Intellectual property and copyright for independent producers is an increasing battleground in this new digital economy. With various forms of protection (from copyright to trademarks to patents) already bewildering, is it better to keep your ideas and work to yourself, or publish as wide and far as possible to show that you 'got there first'?

Last week ANAT's portable platforms and emerging technologies Program Manager Fee Plumley spoke at a copyright forum hosted by DFEEST for the SALA Festival. Featured alongside the "Legendary Tales" exhibition at Higher Ground, Fee joined Robyn Ayres (Arts Law Centre of Australia), Elliott Bledsoe (Creative Commons Australia) and Molly Reynolds (AIMIA) to present information & case studies surrounding the old and new copyright issues facing digital content producers around the world.

Making sure to prefix everything with a disclaimer of 'this is not legal advice, if you have a specific query you must discuss your needs in detail with one of our advisors', Robyn provided a thorough overview of the legal definition of copyright. Arts Law's free telephone helpline service (1800 221 457) and low-cost contract samples from their website (http://www.artslaw.com.au) provide further information and invaluable ongoing support.  

Elliott presented an overview of the new control given through the international Creative Commons movement for both emerging and established content producers. Case studies from the new wiki (http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Casestudies) included Nine Inch Nails release of "Ghosts I-IV", a CC (BY-NC-SA) licensed album "giving fans the ability to remix and redistribute the work from a multitude of different formats". The first nine tracks (of 36) were released for free, the entire album was available for $5 and just to prove that giving something away for free is actually a smart commercial move, an 'ultra-deluxe limited edition' version of the album on vinyl, selling for $US300 a copy, netted $1.6 million overnight.

Highlighting how important it is for digital content producers to understand their rights, respect their status and negotiate 'old media' contracts, Fee represented artists working in the mobile and emerging industries. Noting that the definition of 'content' is now blurring from 'music, video, photography, writing' into 'code, applications, dialogue and interaction', her core message was to 'research, take risks, experiment and innovate…and be prepared as an early adopter for when the masses catch up with you.'

Molly's approach literally took the risk of legal action, with a claim that her hard disk drive contained over $270,000 worth of illegally 'shared' music. Demonstrating how common it is for everyday people to be adopting these free-to-use methods, Molly highlighted the need for industry to accept the new culture and work with, not against the tide.

Interestingly, while the event was targeted at independent artists and people working across the arts generally, a large percentage of the audience were from State Departments and educational institutions, demonstrating the need for more informative sessions like this across industry. Organiser, Alison Kershaw, was more than aware of this issue and scheduled a hefty hour of Q&A session, providing ample debate between panellists and audience alike. More like this to come, we hope…

Websites

http://www.artslaw.com.au
http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Casestudies