Monthly Archives: March 2013

Brownbag

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I thought that the brownbag on Thursday was extremely interesting and it taught me a lot of things about copyright that I had never really considered or put much thought into. For example, I found it really shocking how much trouble the creator of a documentary has to go through to get certain aspects of the film cleared. I would have never guessed that it is such an arduous process. What particularly shocked me was learning how much trouble the speaker went through in an attempt to get Ke$ha’s song cleared in her documentary. Upon learning this, I couldn’t help but think to myself what a persevering woman the creator of the documentary was. I am sure that a lot of artists would not have attempted to go through the trouble she did, and would instead be tempted to give up and just cut that clip from the film altogether.

I noticed that Ke$ha does have a history of going after those who infringe works she has copyrighted, and that she is a bit picky when it comes to allowing others to use her work. For example, here is a case I found in which Ke$ha is suing the Wimo Labs company for copyright infringement:

http://www.andpop.com/2011/05/10/kesha-sues-wimo-labs-for-copyright-infringement/

Online pirate websites in the courts again

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It seems like every time I sit down to do these posts, another one of those pirate websites (Megaupload, The Pirate Bay, etc.) is losing a court case. This time, the unlucky party is BitTorrent. Recently, this website and its associates lost a major ruling against Disney, Fox, Paramount, and a slew of other major producers. The ruling was that BitTorrent was allowing for people to illegally download and distribute films and television shows. The ruling was unanimous, and charges will be named soon. It seems as if a new change is coming for the internet. These websites, which once were major powers on the internet, are now being slowly taken apart. It will be interesting to see how this long developments unfolds, and if the legal system is able to truly eliminate these entities.

http://www.deadline.com/2013/03/hollywood-studios-score-appeals-court-win-in-copyright-case/

Today’s Presentation – Professor Sikand

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It was truly eye-opening today to hear Professor Sikand’s talk about copyright in the world of film, especially with the issue of the high costs associate with licensing music. What I found a bit saddening was the fact that these costs often dissuade filmmakers from making certain works. In a way, copyright in this case holding back the progression and evolution of film. Granted, we should protect artists and ensure that they do not lose out on revenue from their works. However, perhaps some efforts should be made to ease up on the rules regarding the usage of songs. After all, who knows what potentially great films the world could be missing out on because of all the restrictions in place?

Today’s Class – Using Songs vs. Product Placement (Shark Tank)

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In the discussion in today’s class, somebody brought up the topic of song sampling vs product placement, particularly in movies and in television. Some people argued that if companies pay directors and producers to have products featured in movies and shows, artists should do the same thing for the exposure they are getting. I didn’t get to speak on the issue, but my argument has to do with the purpose of such actions. When a song is included in a show or movie, it is usually intended to impart some sort of mod in the particular scene where it is seen. In a sense, the song ends up becoming a part of the show or movie as an art form, and several movies are known for the music featured in them. Product placement doesn’t do any of this, as is seen in the example video below with one of my favorite shows, Shark Tank. The T-Mobile product placement here is not only utterly ridiculous, it adds nothing to the show in terms of value or artistic merit. If there was no licensing deal made here, there is no reason that the producers of the show would include this in there at all. Essentially, even though having a song featured in a movie or show gives exposure to the artist, it is because the directors and producers want to use the songs to ad to their work that differentiates this from product placement.

Copyright and the picture-less Art History Book

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In class when we were looking at the book Professor Phillips authored and all of the images that he had cleared I started to think about all of the image in my art history textbook. Do the publishers have to clear every image? In fact, I found this article about an art school that was forcing students to buy an image-less textbook for $180. The publishers of the textbook said that if they aquired all of the image rights the book would cost $800.An excerpt from the pictureless textbook:

Today’s Class

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I thought we had a great conversation in class today. Something I wanted to expand on in this blog post is the point that was brought up by buying the license to show a movie to the public.  I think it is amazing how companies can charge hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars for a movie to be shown legally to a public audience, but I can go to the DVD store or go on iTunes and buy a movie for a fraction of that price and watch it over and over again.  Would it be legal if I had a bunch of friends over (10 people) and watch a movie.  Would that situation change if I were to watch a movie and invite all of my closest friends over (200-300 people)? I would even let my dog watch.

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On an unrelated note, I am going to try to post a video of “Microwave This!” after each of my blog posts. Enjoy! What will happen to a bag of chips in the microwave? Find out here!

Bollywood vs. Hollywood

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What is the difference between an imitation and a copy?  How far can an imitation go before it is considered copyright infringement?  Would it still be considered copyright infringement if the imitation was altered by culture?

This article by Hariqbal Basil titled “Indianizing Hollywood: The Debate Over Copyright Infringement by Bollywood” tackles some of these questions.  According to the author, some popular Hollywood films are reinterpreted by Bollywood to be more “Indianized” for Hindi audiences.  According to the author, these films may “be liable for copyright infringement if the subsequent film is found to be substantially similar to the initial copyrighted work” (Basil 35).  As a highly successful industry, do you believe Bollywood should pay the companies they are borrowing from?  Or is theirs not a form of copyright infringement due to the intention?

Copyright Criminals

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Dr. Sikand’s discussion of her documentary on PBS led me to another PBS documentary, Copyright Criminals (2010).  This film discusses many of the topics we have covered in class, such as fair use and sampling.  The filmmakers, Benjamin Franzen and Kembrew McLeod, said in an interview that, “this movie could not have been made and distributed without a legal doctrine called fair use.”  While a film like this has the potential to be educational and useful, is it fair that multiple recording companies were not paid for the use of their songs in the documentary?  Do you think that there should be a different standard for documentaries and big-budget Hollywood films?

Glee and Copyright

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During my research of films and music copyright, I stumbled on this essay written by a Yale Law School student.  Interestingly enough, the essay appears on a blog similar to ours, with comments from the author’s peers at the bottom of the webpage.  The author, Christina Mulligan, discusses how copyright is ignored in the popular show, Glee.  The characters often create mash-ups of preexisting songs, perform covers, and even make direct copies of music videos.  The show ignores the issue of copyright completely while, in reality, copyright lawsuits occur all the time.  According to Mulligan, the students of Glee would be on the losing side of a copyright lawsuit for their work.  Mulligan asserts that students who actually do this are doing so “to learn about themselves, to become better musicians, to build relationships with friends, and to pay homage to the artists who came before them” (Mulligan).

 

What do you think?  Should excuses be made for students in copyright law?  Do these excuses already exist?

Class Discussion

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Today’s class discussion was really interesting. It made me look more deeply into the issue of multiple ways to cite. I came across this funny article discussing how to simplify the many different ways into one universal system which the author calls the “author-year” system. Honestly, I agree with the author of this article. All we really need is the author, the year, and the type of source it is. All of these different ways to cite have just got way out of control.

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