Creatorright and the little guy

I used to be on this guys arguments side.

But I have been taken advantage of by people enough times that I want to know that I have the option of protecting my rights against large corporations and exploitative dishonest people.

If you weaken individual protection and you’ll strengthen the large organisations.

We have a completely different law in Germany. It is not even called copyright it is called creatorright. It gives me power to demand things from TV stations and everything else.

The weak American copyright system is being used as an argument to make things worse than they are everywhere else.

I don’t agree with the big media companies, but I do firmly believe that we as individual creators desperately need protection and a way to enforce our rights.

Just 6 days ago someone used my music in a way that was not agreed upon. All they had to do was include my name in the credits. No money, no restriction whatsoever except that one and they didn’t even do that. These kinds of specious people need to vanish from the culture industry and that is why we need a strong creator right.

 

Are you aware of how you deal with things that are free?

You’ve probably come across this video of Joshua Bell busking in the Washington subway during rush hour.

To me, this video and article shows several things: first of all, people just don’t recognize greatness even if it is in front of them in the size of a mountain. But second, and this I find even more important, here is a chance to enjoy something for free, no strings attached at a level of performance that is unrivaled in the world. And yet, no one stops to listen.

Here’s my thought: what about all those people claiming that every artist should put out his/her work for free as it helps to get exposure and exposure and reaching people is what matters? It seems to me that if something is free, won’t even stop to take a closer look. So free seems to equate “not interesting enough to check out”.

Now on the other hand, if there is something with a value attached to it, suddenly the argument is: no, no, no, no, I can’t possibly be expected to pay for something. I’ll just grab it from my friend and be done with it. Does anyone else see the terribly destructive hypocrisy in this?

So please, all you people out there who claim to wanting to help creators by forcing them to just give away  their work for free: think again. And for yourself this time without the “screaming free industry” (I’m looking at you, Lawrence Lessig) yelling in your ear about how modern that attitude supposedly is.

Pearls Before Breakfast – washingtonpost.com.

Iron Sky – Berlinale

Never, in a thousand years would I have imagined, that the City Song that the absolutely wonderful Stephanie Forryan and I wrote would have been connected to a viral internet sensation such as the wonderfully crazy “Iron Sky” film by finnish director Timo Vuorensola. All music in the Berlinale Stories over on MyVideo is by me.

Berlinale Stories Folge 8:


Berlinale Storys Teil 8- Exklusives Interview Juli… – MyVideo

Berlinale Stories Folge 9:


Berlinale Storys Teil 9 – Exklusives Interview Jul… – MyVideo

Ansgar Heveling – die Rache für freie Meinungsäußerung

Heute hat sich der Vertreter der CDU in der Enquete Kommision “Internet und digitale Gesellschaft” mächtig aus dem Fenster gelehnt und wurde dafür von der Netzgemeinde (wenn das denn die sind, die immer so wirklich laut überall schreien…) ordentlich rangenommen.

Ich muss sagen, dass mir die Bullies aus “dem Netz” langsam schon ein bisschen auf die Nerven gehen: sie sind meist in ihrer Message nicht klar, sie glänzen hauptsächlich dadurch, dass sie andere verhöhnen, Mitgefühl oder Veranwortungsbewusstsein existiert fast nicht und letzten Endes geht es doch nicht um die heeren Ziele (freie Meinungsäußerung, Freiheit, Datenschutz, kürzere Patentlaufzeiten damit in den developing countries Generika angeboten werden können), die sie so gerne vorgeben, sondern am Ende des Tages geht es leider darum, dass man sich Breaking Bad und The Big Bang Theory umsonst anschauen kann. Und zu diesem Zweck ist dann auch jedes Mittel recht und man dringt dann auch gleich mal in fremder Leute CMS ein (klar, darf jemand wie Heveling natürlich kein so einach zu ratendes Passwort haben), aber vom Prinzip her, hat das mit Respekt vor freier Meinungsäußerung eben genau gar nichts mehr zu tun. Da sagt jemand was, das jemand anderem nicht passt und BÄM! bekommt er mit voller Wucht alles ab, nur keine politische Diskussion.

Schade, aber zeigt einfach deutlich, wo die Prioritäten liegen: Im egoistischen Dissenz und nicht darin, sich zu überlegen, wie denn eine Gesellschaft sowohl ihre Urheber schützt, als auch wirtschaftliches Arbeiten ermöglicht.

Und die großen Medien spielen das Spiel auch noch mit. Ist ja klar, kann man sich bei den jungen Wilden ein paar brownie points einheimsen.

Pathetic.

Gehe jetzt heim.

Free speech and free culture

Tonight I had the dream about something, that would solve the problems of  both the content industry and the free speech movement.

It would add so much entertainment value to the internet if people instead of posting the actual songs/pictures/films/books/comics that they like would just sing the the songs, draw the pictures  themselves, reenact the films or write a summary of the book themselves and then link back to the creators website (or some store like Amazon or iTunes, earning referral money in the process btw.) to get to the full version.

So let me demonstrate:

If I thought that it would be clever to reference the Sex Pistols “God Save The Queen” (from memory which makes it even more fun, because it’s probably way off) in the context of a bee hive I could be posting it like this:

Citizens of the world, it is time to save the Queen Bee, so let’s get up and sing our world anthem “God Save The Queen”

Get the real song here:

That way everyone is happy and we would have additional value.

Free speech and content creators

I wish that the internet community would start separating the privacy concerns and free speech concerns from the content creators, big or small, and instead focus on what is actually important: political censorship and freedom. Distributing someones content without that persons consent has nothing to do with free speech. Nothing.

Respecting of intellectual property is a social and civil contract that’s in the best interest of both the creator and consumer.

And Googles record gets tainted further

It is amazing to me, that the supporters of free speech (which I am also!!) still see Google as the free and open web.

They have been funding institutes releasing wrongful information about how legislation that is trying to protect content creators may destroy the free internet. But how much interest do they really have in this free pluralistic internet?

But please, read for yourself!

Troubling Google Contractor Allegedly Caught Vandalizing Open Street Map.