Interarts: Copyright and Free Culture

            In Lawrene Lessig’s article, The Failures of Fair Use and the Future of Free Culture discusses the issue about law regulations in creative processes. In the first two sentences, Lessig lays out the reality of the matter, “"the law regulates creative process. It always has and always will”. (Lessig, 42) It does not matter how amazing your art is, if it is located on something that “shouldn’t” be turned into art or if you use (for example) sexually explicit material you may get in trouble. But out of all the regulations that have been created, copyright is the most well known and more recently has been used to stop artists from creating works using other known artists works. A good, modern example of this is “raised about DJ Danger Mouse’s Gery Album, created by mixing Jay-Z’s Black Album with the Beatles’ White Album.” (Lessig, 51) Lessig goes on to tell us that Jay-Z actually had no issue with the remix being made but the Beatles had an issue (the EMI even threatened to sue anyone who even so much as distributed the Grey Album). There are countless examples of artists being sued by large companies for using so much as a sound clip from a movie in a creative artwork. A long time ago, copyright only used to be in place until the creators death, then the work was released into creative commons. This issue of increased copyright is actually going to hurt our society and it’s creativity in the long run. Due of the recent increase of Internet use, copyright laws have been heavily enforced all over the country and for the majority of the time big companies win lawsuits because of how vague copyright issues are. If nothing is done soon, our countries creativity may be stifled.

            An example of a place that has realized the negative effects copyright has on the creative process is Japan. This is why the highly popular art form called doujinshi is allowed to thrive. Doujinshi is quite simply the Japanese word for self-published works (like novels or mangas). They are generally fan made mangas (the Japanese form of comic books) that usually use already created characters (like Naruto from Naruto or Luffy from One Piece). Doujinshi authors write entirely new stories or adventures for characters to go on. You would think that Japan would be upset over these mangas but they actually almost never are. Many real manga artists do not mind if fans make doujinshis because of a few main reasons. One being that these upcoming artists can get practice drawing in either a certain authors style until they find an art style that they like. And two, doujinshis helps new artists learn how to become good manga writers and once they get good will usually go to the publishing companies to create their own stories (which will bring in more money for the publishers). And three, doujinshis actually bring in more profit for the artist who originally created doujinshi characters because many times readers will go and read the original work. Unlike America, Japan has realized that it is beneficial to let some copyright regulations go unenforced for the betterment of their societies creativity and business.

            The United States should realize that enforcing copyright all of the time often stifles creativity. When you think about it, our culture was brought up on the borrowing and use of other people’s ideas (which is what many people would call “piracy”). Steve Jobs and Bill Gates both took different people’s ideas (none of which were credited) during the creating of both Apple and Microsoft computers. Even childhood favorite movies, like basically any Disney movie, would never have been made if piracy and copy right laws were in place because Disney would not have been allowed to put his own twist on a classic Grimm or common story tale. As long as artists are not taking other artist’s work, claiming it as their own and making money off of it (like if someone traced a famous drawing and sold it off as their own original creation) they should be allowed to used other, existing sources to either get new ideas or perspectives or inspiration. For example, there are many artists who take music and noise clips from My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic to create cool songs. Most of these artists make no money off of any of their music because they allow free downloads rather than forcing listeners to pay for the track. If Hasbro wanted to, they could go after these brony musicians and sue them for using sound or song clips from their shows. Yet, they choose not too because, like in Japan, Hasbro does not mind people using their products in art as long as money isn’t being made off of it or the artist is claiming 100% ownership of the music.

It is up to the artists and society itself to fight for the change of these laws. Lawrence Lessig puts it best when he says; "we have entered an age in which the right of artists to create freely must again be won". (Lessig, 53) If no one puts up a fight, then slowly our societies creativity will crumble.