I recently gave a presentation to the Editorial Board of my university’s forthcoming music label Slow Release. This included a paper and several handout (as well as the keynote and accompanying presentation). The topic was copyright, moreover, Creative Commons and my recommendations for its use and how (which) to use [it].

Label proposal
PDF (Google Docs)

Label handout
PDF (Google Docs)

Dissertation paper
PDF (Google Docs)

Sample contract
PDF (Google Docs)

Presentation
YouTube (video above)
Google Docs

Adansonia - Doube Triptych

A collection of Wallpapers of the Adansonia gregorii (Boab tree) from Kings Park, Perth Western Australia.

The set can be downloaded here and the Flickr set can be viewed here.

Licensed under a Creative Commons By Attribution, Non-Commercial, No Derivatives license found here.

Abstract

Creative Commons stimulates artistic integrity without diminutive effects on commercial success; traditional copyright however, is forgetting to protect the artist, promotes art that is geared towards commercial success with little regard to art’s purpose. With tradition copyright increasingly serving as an umbrella for (and of) publishing industries, Creative Commons offers a relaxed and flexible alternative that give the power to the artist, and freedom to the consumer.

Introduction

Copyright is lauded as protecting and motivating creativity, but does it achieve that? Creative Commons (CC) – a legal (Just_Bri_Thanks, 2006) addition to copyright law – is a fast growing alternative to the increasingly draconian interpretations of copyright law. Defendants of copyright are persecuting followers of given creative works, while CC is aimed to reward them.

Copyright’s original purpose is to spread knowledge, but it hasn’t yet attained that mantle. It may well motivate artists to create as many commercially viable works as possible, but this is subverting the objective of Art. CC  – as distinct from Copyright – does not emphasise commercial viability, and does not emphasise quantity; it does, however, emphasise quality and artistic integrity. By re-prioritising artists away from aiming for a work that has monetary value, CC allows artists to create works that are artistically honest. This in turn removes any temptations of quantity over quality, further stimulating the true intent of Art. CC is a justifiable copyright alternative for Art, it successfully promotes the emerging artists, and draws more followers to established Artists, but is does not necessarily impair commercial success.

1. Copyright

1.1 Origins

The Statue of Anne (1710) (Tallmo, n.d.) marked the birth of modern copyright, it’s purpose was to limit the power that book-sellers (publishers) had over creative works; (Lessig, 2004) this was seen as limiting the spread of knowledge. Effectively, copyright was born out of what it is intended to do: protect and spread understanding.

“…for the encouragement of learned men to compose and write useful books…”(Tallmo)

With the Statute of Anne, Copyright was limited to fourteen years after publication. By 1724, with 14 years elapsed, publishers disputed the actual power the law had claiming that the Statue of Anne, a Positive Law, did not supersede the Common Law that prohibited the use of another’s creative work without permission, but rather, supplemented it. This, the publishers said, was the only way to protect authors 1
Initially, the English Court found in favour of the publishers; with Millar vs. Taylor (1769) the courts upheld common law copyright, ensuring works would never enter the public domain. With Donaldson vs. Beckett (1774), th

The Statute of Anne, 1710e House of Lords reversed this decision stating:

“The arguments attempted to be maintained on the side of the respondents, were founded on patents, privileges, Star Chamber decrees, and the bye [sic] laws of the Stationers’ Company; all of them the effects of the grossest tyranny and usurpation; the very last places in which I should have dreamt of finding the least trace of the common law of this kingdom; and yet, by a variety of subtle reasoning and metaphysical refinements, have they endeavoured to squeeze out the spirit of the common law from premises in which it could not possibly have existence.”
Lord Chancellor Charles Pratt (Tallmo)

1.2 Present Day

The reasoning behind the Statue of Anne was mostly abandoned in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.  The length of copyright has been greatly extended; most developed countries have a copyright term of seventy years after the death of the author of a creative work. Lobbying and corporate funding have influenced extensions of copyright on countless occasions.

Much like how the book-sellers of the eighteenth century were regarded as monopolisers, the Recording Industry of the present day should be seen as oligopolisers. Using the same justification as the book-sellers (protecting the authors), the Record Industry is constantly sacrificing the musicians, while punishing the consumers. The Record Industry Association of America (RIAA) which represents the Record Industry, has lobbied to have the royalties of Artists reduced, and has constantly sued consumers for excessive amounts for rather minor intellectual property theft. English Band Radiohead has responded positively to a request to testify against the RIAA. The band has expressed concern over the Record Industry abusing copyright for monetary gain.

The Featured Artists’ Coalition (FAC) is a group aiming at giving more rights back to the Artists. The group has also argued against ‘criminalising fans’ through prosecuting not for profit file sharing of music. Members of the group include Nick Mason of Pink Floyd, Ed O’Brien of Radiohead Robbie Williams and Tom Jones.

1.3 Commerciallity

The motivation that copyright brings to creativity has more in common with personal economy rather that artistic creativity. Copyright   does allow creative works to be commercially feasible, and it achieves this through assuring the author’s right to be the sole distributor of a work. This is indeed a commendable concept, and  a concept that copyright has held since it’s conception in 1710. However, modern copyright does no only restrict the usage of competitors in profiting from a work, it also restricts how consumers use a work 2. It is this notion that restricts artistic integrity.

Requiring a consumer to pay to acquire a creative work, encourages the artists to write creative works that will persuade the consumer to purchase the work; to make money is the motivation to create art in traditional copyright. The reason that others who make a profit out of an author’s creative work is so unwelcome, is because the money made could have been the author’s. Protecting the micro-economic flow of money to the artist is what drives copyright; and of course, this is mostly positive in the economic system that the world uses. Art, however, should be viewed as an exception. Copyright is pushing art to be merely another business, it won’t require passion, love or honesty, and it can be viewed as yet another way to just make money. This is damaging the genuine, primary reason for art: to express.

2. Creative Commons

2.1 Artistic Integrity

As opposed to copyright, where the business of art is pushed and stretched, Creative Commons (www.creativecommons.org) allows the Art to speak for itself. The Art is not aimed at commercial success through immediate consumption, but through a ground swell of appreciation. CC offers more flexibility than Copyright through a combination of various clauses for a total of eleven different (valid) licenses.

The Creative Commons Logo

The proverb ‘Money Makes the World Go Round’ is surely apt in the world today, so what is there to motivate creative works when there is no [direct] money to be immediately made? Expressing oneself through Art is one motivation, but seeing others appreciate your Art should be the main motivation, and there is no better way to allow this, than encouraging the consumers to easily admire and critique a work without the pressure to purchase the work.

Expression itself is pointless without an audience to share it with. Requiring an extra-artistic payment to view an expression is subverting the expression itself. With expression as the motivation, artists would be pressured to accomplish the best art they can create.

2.2 Case Studies

1. In November of 2008, popular comedy group Monty Python created a channel on Google’s YouTube.com (Youtube, Monty Python, 2008). The videos linked to Amazon.com where DVD’s of the group can be purchased. As a direct result of sharing the copyrighted files free online, sale of Monty Python’s DVDs grew by twenty-three thousand percent. (Schroeder, 2009)
2. Noir-rock band Nine Inch Nails released Ghosts I-IV under a Creative Commons license allowing consumers to  remix and redistribute the work. Limited editions on various formats allowed the group make US$1.6 million from the venture. (Creative Commons Clinic, n.d.)
3. [m]agnatune.com is an online record label that uses CC to ‘…promote its catalogue with free samples of songs, alongside a variable pricing model’. The site allows consumers to pay a price they (the consumers) think is fair ranging between US$5 and US$18. A fixed rate on physical copies applies (Magnatune, 2009), with fifty percent of any sale going to the Artist. As at January 2006, artists on magnatune.com received on average, between US$1500 and US$4000 a year from sales on the website. (Creative Commons Clinic)
4. Music Score Library petruccimusiclibrary.org (previously known as The International Music Score Library Project) is a repository  of Public Domain and CC works. Music Composer’s can upload (and thus publish) works online. In addition to the aforementioned CC clauses, the founder of The Petrucci Music Library, Edward Guo, has created a Performance Restricted clause.
5. The Wikimedia Foundation, through donations, received US$1,510,000 in 2006. (Wikimedia Foundation, 2009)
   Google, in 2008 released the web browser Google Chrome with an open source license allowing editing and sharing by anyone. Google also released Andoid, its  mobile phone operating system under a similar license.

2.3 Commerciallity

Studies have found that online piracy positively effects the profits of less popular artists, (Pollock, 2006) and that online piracy results in more CD Sales 3 (Andersen, Frenz, 2009). While piracy and CC are worlds apart, they do have the concept of sharing in common. Less popular artists enjoy more success because CC promotes sharing, which in turn promotes the name of the artist. Having a ‘known’ name or brand is what the less popular artist find difficult to obtain.

Commercial success (which, in regard to art, should be regarded as a bonus rather than a necessity) in CC licensed works, relies on as much fame of the artist and the work as possible. Particularly, the ‘digital ego’ of the artists should be prevalent and the artists should be actively promoting themselves and their art on as many mediums as possible, as often as possible. Participation in digital projects related to the creative works of the artists is emphasised.

Creative Commons on Magnatune is used as incentive to purchase the work. Providing sample or low quality works in CC, and higher or physical copies at a price. Similarly Nine Inch Nails offered the high quality album free with a CC license, but supplied (at a cost), special editions at various pricing on differing physical mediums. Methods like this should be considered by artists to promote their work.

The creative works should be uploaded and spread by the artist. If musical; the score, commentary, photos and recordings (where applicable) should be easy to find online. It is up to the artist to link as often as possible to the creative works. The more that find and share a work, the more likeliness of commercial success. As demonstrated by Magnatune and Nine Inch Nails, using Creative Commons as a double edged sword (or pen) will accomplish both artistic honesty as well as commercial success. With expression as the motivation to create high quality art, and using CC’s unique ability to have a (world) wide audience, Creative Commons puts the artist in a credible position both commercially and artistically.

Conclusion

With copyright, the artist is assured safety from intellectual theft, and with the addition of Creative Commons, the artist is free from any burdens of modern copyright. Consumers can appreciate the abstraction of art (which is driven by expression instead of money) without the having to treat it as a commodity. Supplementing this, Creative Commons provides an adequate commercial model with little applied knowledge.

1 There are correlations to the present day cases of Copyright infringement where the Recording Industry Association of America’s (RIAA) notoriously aggressive behavior is defended with the claim that it is to protect the artists.

2 It is still contentious whether changing the physical medium in which a legally acquired product is originally on (e.g. from a CD to an MP3 Player) is legal.

3 It can be argued that those we little or no interest for music both pirate and buy less than those with greater interest.

References

Just_Bri_Thanks [sic] (2006, March 16). Creative Commons License Upheld by Dutch Court. Retrieved June 17, 2009, from http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20060316052623594

Tallmo, Karl-Erik (n.d.). History of Copyright: The Statute of Anne, 1710. Retrieved June 17, 2009, from http://www.copyrighthistory.com/anne.html

Lessig, Lawrence. (2004). Free Culture. Retrieve from www.free-culture.cc/freeculture.pdf

Creative Commons. (2009). Retrieved June 17, 2009, from http://www.creativecommons.org/

YouTube, and Monty Python. (2008). Channel of Monty Python. Retrieved June 17, 2000, from  http://www.youtube.com/montypython

Schroeder, Stan (2009, January 22). Can Free Content Boost Your Sales? Yes, It Can. Retrieved June 17, 2009, from  http://mashable.com/2009/01/22/youtube-boost-sales/

Creative Commons Clinic, and Cobcroft, Rachel (Eds.). (n.d.). Building and Australian Commons. Retrieved from http://creativecommons.org.au/casestudiesvol1

Magnatune. (2009). Model. Retrieved June 17, 2000, from http://www.magnatune.com/

Wikimedia Foundation. (2009). Finance Report. Retrieved June 17, 2000, from http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Finance_report

Pollock, Rufus (2006, March 31). P2p, Online File-Sharing, and the Music Industry. Retrieved June 17, 2009, from http://www.rufuspollock.org/economics/p2p_summary.html

Andersen, Birgitte and Frenz, Marion (2009, March 05). The Impact of Music Downloads and P2P File-Sharing on the Purchase of Music: A Study. Retrieved June 17, 2009, from http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/ippd-dppi.nsf/eng/h_ip01456.html

Copyright © 2009 Yagan M Kiely
This paper uses a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported Licence.

Draft intro to conference paper that will eventually form into my thesis:

Copyright is lauded as protecting and motivating creativity, but does it achieve that? Creative Commons (CC) – a legal1 addition to copyright law – is a fast growing alternative to the increasingly draconian interpretations of copyright law. Defendants of copyright are persecuting followers of given creative works, while CC is aimed to reward them.

Copyright’s original purpose is to spread knowledge, but it hasn’t yet attained that mantle. It may well motivate artists to create as many commercially viable works as possible, but this is subverting the objective of Art. CC  – as distinct from Copyright – does not emphasise commercial viability, and does not emphasise quantity; it does, however, emphasise quality and artistic integrity. By re-prioritising artists away from aiming for a work that has monetary value, CC allows artists to create works that are artistically honest. This in turn removes any temptations of quantity over quality, further stimulating the true intent of Art. CC is a justifiable copyright alternative for Art, it successfully promotes the emerging artists, and draws more followers to established Artists, but is does not necessarily impair commercial success.

It’s been a while since my recital in November last year, but I have finally got arround to mixing my recording and uploading online. Thanks to Cherie Lebrasse for recording, mixing and mastering; there were a lot of hassles with the mastering process, as cords with ignorantly pulled from the setup proir to my recital. Thanks to Jessica Andrew on Clarinet, David Wickham on Piano (Clarinet Sonata), Emma Hayes on Cello, David Sanzone on Violin, and Zen Zeng on Piano (Piano Trio). The mix in this uses close mic with a quiet hall mic. As always (unless otherwise mentioned), the recordings and the score will be Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported, so please feel free to spread around, but please let me know also!

Piano Trio:

1. Presto – Moderato 7:11

2. Andante – Presto – Allegro 5:47

3. Presto – Moderato – Presto – Vivace 8:43

Full Score

Clarinet Sonata:

1. Allegro 7:15

2. Andante come sopra 5:11

3. Allegro Vivace 6:50

Full Score

Score can also be found at the Petrucci Music Library.

Leaf

Apps used: iMovie, Audacity and QuickTime Pro, Finale 2009.
Methods: Stop Motion, Video and Photographs.
Music: Finale 2009.

i/normal

Apps used: iMovie, Audacity and QuickTime Pro.
Methods: Stop Motion, Video and Photographs.
Music: Improvisation on out of tune piano edited in Audacity.

FTP, originally uploaded by phatcontroller.

The protocol of use of the FTP server in relation to the OP Project has been drafted. This may not sound like much, but it means that the OP Project is very much alive and trudging through its early alpha stage comfortably.

A draft on privacy has also been completed. Email being the main form of communication, and OP Project members are encouraged to communicate on first name basis. All the rest of the 3 page document remains largely logical, but it is another step for the project. All documents of the project are not to be shared or distributed with people not associated with IMSLP management, or the Project. Within these boundaries it is encouraged.

The 5 page FTP server protocol has been decked out with images to boot with admin and member privileges, roles, and how files and folders should be categorised/sorted within their dir. or subdir..

It is speculated that requests for certain parts, will be available for accomplished* ensembles. It is up to an Admin’s discretion whether a completed part can be shared.

How the project will be released is still under consideration.

*We are not trying to block users from access, but rather control it until completion. By accomplished we mean ensembles that are not ‘going away’. For example, they are not a piano trio that is getting together for one high-school performance and will then disband.

If you want to purchase some DVDs of Classical Performances a cheap prices, go to the ebay shop here. Each DVD is either £3.99 (one DVD disc), or £4.99 (two discs). They don’t come with plastic DVD cases, but they are easily obtained for small pittance anywhere; they do, however, come with the paper cover for a case. The price for shipping is very good and they make excellent deals on bulk shipping. I bought sixteen videos with a Shipping of £12.30; very reasonable. The only downside, is that they will only ship to Europe and Australia. Quallity is excellent, and the region code is 0 (worldwide), some have Picture format of NTSC, but it works on my tellevision in Australia (PAL).

Worth a look! I will give a list when I recieve the second half.

MusBook.com

MusBook.com is a relatively new (and still infant) social network. This one, however, is designed for musicians, both professional, amateur, and everything in between. It caters for a wide variety of professions within music as well as ‘music lovers’ and teachers.

The site has specific portals devoted to teachers, and education, and also has a section for jobs in music. While the site may have a few tiny issues (the ‘applications’ are ugly and obtrusive – they look more like a late-night advert for a mobile-phone dating service), the site looks promising, especially for a professional musician.

It allows videos, pictures and audio to be uploaded, which is a must for a music site, and while being rather an obvious necessary inclusion, is still worth noting.

I have recently been ’showcased’ on the site.

http://my.classicalmusic.org.uk/page/showcase-1