Culture

Fairey gets two years

On Friday Shepard Fairey was sentenced to two years’ probation by the Boston Municipal Court. The sentence is based upon the images he posted on public and private property over the years. (via Designboom)

the well-known illustrator and graphic designer has pleaded guilty to three charges of vandalism, including defacing property and wanton destruction of property under 250 USD. he had 11 other chargers which have been dropped. he has been fined 2,000 USD for graffiti removal. Designboom

Fairey’s most widely spread and famous work (probably) is the André the giant obey mashup (or whatever it should be called).

Multi-affiches Boulevard St Germain 06e? .jpg by yoyolabellut (CC BY-NC-ND)

But he reached new peaks of fame for his wonderful “hope” poster designed during the Barack Obama campaign.

Obama Posters by el clinto (CC BY-NC-ND)

Is this the plight of all known street artists who become famous enough to be identified?

Posted on by mklang

Disrespectful handling of digitalized cultural artifacts

On several occasions I have had the opportunity to discuss digitalization of traditional media. In particular to images that are no longer covered by copyright. Those who act as caretakers and gatekeepers for these cultural treasures have long been positive to digitalization – but were quick to discover that digitalization alone is not enough. The turning point of public opinion occurred when the Library of Congress began its pilot project with Flickr in the Flickr Commons. Read more about it on the Library of Congress blog or the report from the pilot.

Despite the anecdotal evidence, the gut feeling and the report some gatekeepers are still concerned about what will happen to “their” images if the plebeian mass can access them freely.

At first I thought their fears stemmed from a loss of income from selling prints, but this seems not to be their main concern even if some do refer to this. There main concern is the way in which the images will be treated.

They fear the disrespectful handling of digitalized cultural artifacts.

Now you may well ask yourselves how a digitalized artifact may be manhandled? Obviously it is not about destruction but there are concerns about use. The legal protection is long gone. The photographs are long since in the public domain and can be used and abused at will. This is of concern to the caretakers/gatekeepers since they have been entrusted with the images in physical form. In almost all cases they have received the photographs with a promise that they are preserving a part of cultural heritage. They believe that in their role as cultural preservers lies a duty to ensure that the photographers honor is not sullied by disagreeable online use.

And they know all too well that once digitalization and access has been granted there is no longer any control.

While I am a copyright minimalist and I think our protection terms are way too long I do feel there is a point here. How can museums and archives fulfill their duty to preserve what they have received in trust while maintaining their duty to provide access to culture?

Then I look at the work done by the Swedish National Heritage Board in relation to this question. They have put a small selection of their images on the Flickr Commons. A mere 274 photographs by Carl Curman (1833-1913).

The photographs have been accessed over 200  000 time since 17 March this year, that’s less than four months! Or 50 000 views per month (K-Blogg).

Besides pushing the almost unknown Carl Curman to a portion of internet fame the project at the Swedish National Heritage Board has brought back to life a set of dead photographs. Image how many times a photograph is seen in it’s lifetime. The average must be depressingly low. The most popular photograph in their project has been viewed 7805 times. Stop. Read the numbers and think. Seven thousand eight hundred and five times.

Stockholm by Carl Curman now seen by one more person: You…

Sure the photo will be ripped off. It will be posted on websites, stored on computers, used in presentations and the name of Carl Curman will be disassociated from the picture he took. Even more certain is that the Swedish Cultural Heritage Board will not be attributed enough for their thankless task of bringing this dead cultural artifact to life. But let us remember the old adage – no good dead goes unpunished.

The role of the caretaker/gatekeeper is, not a they once believed it to be, to prevent access. In the real world, grubby fingers and clumsy handling destroy the real artifact and lose it to the whole world. That is why we should be kept away from the real thing. But in the digital world the same is not true. What the flickr commons shows beyond a doubt is that while digitalization is good, it is nothing without access.

Ask Carl Curman.

Posted on by mklang

Enforcing dress codes

In case anyone missed it President Sarkozy recently decided to attack the Burka

In our country we cannot accept that women be prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity,” Mr Sarkozy said to applause in the parliament’s ceremonial Versailles home. The burka is not a religious sign. It is a sign of subservience, a sign of debasement,” he added. “It will not be welcome on the territory of the French Republic.”

So ok the man has a point. Equality cannot be achieved in a society when one group has the power to enforce dress codes on another group. The intentions behind forcing a sub-group to behave or dress in a special manner is irrelevant. As the saying goes: “the road to hell is paved with good intentions…”

Photo: Stencils Oslo May 2009 by svennevenn (CC BY-NC-SA)

So even we can agree with Sarkozy what can be done? Sarkozy seems to be attempting to regulate the wearing of a specific style of clothes in public. This is not the same as refusing to allow different types of clothes inside public buildings such as schools or courts. Attempting to enforce such a rule would in itself be a form of denial of freedom. Can you imagine police arresting burka wearing women on the street? This would hardly strengthen the image of France as a democracy.

Another question is what other forms of dress would be prohibited? Are we to focus on the fully dressed aspect then maybe wearing hoods, scarves and masks would be considered wrong. On the other hand if we were to see the lack of individual freedom as an important aspect then wouldn’t all the slaves to fashion be violating the intent of the law?

Times Online has a list of dress related regulation:

— In France a law was passed in 2004 banning pupils from wearing “conspicuous” religious symbols at state schools, a move widely interpreted as aimed at the Muslim headscarf

— In Turkey where 99 per cent of the population is Muslim, all forms of Muslim headscarf have been banned in universities for decades under the secular government. In June 2008 the country’s Consitutional Court overruled government attempts to lift the ban, prompting protests

— In Britain guidelines say that the full Islamic veil should not be worn in courts, but the final decision is up to judges. Schools may forge their own dress codes and in 2006, courts upheld the suspension of Aishah Azmi, a Muslim teaching assistant who refused to remove her veil in class

— German states have the option of choosing to ban teachers and other government employees from wearing Muslim headscarves; four have done so

—The Italian parliament in July 2005 approved anti-terrorist laws that make hiding one’s features from the public — including through wearing the burla — an offence

— Tunisia, a Muslim country, has banned Islamic headscarves in public places since 1981. In 2006 authorities began a campaign against the headscarves and began strictly enforcing the ban

— The Dutch Government said in 2007 that it was drawing up legislation to ban burkas, but it was defeated in elections in November and the new centrist coalition said it had no plans to implement a ban

Posted on by mklang

Big brothers birthday

Almost missed the news that last week was the 60th anniversary of the publication of George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. And even though it seems that Huxley is winning the ideological pole position (check out the Neil Postman cartoon), aall birthdays are doubleplusgood.

You can read the full text of 1984 here.

Posted on by mklang

The abbey of Saint Sixtus of Westvleteren

Buying a good beer has never been this complicated! Check out the instructions and the promises you have to make if you would like to buy beer from The abbey of Saint Sixtus of Westvleteren. Amongst the instructions and warnings:

Our beer is sold in limited quantities and the reservations which we accept are always for a particular type of beer. Since we want to serve as many customers as possible, orders are limited to one order per car per per telephone number within any given month.
Anonymous numbers cannot be used.
You yourself must be the consumer. The receipt stipulates that the beer is not to be sold commercially to a third party. We reserve the right to prosecute offences.

Not only are you making promises to the monks – they even reserve the right to prosecute you if you break your promise. What is the religious punishment for lying to a monk?

Posted on by mklang

Copyright in fossils

Some early morning copyright humor from Norway via Olav Torvund‘s blog. Apparently the researcher who found the fossil Ida, Jørn Hurum wants to hold copyright in the fossil (in Norwegian). A quick reminder of what we are talking about here, from the Guardian:

Ida is believed to be the most complete primate fossil ever discovered. She is 95% intact and so well preserved that her tissues, hair and even her stomach contents are visible. By comparison, the much more recent fossil “Lucy” from Ethiopia is only 40% complete.

And for what noble cause does this academic want copyright? Well he tells the newspaper that he wants the exclusive right to put the image on caps, t-shirts and childrens soft toys.

Statements like this should make us copyright speakers think! With all the noise about copyright in society today many people, even highly educated people, just don’t get copyright. They don’t understand how it works today even less why some groups argue that it does not work today.

Hopefully Jørn Hurum and the Museum of Natural history will read Olav blog or be informed by someone else that copyright expires 70 years after the creators death… and may be a tad difficult to apply to a 47 million year old corpse.

Posted on by mklang

Blade Runner & Copyleft

OMG! From the Creative Commons blog:

Ridley Scott, the famed SciFi director of the classic Blade Runner will be producing a new web series based on the film released under our free copyleft license. The series will is initially slated for web release with the possibility of television syndication and will be a project by Ag8.

Read more about the project at the New York Times, on Ag8’s Purefold page, or join up on the FriendFeed discussion.

Posted on by mklang

Robots attack in hostile media

In 2007, a man in Sweden was injured by a industrial robot used for lifting heavy stones. The accident occurred when the man thought that the power was cut off and went inside the security area. The man received head injuries and broken ribs. Now that the matter has been investigated by the Swedish Work Environment Authority and the police, the prosecutor has chosen not to prosecute but to issue a fine of 25 000 kronor.

The exciting thing is the language with which the media chose to present what happened. If the machine had been a drill or a washing machine or a tractor, which caused the damage media would have used a completely different language – if it even had made it into the media.

Since this is Swedish media they are all in Swedish but here are the sources for this post: Dagens Nyheter, Dagens Industri, Norran, Piteå Tidningen, Gefle Dagblad, Sveriges Radio, Ny Teknik & Metro.

But because it is a robot the mainstream media have all chosen to write about the killer robot that attacks with the intention of causing harm. Certain media have even insinuated that such attacks may be coordinated! In the media the machine is given a being, a consciousness and a soul. Which is then developed into a being with the evil intentions rather than a product of design and programming. Like a modern Frankenstein, it is we create beyond our control.

Although industrial robots have long been among us, we want to still see them as exotic. We like to mix them together with the robots that we see in films where they quite often develop thoughts, ideas and feelings in order to finally figure out that we are superfluous and dangerous to their existence. This justifies the use of pre-emtive self-defense. In the world of film we are usually saved by a violent, technology hostile man (almost a luddite, except with guns) who shows that scientists do not understand the meaning of what is being created (see, eg, I, Robot or Terminator Trilogy). It is a paradox that in a technological world the hero that saves us all is an opponent to technology.

Films and media, in these cases, play on dark fears barely hidden in our subconscious. These fears are that we live in a world that we do not control, and a suspicion that those who claim to have control do not really have any control either. In a way this approach to technology and science is similar to our primitive need for religion to explain what we do not know. The difference is that today everybody can find out how things really work. But it’s too much hard work to read and discover the truth – much more fun to attack the robots.

Posted on by mklang

Boyle Public Domain podcast

Here is an interesting podcast of James Boyle on his book The Public Domain (via BoingBoing)

Professor James Boyle describes how our culture, science and economic welfare all depend on the delicate balance between those ideas that are controlled and those that are free, between intellectual property and the public domain —the realm of material that everyone is free to use and share without permission or fee

Intellectual property laws have a significant impact on many important areas of human endeavour, including scientific innovation, digital creativity, cultural access and free speech. And so Boyle argues that, just as every informed citizen needs to know at least something about the environment or civil rights, every citizen in the information age should also have an understanding of intellectual property law.

The Public Domain: enclosing the commons of the mind

MP3 Link

Posted on by mklang

No twittering in court

A post on Slashdot this morning dealt with a juror who posted twitter comments about a trial (while it was in progress) and the effects of this may be to declare the trial a mistrial.

“Russell Wright and his construction company, Stoam Holdings, recently lost a $12 million dollar lawsuit brought by investors. But lawyers for the firm have complained that juror Johnathan Powell’s Twitter comments broke rules when discussing the civil case with the public. The arguments in this dispute center on two points. Powell insists (and the evidence appears to back him up) that he did not make any pertinent updates until after the verdict was given; if that’s the case, the objection would presumably be thrown out. If Powell did post updates during the trial, the judge must decide whether he was actively discussing the case. Powell says he only posted messages and did not read any replies. Intriguingly, the lawyers for Stoam Holding are not arguing so much that other people directly influenced Powell’s judgment, rather that he might have felt a need to agree to a spectacular verdict to impress the people reading his posts.”

This is an interesting example of the way in which new technology practice is clashing with established rules and ideas. During the recent Pirate Bay trial in Stockholm there was a vertible information orgy with live audio feed, spectators twittering from within (and outside) the courtroom and live bloggers en masse – in addition to traditional media channels. Yet the interesting thing was that the audio tape picked up the judge telling individuals in the courtroom that no pictures could be taken. On a least two occaissions the judge asked whether a laptop and a phone was being used to film the proceedings.

Everybody was filmed, photographed and interviewed entering and leaving the courtroom. All the participants were activly seen courting and presenting their cases to the media on the courtroom steps – but no photographs in the courtroom.

When a witness who was to be heard at a later date was discovered in the audience he was asked to leave. Before leaving he asked whether he was allowed to listen to the radio. The judge understood the futility of the rules when he replied – well you cannot stay in here.

The “no images” rule in Sweden or the no communicating in the US are rules which need to be explained logically to the participants. Naturally the principles of justice and equality must be upheld and should not need to be questioned at every turn…

Posted on by mklang