Where Do Artists Draw the Line with Copyright Law?

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2009/02/26/Remix_Steven_Johnson_Lawrence_Lessig_and_Shepard_Fa...

Shepard Fairey, Steven Johnson, and Lawrence Lessig weigh the pros and cons of artistic freedom, fair use, and copyright law.

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What is the future for art and ideas in an age when practically anything can be copied, pasted, downloaded, sampled, and re-imagined?

LIVE from the NYPL and WIRED Magazine kick off the Spring 2009 season with a spirited discussion of the emerging remix culture.

Our guides through this new world--who will take us from Jefferson's Bible to Andre the Giant to Wikipedia--will be Lawrence Lessig, author of Remix, founder of Creative Commons, and one of the leading legal scholars on intellectual property issues in the Internet age; acclaimed street artist Shepard Fairey, whose iconic Obama "HOPE" poster was recently acquired by the National Portrait Gallery; and cultural historian Steven Johnson, whose new book, The Invention of Air, argues that remix culture has deep roots in the Enlightenment and among the American founding fathers.

Shepard Fairey shot to national fame as the graphic artist behind a 2008 iconic poster of Barack Obama, a portrait labeled simply "HOPE" and in a style that could be described as Andy Warhol meets Socialist Realism. Fairey, who graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1992, was already well known among graffiti artists and fans, thanks to one of Fairey's early works of "guerilla" art, an impromptu stencil design based on an ad for Andre the Giant, a professional wrestler.

Lawrence Lessig is a professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of the school's Center for Internet and Society. He teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, contracts, and the law of cyberspace. Prior to joining the Stanford faculty, he was Berkman Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and a professor at the University of Chicago. He clerked for Judge Richard Posner on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals and for Justice Antonin Scalia on the United States Supreme Court. For much of his career, he has focused on law and technology, especially as it affects copyright. Recognized for arguing against interpretations of copyright that could stifle innovation and discourse online, he is CEO of the Creative Commons project, and he has been a columnist for Wired, Red Herring, and The Industry Standard.

Steven Johnson is the author of the US bestsellers Mind Wide Open and Emergence. His most recent book is The Invention of Air. Johnson's writing has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, The Guardian, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. He also writes for Discover magazine and Wired.com, and was co-founder of the award-winning websites FEED and Plastic.com. He teaches at New York University's Interactive Telecommunications Program and also hosts a weblog at www.stevenberlinjohnson.com.

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• rights
• commons
• fair
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[freaks182]

this is the era to get rid of the huge corporations that just try to get rich off of artists, where the artists get 1 dollar an album and the industry gets 14 dollars. FREE THE MUSIC!

[humanist7117]

He is infected with the "you know" virus.

[22YearOldBoy]

In terms of music, you get the Artist and the Label. The label makes the cash, the Artist is to create works for the Label to sell. It's the greed of the Label that fucks things up for the Artist not "Pirates". Artists are too naive to see that. So, to sum up: Artists: are not businessmen, Art is for expression not so much profit. Labels: are corporate pigs that leech off of unwitting Artists gaining more income than the Artist itself. If an Artists main desire is money, They are not Artists.

[12107170]

@AsTimeDilates Thank you.

[AsTimeDilates]

@12107170 You can cover a song but you have to give notice to the copyright owner and then pay a royalty (about a few cents per distributed copy) called a compulsory license. It's a specific exception (the copyright act is riddled with them and they are generally designed to comport with people's sense of fairness). The condition is that you can't change the work too much (i.e. remix). Note that you have to give notice before distribution or its infringement.

[12107170]

@bersaba I agree.

[bersaba]

@12107170

Society, don't know shit about the law (at least, in this issue). I just thing the law to music should be roughly the same as books. If I quote a small proportion of a book, and say I've quoted it, and give references too it, that's not only ok, but required to get degrees.

But if you sample a song, even giving credit and acknowledgement, that's bad. But copy the whole bloody thing start to finish (re, cover), that's ok. To me that's crazy.... craaaaazy.... possibly.

[12107170]

@bersaba Do you mean bad legally or in society? Because I read or was told or something that if you redo a song without sampling the actual recording, you are ok, but I believe my lawyer said that it is not ok. I'm with you though I've been wondering many things for a long time. I've got to go back to my lawyer or just finally buy a book instead of librarying it.

[bersaba]

@strangeroneuk

I suppose, like I said I'm way out of my depth of understanding here. I think that the music industry (and movies even moreso) need to look at new ways for selling and dealing with piracy. Itunes and digital sale has been a bit of a saviour for music, and think movies need to look at digital sale aswell.

Ask me a question about a shitty ass and I'm ya man. (Nurse).

[strangeroneuk]

@bersaba I agree my point is iif you covered John Lennon - Imagine you must agree with the point of that song but if you remix it you would lose the message and could remix it to the point where it goes against the point of the original. its an artistic thing really

[bersaba]

@strangeroneuk

Some of the covers I've heard are (In my opinion) like taking a dump and wiping your backside on the mona lisa. (Snoop Dogg - Sad But True springs to mind).

Also, most remixes (at least that I've heard) only use a fraction of a song anyhow. Like I said I'm really out of my depth on this one, but I would have thought using more of a song should be grounds of copyright issues then using less.