own and do as they will and not to be a part of the megacorps slavery system.

Consider learning more.

By the way, I did order a t-shirt, might as well make it official.

Learn more and free culture.


Peace