Twittergem: Lawrence Lessig

Warner Music has issued a takedown of one of my presos on YouTube. Someone send them a copy of §107 ("fair use").

@Lessig.

Perhaps Warners are just trying to make themselves look stupid by filing a DCMA takedown against a leading Copyleft expert. Perhaps.

ASCAP hope to pop a cap in copyright carpers

Ben Sheffner has some fun with the idea that ASCAP is campaigning to "shut up" campaigners for a looser copyright regime:

ASCAP is out to "shut up" its ideological opponents by sending out an email with links to articles and commentaries that support its point of view! And criticize a book by a law professor with different views on copyright law! Scary! Perhaps next week, in another bold move to silence the copyleft, they will organize a panel discussion on issues that affect songwriters and publishers. And my super-secret ASCAP sources tell me that the final stage of the "shut up the copyleft" strategy consists of drafting an op-ed to run in Billboard. With all this shutting-up going on, it's a miracle ASCAP is even allowing Techdirt to go on publishing...

It's probably fair to say that Techdirt would have been better to say "drown out" than "shut up" - after all (for the moment) ASCAP and its chums have deeper pockets than the copyleft campaigners.

On the other hand, while Sheffner is having his yuks, he does forget to engage with the sharper points in the original Digital Music News story on which TechDirt was commenting:

In a letter emailed to members, longtime ASCAP board member (and distinguished songwriter) Dean Kay stamped on the Lessig ideology. But instead of directly countering core Lessig points, Kay offered a collection of articles, reviews, and even a video interview with Stephen Colbert to undermine the less-restrictive copyright thinking that Lessig espouses.

They're using The Colbert Report as the basis of their case? What, couldn't they find a Saturday Night Live sketch that shared their views?

It's easy for Sheffner to make fun of TechDirt's histrionics; it's easy for ASCAP to assemble a few pieces on the web that don't actually consider Lessig's arguments. It's just kind of funny that neither seem to want to directly debate.

Telling fibs about Creative Commons

If you were in charge of one of the organisations raking off royalty payments for eventual distribution to singers, songwriters and other artists, you'd probably be a little nervous about Creative Commons licences, which - besides other benefits - pretty much leaves them without a role to perform and threatens their income stream.

So, it's not surprising that ASCAP have produced a document arguing why, in their opinion, CC licences are bad for artists.

The trouble is, it seems that - let's be generous - ASCAP have misunderstood some aspects of licence. While this is slightly disturbing - a body whose job is interpreting copyright law not being able to do so - the other explanation, that the errors spotted by Lawrence Lessig were deliberate, would be somewhat disturbing.