Flipping the bird at answers

Think that Copyleft sounds like a shitty socialist pun? You’d be dead right. But it’s a socialism of ideas, and isn’t that shitty… kinda. In essence, Copyleft says two heads are better than one, and what’s in my head might do just as well to be in your head, and really we should just work this out together. It’s a movement born, unsurprisingly, from computer programming.

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Copyleft is an idea that makes sense for programming because a computer program is a piece of logic designed to do a certain thing. There are clear objectives, and clear guides built on a pass/fail basis as to what could change to make it easier to use, faster, compatible with different operating systems. Different developers may add certain functionality as a personal flourish, but it is ultimately a utilitarian pursuit. People have made some pretty good open source software, if you’re into that kind of thing (and by that kind of thing, I mean building software, because you should have a decent knowledge of your OS before you delve into using most open source stuff). So, global community of knowledge, some excellent free software. Good times.

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HOWEVER: a computer program is not a novel. There are massive differences that render what is right for one NOT right for all – most strikingly literature’s propensity to often be very personal in creation, use and interpretation. I can’t even imagine what possible application Copyleft would have with literature, other than justifying piracy in a pseudo-intellectual doublespeak. Oh wait…

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ENTER: Doctorow.

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Ryan’s right in that I don’t like Doctorow. I find his ill-conceived metaphors a bit like chewing fat – if there’s substance to the argument he misses it by disguising his meaning under layers of unappetising rhetoric. They’re not usually things that make me go ‘hmmm…’; they’re things that make me go: ‘How can someone get away with talking this much shit and not be pulled up on it?’

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But even I’m not bigoted enough to let just one guy ruin a whole movement for me. Maybe Doctorow is like Mao – complex, misunderstood by those not as brilliant. Certainly his ‘we don’t need copyright’ chant is reminiscent of the ‘kill the sparrows‘ movement. Regardless of this one guy, I have major problems with the idea that Copyleft is applicable to everything covered by copyright, and literature in particular.

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So here we go, an example of a Copyleft ‘contract’ in all its glory. The main crux of this sort of license is ‘to promote and protect these creations of the human mind according to the principles of copyleft: freedom to use, copy, distribute, transform, and prohibition of exclusive appropriation.’

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The bit I’ve highlighted in bold is something I know is a major sticking point for some people largely because they equate the monopolisation of copyright ownership with decreased diversity in content. I’m not sure how this argument works, as a publisher who buys copyright from an author comes in after the content has been written. Maybe there’s a fear that someone may come in and snatch up rights to every book ever from unsuspecting authors and then… I don’t know, keep them all in a vault or something. But there’s another side to this. Wouldn’t Copyleft ideas make it a lot easier for people like Google to come away with a free (and dangerously large) slice of pie? I don’t see anything wrong with a giant digital library – there’s no debate as to whether this would be a valuable resource for readers. I do see a problem with Google appropriating in-copyright work at no cost to themselves, and yet making money from it through selling  advertising space. What this whole Copyleft support thing really boils down to (for most people) is an unwillingness to pay for something.

I own ALL THE COPYRIGHT!

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Doing away with copyright of intellectual property is, essentially, saying either your ideas aren’t worth anything, or they might be worth something if they were appropriated by someone more brilliant than yourself. If you are to deny that an idea  has monetary value, then you’d better also be prepared to tell me why a mechanic should be paid for employing his skills, or why I have to pay rent, or why a loaf of bread costs a certain amount but not less. This is not some exercise in exploitation by publishers so they can line their nests with fat wads of cash or pimp their merc. It’s an established business norm for the simple reason that artists, writers, musicians deserve to be paid for the time and effort they put into their creations.

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We have more to fear from obscurity than piracy? Don’t think so. They both lead to the same thing: an industry that can’t support its producers.