Later, with globalised capitalism, control over copyrighted works became centered in the hands of the media corporations instead of authors and artists. Even as the internet and digital media rendered distinctions between original and copies largely obsolete, changes in the law tried to artificially maintain them. As a result, copyright laws over time have been transformed from their original purpose of regulating the publishing industry to instead regulating its customers, artists and audiences.
Traditionally, copyright was of little relevance to cultural and artistic practice except in the realm of commercial print publishing.
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*Lawrence Liang is the author of 'Guide to Open Content Licenses' published by Piet Zwart Institute with support from Creative Commons. He works with the Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore as a legal researcher and can be contacted at: lawrence@altawforum.org
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By Lawrence Liang*
What Is Free Art License?
Perhaps one of the first initiatives aimed at translating some of the Free Software/Open Source ideas outside of the domain of the software and into the domain of art, this license, describes itself as the license with a Copyleft attitude.
The Free Art License was born out of the meeting 'Copyleft Attitude' in Paris in 2000. These meetings brought together for the first time, computer specialists and free software activists along with contemporary artists and members of the art world. The license allows artist/creators to make their works available freely to the public, and grants them the right to copy, distribute and modify the work if certain conditions are met.
Philosophy: The preamble states that "Whereas current literary and artistic property rights result in restriction of the public's access to works of art, the goal of the Free Art License is to encourage such access". The license is also designed to enable the public to creative use of artworks, therefore reinforcing the idea of the user/producer model of the internet and other digital media. It also recognises that with the birth of the internet, there are greater possibilities of collaboration, shared and distributed production etc., traditional copyright does not facilitate such collaborations. The Free Art License "Also encourages a continuation of the process of experimentation undertaken by many contemporary artists".
The Free Art License advocates an economy appropriate for art - based on sharing, exchange and joyful giving. It says "What counts in art is also and mostly what is not counted".
Rights Granted: An artist/creator using the Free Art License grants the user the following freedoms:
- Freedom to make copies of the work for personal use or the use of others.
- Freedom to distribute the work in any medium. This right is applicable both to modified and unmodified works. The person distributing may do so either for free or for charge for the service.
- Freedom to modify the work as long as the same preconditions as mentioned above are met.
The freedom to distribute and the right to modify are however subject to the following conditions:
The licensee has to attach the license in its entirely or indicate where it can be found.
- Specify the name of the author of the original
- Specify to the recipient where he can access the originals
How Does It Work? The license envisages enabling a contribution of the process of the creation of art. This is counter-posed to an idea of art as simply and end result oriented activity. Therefore it establishes the following model:
Original Work --> Subsequent Works (based on original) --> Communal Work
To ensure that any work that is used under the Free Art License does not get taken out of the public domain, the license prohibits the incorporation of the license into any artwork which is not licensed under the same terms and conditions as the Free Art License. Thus a person who creates a subsequent work based on an original work cannot then attempt to remove it from the public domain. That work has to be licensed under the Free Art License. The Free Art License imposes this restriction not to deny any person his or his contribution or authorial rights but to ensure that in choosing to contribute to the evolution of this work of art, the license/user agrees to give to others the same rights which were also granted to the license.
The Free Art License clearly states that no person has any right to use any of the works without accepting the terms and conditions of the license. The moment they accept then they are bound to follow the terms of the license. Acceptance does not have to be explicitly stated, it can also be stated by means of an act such as copying, distributing or modifying the work.
Why Use the Free Art License? The Free Art License offers a useful legal protocol to prevent abusive appropriation. It will not longer be possible for someone appropriate your work, short-circuiting the creative process to make personal profit from it. Helping yourself to a collective work in progress will be forbidden, as will monopolising the resources of an evolving creation for the benefit of a few. Expressed positively, this is a good license to use to contribute a cultural public domain.
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*Lawrence Liang is the author of 'Guide to Open Content Licenses' published by Piet Zwart Institute with support from Creative Commons. He works with the Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore as a legal researcher and can be contacted at: lawrence@altawforum.org
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