Slashdot Mirror
Who Owns Your Culture?
Galvatron writes "The Maori people of New Zealand are suing Lego for creating a polynesian-themed game without their permission, according to CNN. Ridiculous? You bet. But it's just one example of the kind of thing the Hague Convention could make possible."
The real issue here is of course - who owns the IP involved in a culture - if you as a group owned it before the advent of modern IP laws and have always treated it as belonging to you, handed down from generation to generation do you get grandfathered in (perhaps in a common-law sort of way) as having a different sort of IP that is owned communally and is passed on differently.
NZ has struggled with these issues on a number of fronts for the past few decades - communally owned tribal land is another good example - plus there are many other issues in and around what was promised in the orignal treaty where the Maori ceded sovreignty to the British crown - basicly stuff was promised by the Brits and those promises were not kept - this is slowly being made right - at great expense (think of the interest alone on stuff that was taken from people 150 years ago) and gnashing of teeth on both sides (though in general I think it's a positive process) - what we are seeing in this article is yet another skirmish in that process.
"The New Zealand Story" was a great game, but the depiction of our national bird as a yellow chicken irritated me immensely.
The brown kiwi is brown, it has a long beak, cannot fly and lays huge eggs. This is what it's known for. It is not a yellow chicken. There are many cartoon depictions of kiwis (e.g. the TV kiwi who played when the TV channel switched off for the night) and even stylised kiwis (like the ones on recycling logos). They were not yellow chickens.
Warner Brothers with their kiwi depiction (in Tazmania) was bad also.
And USians seem to like abbreviating the word kiwifruit to kiwi (well it was originally chinese gooseberry anyway).
Grump grump grump :-( yes I've had a bad day today. Oh well, I'm off to see the US navy win the battle in "Pearl Harbour" (disney version) :-)
where apparently Polynesians are a lot fewer on the set than they are in real life.
So successful methodology in warfare is the measure of civilization, even if the tactics fail in the long run? C'mon! Even accepting that the Maori "had carbine rifles before the english" (presumably it helped, not having to go through all those bothersome intermediary steps such as developing steel)... 1) How many heads are you counting? Any metric "per head" is going to look a hell of a lot more impressive among the Maori than among, say, the backward heathen Chinee. (But Heaven help us if they ever jump up and down in unison.) 2) What "technology" are you using per head? Running water? Electricity? Broadband DSL? "It supports buildings, provides replacement bones, preserves food, brings power to the needy... it's metals." (A message brought to you by the National Metals Council.) Having said all that, I am not about to claim that the Maori are a "primitive" culture. I don't know within light-years what the Maori culture has produced, but I do know that they're made up of humans, and if there's one thing we upright apes are good at it is creating culture. I'll bet any money that there are cultural and societal innovations amongst the Maori that Western Europeans never thought of. I'll even bet that there are ideas among them that would substantially benefit WEs if we/they ever really took the time to think about them. Technology in general is one area, maybe the only area, where Western European culture (already one major misnomer in its own right) is totally and absolutely in the lead. To claim that the Maori are "not primitive" is correct; to claim that they are not primitive *because* they use, per capita, more of a Western European resource than WE does... is just sad and unconvincing, IMO. Dr. Frog
Every primary school I'm aware of teaches Maori, and all the secondary schools where I grew up had it as an option (and Taranaki is hardly a bastion of Maori culture).
Disney's at least as good as 'Pravda' at reinventing history and truth for pragmatic reasons- and they are believed every bit as unquestioningly. This bears watching.
The British suing the US/Canada/Ireland/Rest of the World for use of the English Language?
The Mexican Government suing Taco Bell for Culture Infringement for their spicy delacicies?
The Arabian peoples suing the Western world for use of arabic numbers?
When does culture become intellecutal property? If this is the case, when does it expire? Even Windows Source Code has an experation date.
Secret windows code
Clinton made me a Republican. Bush made me a Libertarian. Trump is making me question reality.
True, but the modern pizza (i.e., since the 17th century) is not possible without the tomato of the New World as discussed here .
OpenSourcerers
There is an interesting page here where the various versions of the persecuted heroine story are online. Apparently there are hundreds of such folktales but the earliest one documented was written down by Charles Perrault (as you say) in Histoires ou contes du temps passé, avec des moralités: Contes de ma mère l'Oye (Paris, 1697).
The Brothers Grimm version first appeared in Kinder- und Hausmärchen, 1st ed. (Berlin, 1812), v. 1, no. 21.
OpenSourcerers
Your're right. Senet is claimed as a trademark by IGT games. I wonder if Sierra/Impressions had to pay IGT so that it could incorporate "Senet Houses" in Pharoah.
If this holds up, they'll soon find themselves being sued by pirates, medieval knights, firemen, and the association of people with bumpy yellow heads.
you don't think the 10,000 tourists the silly rob roy and brave heart movies spawned is not some form of payment ? Neither film crew spent more than 2 weeks in scottland, mostly filmed in Ireland and the states.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Though the Scotts' clan may lay claim to the design they've never tried to stop anyone else from using them. This is just plain silly and the Maori are going to look even stupider to the rest of the world. Though I bet they get a lot of support from France and Quebec :)
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
rrrrridges :)
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Lack of culture is why we have s HUGE gang problem with kids out seeking an IDENTITY that has been stripped from them by corporate america. While I won't argue differing cultures can produce friction, they also produce the MOST inovations socially, and a hugely diverse and balanced people. All good things in my book.
BTW the lameness filter is just that LAME
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
And see if the state of New York sue us. Or let one based off an Italian Mobster in Sicily. Bull fighter in Spain? Let see who sue us.
These have distinct culture references. Are they property of the overall culture. Can they stop other cultures from borrowing ideas from them. What about the cultures that they came before them? They borrow ideas from them. So do they really own thier own culture if it was derived from another?. My only question is were would it stop.
So we can have Disney sued by both the Germans and French.
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Infuriate left and right
How about Germans suing Disney for Cinderella? Would Disney then blame it on the brothers Grimm?
Will Americans sue Mark Twain's heirs for not asking permission?
Will Jews sue Christians for Jewish heritage in the Bible?
How about anyone who has ever had a newspaper article written about them? Go sue the newspaper!
And my favorite: my name, my financial records, my address, all that info -- seems to be my IP, eh? Except of course my name, which is part my parents' IP, and grandparents, etc. And the street name, which is the heritage of not only the guy it was named after, but everybody else living on it. And the city name, state, country, etc.
I don't see how any of these are anything more than just the next step in pushing IP ownership. Pretty soon all info will be so tightly controlled, no one will be able to speak or write without violating somebody's IP, and in most cases, the true ownership will be so hard to pin down, there will be a zillion people suing each other as to who actually owns the IP! I imagine we will have to put royalties into escrow accounts until that's settled.
I say let's go for it, get IP rights so twisted they will have to be thrown out altogether.
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Infuriate left and right
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It looks like the Native Americans are starting to get their own back. The Great Plains are turning fallow and the proportion of N.A. population is zooming. They'll own a few states again in a few years.
Veteran, Bermuda Triangle Expeditionary Force, 1992-1951
Man, those Samoans are a surly bunch.
--
Ben "You have your mind on computers, it seems."
Actually, Mattel should sue Britney's parents, or perhaps humanity in general for creating people who
look like the dolls they sell.
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NEWS FLASH:Monty Python has been served notice that the heirs of King Arthur are going to sue them for creating an Arthurian-themed movie without the expressed consent of the family.
grub
Yes, I know Arthur was a legend :)
Trolling is a art,
I'm jamaican and I coudl probable site a dozen simular infringments on my "culture" many of them defermations if you ask me. I forget the name but a certain Steven Segal movie that represented jamaicans as gang related drug dealers who smoked weed and were all rastafarians. to be honest I dont know that one can sue someone over defermation, misrepresentation, or un sanctioned use of ones culture but expecially with the way hollywood chooses to represent many cultures I think this is very fear. the only draw back is where would we get all the lawers for these suits, and who would collect.
Careful about Buddy - AOL already owns that... (sort of).
I dunno about you, but if I were a member of an indigenous people which had been decimated in the past couple of centuries by various effects of European contact, I'm not sure I'd want some Danish toy company commodifying my identity either.
:P
You missed the point. It's ridiculous to think there could actually be a legal basis to such a suit.
In a way, it's rather sublime. It's intellectual property taken to the extreme. I almost wish this would happen, as it would provide a great example of what's wrong with IP laws.
Of course, I _almost_ wish it... with the way things have been going as of late, they might actually win...
By this same standard, any game which features characters with american names, and is in english, with allusions to the american culture, should be under similar scrutiny.
I'm sure that if the Lego were a Polynesian company, this wouldn't be an issue either.
Though I don't know where the Scottish films were made
:)
Like all good american films, it was made right here in Toronto!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
'Smile' (tm) *almost* makes sense when you compare it to one of McDonald's other trademarks:
'Hey' (tm)
as an aside, does anyone recall a site that hosted a feature that would randomly display McD's trademarks, as well as one that would display a random domain owned by Procter & Gamble? It was mind-blowingly inane.
--kevin
vOv
Hawaii has polynesian cultural roots....and that's part of the US.. so wouldn't that give the US de-facto rights to the polynesian culture?
Remember you can file just about any suit you want. It's not getting it laughed out of court that's the hard part.
...and for a prime example of such stupidity see
UNITED STATES ex rel. Gerald MAYO v. SATAN AND HIS STAFF
on the Wacky Court Cases site. Its an old item, but worth a chuckle if you've never seen it before.
--
Actually it is rocket science...
What would American courts care about GPL infringements in Germany?
In most cases they shouldn't. If there's a GPL infringement in Germany you should sue (or not) in Germany. Your question almost seem to imply that the American courts should be involved in such circumstances, why?
Because the holder of the license is in America. Historically, people often sue foreigners in their own country, and then expect the other country to agree..
Well a great many of these historical people will have been gravely dissapointed then. At best you then have to sue again in the person's own jurisdiction to get any money because your own courts simply won't have the power to seize their assets, regardless of any ruling they may make.
This whole discussion should be invalidated by a new first corollary to Godwin's Law. Such a Corollary should read:
The moment someone mentions "Culture", and "Lawsuit" in the same sentence they should be taken out and whipped with a wet noodle. If a noodle isn't available then a plastic spork from Taco Bell will do the trick.
Why? Because there is no way to win, no point to make, and no facts to prove. In this case the Maori are stupid, Lego is stupid, the whole article is stupid.
More to the point though is that it is odd anybody should have found that the Maori suing Lego for Culteral Copyright Infringement should ever have made it into Slashdot in the first place. If the Maori had decided to sue John Deere would Slashdot have cared?
Beware the wood elf!!!
I think a lot of what's being said here is pretty off-base. I think the Maori people have every right to complain about the misappropriation and commoditization of cultural symbols. Where they go wrong is in treating those symbols as intellectual property. It's not. Words and images etc. already in common use - in any language - are not copyrightable and that's that. You can't claim copyright retroactively.
IMO Lego should offer to donate some of the profits from sale of the game to charities that help Polynesian people - not just Maori, BTW. Suits like this are the stock in trade of a few opportunistic pricks who have spent years taking advantage of their brown skin to line their own pockets with extortionate lawsuits, ruining the NZ economy in the process and generally doing exactly nothing to preserve Maori culture or improve the lot of the average Maori on the street. By making an offer to contribute to legitimate Polynesian-indigene causes and organizations, Lego would both be performing a culturally sensitive humanitarian act and showing up the charlatans for what they are (when they refuse to accept such a settlement because it doesn't make them rich).
Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,
Quote of note:
I'd side with the Maori if Lego is actually trying to obtain rights to Polynesian words and I'd side with Lego otherwise.
*** Work like a king, command like a slave, create like a dog.
There are folks in the US who get pissed because Disney commodifies traditional western cultural symbols, fairy tales, and works of art (Hercules, Pocahontas, Hunchback of Notre-Dame), and I know I'm one of them.
Disney dosn't even stop with things which started life as fiction. e.g. "Pearl Harbour" contains a fair amount of rewritings of history.
They don't necessarily blatantly misrepresent something of cultural significance, but they remove many of the 'difficult points' to make it more accessible.
The Brother's Grimm fairy tales probably wouldn't make it past the censor in their original form
Unfortunately, when you do that you often remove a lot of the very subtle but highly important elements of it that you've overlooked in your 'popularization.'
Film makers don't just take things out they also like to add things. So you end up with films full of Hollywood stereotypes.
Well, the crud that is sold in Dominos, Pizza Hut, Papa Johns and other places (Uno) is an American invention, since none of those remotely resemble Real Pizza(tm). Anyone who knows pizza knows that Ray's is the Only True Pizaa (all hail). And knowing this, I move to pizza hell (Minnesota), where people think Papa Johns is gourmet...
That and the lack of good Wings this far west is incredibly dissapointing...
--
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
MS also brought you 'Bob'(tm) and 'Windows'(tm)(c)(r)(sm)(ayb), as well as 'Start'(tm). Though I'm sure none of those words are nearly as common in everyday usage as McDonald's 'Smile'(tm)...
--
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
Trade Mark
Lego have stated that they have only applied for trade mark protection for the name 'Bionicle' and not any of the Polynesian names quoted in the cnn.com story.
Arrogance ./ readers to understand that those cultures with a unique identity have a desire to protect that uniqueness.
I don't expect the US
Your ancestors ran away from their homeland, your nation has assimilated many old world cultures into what you now delude yourselves to be your unique culture.
The USA was built using slave labour and completely ignored the existence of your own indigenous people so you shouldn't be surprised that some nations adhere to the rule of law.
New Zealand is different, we never had a lawless wild west. The Treaty of Waitangi established between the Crown and Maori tribes in 1840 is the founding document of our nation and granted Maori full citizenship with all of the accompaning the rights and obligations. I don't remember the indigenous indian nations getting citizenship but were abused and almost wiped out by the American settlers (and your government of the day).
Lego are mistaken, they have made (what appears to me to be) an honest error in judging the degree of reaction to their intention.
Regards Sinesurfer A Nerd is someone who lives for technology, A Geek is someone who lives for technology and loves it
Well, I see two opposing sides to this, from the Maori point of view. First of all, white man has pretty much caused the loss of their culture in New Zealand. They are desparately struggling to regain knowledge of their language.
On the other hand, Maori culture != polynesian culture. It is possible to discuss all sorts of "Polynesian Culture" without mentioning anything specifically about "Maori Culture".
---gralem
to quote Drew Carey
"You want a Politically correct joke? A person and another person went to a place."
We're slowly de-evolving into a everything neutral place where we can't use common language to describe anything.
I think you misspelled "Atlantic City."
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | http://www.infamous.net/
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Where does it say this? All the article says is that they're using Maori words and oral stories, it doesn't say they're trademarking anything.
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
Hey, come on. Our Government has been pulling racist crap for the last 15 years that has given the local Maori the idea that they are some sort of gods, and they own and can sue for anything that could possibly be vaguely connected with their culture.
Unfortunately, this means that Maori vote for them, so they aren't going to be stopping it any time soon.
So don't judge the whole country by the arrogant actions of an unfortunate minority. I *hope* any international courts will have the sense to throw this out (although I think local courts, unfortunately, wouldn't).
Oh please...
I don't want to learn the language, and I'm glad my school at least gave the option of either Maori or French.
It is unaesthetic, has no practical value, and (like all Polynesian languages) it has a very limited set of phonemes and vocabulary, so you just can't express most of the ideas common to a Western culture. Have a look at how many "Maori" words are just English words re-spelt.
If you want to learn it, by all means go ahead -- it's easier to learn languages in your own time than via a school anyway -- but don't force everybody else to.
The treaty doesn't give them jack. It gives the Europeans all their land and gives the Maori "spiritual" rights. What's going on now is that people are arguing over just exactly what the people had in mind when they wrote the initial treaty, and rewriting history for political point-scoring.
One day we will get over this and actually move forwards..
Lego aren't trademarking any of the words in the game (as the NZ Herald article tells). They have only trademarked "Bionicle", which is not Polynesian.
More relevantly, why should you have rights to a culture that is yours?
Most cultures would be happy to have knowledge of themselves spread around the world, especially in educating children.
Why must Maori always be the difficult ones?
Wish I had some mod points..:)
This is very true. There are the tribal 'leaders' (I mean business wannabes) who deal with money "on behalf" of the tribe, when in fact most tribe members never see a single cent of the dealings. Essentially, Maori bargaining these days is just big business between 12 companies and the Government and really nothing to do with culture at all.
What would American courts care about GPL infringements in Germany?
Because the holder of the license is in America. Historically, people often sue foreigners in their own country, and then expect the other country to agree..
I agee. It's not only that these companies commodify these cultures for their own commercial gain, but that they also often completely bastardize what they commodify. The Maori language has been a social and political battleground for the Moari for a long time now and i'm sure that it pisses them off that these guys can just use it as the basis for a game of all things and probably without any consultation for historical or cultural accuracy.
Dumbass. Get your facts straight. They are considering tradmarking the names.
Nevrar
Intellectual property is a threat to our species because it forces people to compete against one another for selfish motives as opposed to bringing them together. It forces us to constantly reinvent the wheel so as to get around someone else's IP. It's an immense waste and duplication of effort. Worse, it makes us hate and resent one another. It's a symptom of our collective madness as a species.
In my opinion, the only property worthy of the name is tangible property. If you can't lock it up or build a fence around it, it does not belong to you. Once you release something like music, ideas, software, novels, etc..., you cannot prevent people from copying it and using it for their own benefit. An example is Brazil where US patented aids drugs are copied freely to save lives. Tens of millions of copies of Windows are being used free around the world. There is not a damn thing MS can do about it.
The wealth of the earth is the earth and what it contains. The only way to ensure that people get a fair share is to make sure that everybody is guaranteed possesion of a piece of the earth, an estate if you please. Then it should be up to us to increase the value of our piece as we see fit, either through cooperation with others or not. This would bring freedom and eliminate exploitation. Any other system is slavery.
The Maori should be happy that Lego is using their culture as a game theme. It's just one of the ways the best aspects of a culture are preserved. They should not adopt the bad habits of Europeans. After all, were there any IP laws among the Maori before the Europeans arrived? But then again, I do not blame (or anybody else) for trying to get an advantage in a sick and dying system. If Lego is allowed to make money using IP laws, why shouldn't they?
...by building gigantic Lego casinoes on their reservations in New Zealand which only the Maori are allowed to own and operate.
In seriousness, however, one wonders whether the motivation for "protecting their culture" derives from a sense that to merchandize the Maori traditions / icons / language / etc. actually cheapens the traditions (et al), or that only they, the Maori, should be allowed to merchandise and profit from their culture?
I suspect it is the latter. I visited New Zealand for my honeymoon, and certainly saw a lot of signs that they were comfortable profiting from the "curiousity trade" around their culture. I don't say this cynically or dismissively- they were quite gracious to tourists and more than hospitable. One is left to assume that at this point, their culture itself is one of the only things with which they are able to generate an economic return. They can choose to remain a part of the Maori tribal community, and generate decent livings by simply preserving their culture and allowing tourists to 1) pay to be a part of a giant Maori banquet 2) buy various handmade Maori crafts 3) etc... OR they can leave and join the New Zealand community (which many do) and get jobs in the service sector (cab drivers, hotel workers, retail, etc...)
Whatever the case, there may be a bright side to this whole thing. It would seem that perhaps there is a chance that this might ultimately result in a ban on Styx's 1978 album "Pieces of Eight", which featured the stone-faces of Easter Island prominently on the cover, and included a hokey-mystical-pseudo-prog-rock instrumental called "Aku Aku" at the end. In any case, it gratuitiously uses Maori symbols and words, to no coherent end. I find great joy in the hope that perhaps this Maori legal wrangling might ultimately result in the removal of this album from circulation, most particularly because it contains Dennis DeYoung's cornball classic of self-affirmation "I'm Okay". THAT deserves to be banned.
Then again, maybe banning that album wouldn't be such a good idea, since it might result in an INCREASE in the sales for "Kilroy Was Here", a concept album about a future in which albums are banned and rockers forced underground.
Clearly, there is a lot riding on the outcome of this issue. Don't let it end. I'm begging you. Don't let it end this way-hey-hayyyyyyy.
Didn't American lawyers invent the cultural phenomenon of "suing anyone you can over anything at all"? Does this mean that the American Bar Association should be suing the Maori for violating their culture and traditions?
I wonder if any signatory countries to the Hague Convention allow that and would be willing to offer me a fair price for that service. I might be interested. I'd be happy to license it for a reasonable price, along with an editorial veto if I don't like the context, say in a mailing list. Of course, my license would not include any right to rent it or resell it.
The net will not be what we demand, but what we make it. Build it well.
their polynesian sauce (their version of sweet-and-sour) is the best for their nuggets!
Wheeeee
Any attempt to use the cultural heritage of my people(s) will hereby be an act of infringement.
I'll sue... No, really!
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
This makes a person take pause, particularly when one considers the games with which many American's grew up. Does this mean that New Yorkers could take offense at Monopoly (the game (and note the nice URL), not the practice)? What about the different cultures represented in the game Age of Empires (Huns, Aztecs, Mayans, Koreans and Spanish in the recent edition). Would this be the a way for people to kick Microsoft in the shin?
Truthfully, without knowning more about the Lego game or the laws that are being cited to pressure Lego, I can not say a great deal. However, it does seem extremely odd to assume that the Maori "peoople" are all in agreement over this.
Specifically, I wonder what their points of contention are? Usage of "names that sound Maori" is prob would not stand up well as a legal arguement. However, it seems just as silly to think that using images of people with traditional tatoo/painting patterns (as many Maori have) would become problematic. What of the American Indians? Would they be able to *legally* prevent the use of "indian" images. (Note: there are a great number of debates on this topic with US sports teams, however, afaik, none of these discussions are being handled as legal matters.)
All that said, assume that Lego continues and the issue is brought to trail. If the trial was lost, what penalties could be levied? Aside from removing the game from market, who might be the recipient of damages? A class action representing all Maoris?
Or, is all this legal rumbling simply a way to gain exposure to the issue, without any real expectation of legal action?
While we're at it, I'd like to sue Jon Katz for having the temerity to think that his poorly researched writings are in some way representative of the 'geek culture' of which I am a part.
AFAICS Lego are not stealing or commodifying anyone's identity, they are just using a couple of Maori/Polynesian words (nothing specific to the Maori language at all) in a ficitional game
They aren't just using a couple of words, what the major complaint is about the fact that they are using some of our legends as a basis for their game.
While I have no problem with them using the story (which could almost be from any culture), its the combination of the story and the use of the words that is offending. It makes it a little too copied, infringing on our identity.
That said my tribe isn't one of the ones complaining (yes, IAANZ of the Ngapui nation/tribe).
Point of fact: at 300,000, there are more Maori now than there were before the European Devils arrived.
However non of us are true Maori any more. We all have European blood in our ancestory somewhere.
As it was the Maori blood stock had been decreased so low, that the only method of survival was to interbreed with the Europeans.
Its took over 100 years to build the Maori numbers back up past the point they had been at the arrival of the europeans.
The Maori are degenerate and disgusting niggers.
Wrong. The Maori are of polynesian descent not african (ok - so we may be somewhere way back).
My skin barely looks like I'm a tanned Pakeha (thats european to non-Maori speakers).
If you want to know what most Maori look like (as a generalisation) go to http://www.culture.co.nz/portraits/
. . . and I don't respect primitive cultures.
The Maori aren't a primitive culture. They had carbine rifles before the english, they used trench warfare before anyone else did.
At the battle of Ohaiwai (probably not spelled correctly), they wiped out a 3rd of the British Army in less than 5 minutes!
The English wrote that they had won - because they had the Pa (Fort). The Maori had retreated into the bush and were fighting using Guerrilla warfare, something the British didn't understand yet.
They lost the later land battles because they were losing numbers due to disease (brought in by the Europeans), and the fact that the English could just bring more people in to replace those they lost.
Nowdays as a people we use more technology (per head) than just about any other race. We have more internet usage (again per head) than most other races.
There are folks in the US who get pissed because Disney commodifies traditional western cultural symbols, fairy tales, and works of art (Hercules, Pocahontas, Hunchback of Notre-Dame)
:o)
Not only in the US
In fact, what's really annoying is not their ripping-off of foreign cultures. After all, culture is meant to be shared. No, the really annoying thing is that they never, ever mention the origins of their "creations".
In other words, making a movie about Notre-Dame de Paris is okay, but not even citing Victor Hugo's name once is most definitely NOT ! -and that's what really pissed us about the Hunchback.
And I think it's pretty much the same thing with these Maori words: the Polynesians would be much happier with Lego's idea if the company had actually mentioned the Polynesian origin of these names. But they didn't. Take nice-souding words and just pretend they were born out of the genius of your marketing department.
You were talking about Disney movies; I wonder how many Americans think that Walt Disney actually invented Snow-White and Cinderella...
("What, you mean, he didn't ?")
Thomas Miconi
Britney spears will sue Mattel because they did not ask her permission before creating a woman with fantastically large plastic breasts.
I dunno about you, but if I were a member of an indigenous people which had been decimated in the past couple of centuries by various effects of European contact, I'm not sure I'd want some Danish toy company commodifying my identity either.
-carl
. We've got computers, we're tapping phone lines, you know that ain't allowed - Talking Heads, "Life During Wartime"
Good, maybe the Native Americans can sue the Cleveland Indians and finally put an end to their racist mascot.
A person does not dress up like a police officer and walk down the street, that's most likely to be illegal where you live (It sure is here).
We're not talking about impersonating police officers, or Maori. We're talking about a doll; a likeness. It's not illegal to make dolls of police officers, and nobody is talking about impersonating Maori.
Ignorance.
Fine; I'm ignorant and you've educated me well. It's been a while since I was last in NZ.
So you're telling me that the Maori have plenty of representation in the government, you're doing fine on the land confiscation issue, and the preservation of your culture through educating ignorant Pakeha like me, both locally and on the other side of the planet, is going well.
Sounds like you're doing great, overall. I'm truly happy to hear that, no sarcasm. Remind me, then, what exactly the problem is with a toy company making dolls and toys with a Polynesian likeness and theme?
TomatoMan
-- http://frobnosticate.com
I dunno about you, but if I were a member of an indigenous people which had been decimated in the past couple of centuries by various effects of European contact, I'm not sure I'd want some Danish toy company commodifying my identity either.
I know I feel pretty commodified by the Ken doll.
OK, I'm being facetious, and since I'm at the top of fhe food chain, I can only say so much. But this whole thing is patently ridiculous and I'm not the slightest bit worried about it becoming a reality. Once you start down that slippery slope, where do you stop? Are we allowed to TALK about Maoris without infringing on their culture? Write about them? Where's the line? It's absurd. It's a short step from here to banning black Barbies. Why? What is gained by doing that?
Your identity is not compromised when someone makes a doll that looks like you. Surely Maoris have more important battles to fight than this one. How about seeking more representation in the NZ parliament? How about addressing questions of land confiscation? How about preserving Maori language and culture through sharing and outreach, rather than trying to establish a stamp of unenforceable "ownership" over whatever incredibly vague notion of "likeness" they're trying to tie this thing to?
TomatoMan
-- http://frobnosticate.com
Let's sue Matt Groening for creating an American culture-themed TV show without the express permission of the U.S. government . . .
As a geek I should be consulted and compensated. I will also sue major hollywood studios for the portrayal of geeks in film, because it infringes on my intellectual property rights to geek language and culture.
Make sure that you also get an apology for The Net and Hackers, and for the technical abomination known as Mission Impossible. 686 RISC chip powered Apple laptop my ass.
All the blather about colonial exploitation aside, wouldn't you be pissed if someone tried to trademark a word or idiom from your culture?
"Now introducing 'Dude'(tm), the linguistic innovation from Microsoft, the company that also brought you 'Buddy'(tm), 'Radical'(tm), and 'Gnarly'(tm)!!! Don't worry, you can still use these words in your head, in dreams or other thoughts, but if you use them in any written or oral form, you'll have to pay us a small usage fee."
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
The article presents the information as though it is equally invasive of some "generic" Polynesian culture. I'd like to point out that I'm from New Zealand, and most of the words quoted in the article are actually specific Maori words. The Easter Islanders share a very similar language despite massive geographic difference, as they share a probably-similar expansion point from the ancestral central Polynesian point, believed to be the Marquesas Islands by most scholars.
What I'm pointing out here is that, at best, a few cultures have been ripped off. At worst, one has been completely. I don't really believe that the Maori or Easter Islanders have any more right to restitution from the Danes than do the people of Scotland for what the Americans have done with Braveheart or Rob Roy, but I do believe that at least some measure of homage is warranted in all these cases. Presumably local economies benefit when films are made in their areas* which would do alot to quell protests in most Hollywood productions. One wonders how the American Indians feel about the wholesale ripoffs of their culture that have been going on for a hundred years, however.
*Though I don't know where the Scottish films were made
toeslikefingers.com - because
Millions of home owners all over the world were dealt cease and decist orders for the habitation of their homes.
Apparently the likeness of bricks to legos clearly infringed on shape copyrights currently heald by Lego corp.
Aluminum siding prices have skyrocketed, and raw lumber prices have increased 5-fold. This economic activity is predicted to boost the markets, which have been weighed down by tech stocks recently.
"There is no knowledge that is not power"
Mandatory Hitchhiker's quote:
"...most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd, because on the whole it wasnt't the small greem pieces of paper that were unhappy.
And so the problem remained; lots of the people were mean, and most of them were miserable, even the ones with digigal watches.
...And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change..."
Yes, we are crazy. As Arthur Dent once said, "I think I'll go mad now".
(I just read all 5 books and the short story in the trilogy last week....)
Fish
Well, Lary Wall is, in fact, off his rocker, but we all knew that...
Fish
The submittor should have read the article more carefully.
That's Lay's OS.
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Ceci n'est pas une sig.
Litigious idiots are, unfortunately, a recognized feature of Western culture. Therefore, his suit violates my IP.
Where did you read this? The article mentions nothing about it. The case is even more ludicrous when you realize that the Maori's threatened suit rests almost entirely on these similar words. Take a look at bionicle.com: the game is about an island "at some distant point in the future", populated by what look like some sort of mutant, mask-wearing cyborgs. So the law-suit is about Lego's taking particular elements of maori culture? The estate of J.R.R. Tolkien is screwed (theft from Norse and Anglo-Saxon traditions), then, as is National Geographic (theft from pretty much everybody to sell their nifty magazine).
Of course, the sad thing is, there seems to be enough precedent. "Senet", the name of an ancient Egyptian board-game, is a registered trademark of some gaming company ('course, they don't have to worry about lawsuits....).
Absurd! This is Absurd!
"Oh Bother", said the Borg, "We've assimilated Pooh."
Personally, I think it's time to Open Source everything, but I'm not holding my breath for that to happen.
Some don't mind, others are actively protesting sodas like Medicine Man. Quite ironic, actually.
It doesn't say that anywhere in the article, where did you read that? Besides, companies trademark English words all the time. (read: Windows, Mobile, Ruffles)
Is you would support suing anyone who makes a fingerpainting of the Mona Lisa? Besides which, this is a GAME, not an educational tool, and it apparently has to do with cyborgs.
The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
Again this is just a few lawyers trolling using the court system.
Remember you can file just about any suit you want. It's not getting it laughed out of court that's the hard part.
Culture is the quintessence of "public domain". This will go nowhere fast, unless LEGO decides the 'bad publicity' is more costly than just giving in.
Apparently, the linux community, in a move to protect their culture, has decided to sue slashdot.org for their use of words such as "linux," "slashdot," and "Andover." No comment on violations of the GPL.
For many of the South Pacific Islands there are very few natural resources. Increasingly there are attempts to find ways to protect symbols of identity, cultural practice or biological significance, possibly with a view to licensing them, as a way of supplementing meagre national incomes. Amongst some of the more tangible examples are the licensing of an Australian company to study Tongan DNA and potential licensing fees deriving from research of ethnobotany and traditional medicines.
The governments of the Pacific region are attempting to draft legislation to protect the traditional knowledge and expressions of culture unique to this region. We have in the past seen big business use the legal system to steal rights from the peoples of the Pacific. Perhaps this will go some way to redress the balance.
The preceding line was intentionally left blank.
But no all cultures are like that.
Some people get very offended when you hack there culture to bits, especialy just to make money, when you don't even give a toss about how they feel, respect, or even try to understand there culture.
And what exactly is your idea of sharing cultures? It's not like that game/or the lego set, will be historicly accurate, or even mention any cultural values. It's just ripping of bits of someone elses culture.
Well, you can't make money off a parody. So unless Lego are going to give those sets away...
I'm sure they would have if Star Trek had accually used alot of words, phases and names from the scientology crap. But IFAIK, they haven't.
I'm a (white) New Zealander. Do I have de-facto rights to the Maori culture? No.
Why? Because I'm not Maori.
Why should I have rights to a culture that is not mine?
Anyway. I belive the people making it are in Denmark.
Really? Unless something has happend in the last 2 years. There wasn't even an option to learn Maori at my (public) school when I was there. French, Japaness where compulsary to a certian grade. And Spanish and German where introduced latter on. But never Maori. Not our own native language.
The rest of what you said is true. But I think Maori are looking for more respect internationaly. I think there seems to be a thing where that feel like they are being used as a cheap marketing gimmic to wow the tourists.
The Indians demand royalties on every chess set ever sold!
They are suing because Lego is trademarking Maori words for use in the game. Sheesh.
I'll sue this website on the basis they have created a geek-theme website without my permission. As a geek I should be consulted and compensated.
I will also sue major hollywood studios for the portrayal of geeks in film, because it infringes on my intellectual property rights to geek language and culture.
for taking our posts and compiling them into a book; how the Hell can New Zealand sue Legos for anything?
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This
So if created/written/composed by literate western man it deserves protection, if created by illiterate eastern tribe "it belongs to humanity"?
but where does *education of children* fit into this discussion of intellectual property? lego has done something good, in my opinion - they've created something at least *vaguely* culturally accurate to portray a Maori or Polynesian group.
Pretty darn "vague," if you ask me. Unless the Maori really are bignasty elemental-robotic dudes who come from meteorites?
My son got a Lego "Bionicle" comic recently, and I read it. It was clear to me that they took some words and "sounds" from Polynesian languages and maybe some cultural ideas such as the power and importance of masks, but all in all Bionicle is an all-out science fiction/fantasy. It's about as closely connected with Polynesian culture as Star Wars is with Medieval Europe or Taoism. I wouldn't call this any sort of portrayal of Maori or Polynesian culture.
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WWW.TETSUJIN.ORG
- - - -
The real Tetsujin 28 is a giant robot.
Once I read a very insightful comment somewhere online. It was:
To share a common future, we all need to give up a little of our past.
It's the people who aren't willing to give anything up who are spoiling it for the rest of us. I will never understand people who are so savagely protective of their ethnicity. Having an identity is GREAT, sure, but you also have to fit into a SOCIETY FULL OF DIFFERENT PEOPLE. This involved COMPROMISE.
Maybe I just don't get it because I am another white-descended American, an orphan of a bankrupt culture. (as Hans said in Die Hard... doh, I just proved my cultural bankruptcy, I used a Bruce Willis movie reference!)
Can you imagine the reaction if there were two guaranteed spots for whites?
We grapple with the same problems in the states. It is interesting for me to read about this in another country. FWIW I am with you, I think those policies taint the accomplishments of the people they are trying to protect.
In much of the US there is also a very weird stigma about white culture. The vocal and organized racist groups we have like the Ku Klux Klan sure don't help matters of course...
Anyway, where I grew up, in Southern California (a place where non-whites are the majority of the population), there was simply no way to express any kind of 'white pride' or interest in the culture of your European ancestors. As a testament to my conditioning, I am actually cringing as I type the words 'white pride' again. In high school there was a club for every ethnicity you could think of, except any white ones. A fascinating double standard. (not like I even care about the culture of my white ancestors personally, but I dislike those kind of double standards.)
I recently moved to Seattle, in Washington State. Unlike LA, nearly everyone here is white -- which is extremely strange for me. Even weirder, there are symbols of European culture all over the place... I see freaking Swedish flags hanging from supermarkets, and I think I even heard Swedish being spoken out in public. This sort of thing did NOT happen in SoCal, and I am in an extreme state of culture shock. The only place I ever saw a Swedish flag in Los Angeles was on a Volvo repair shop, where it still looked exotic.
If saying that this situation is wrong makes me racist, then f%$# it, I'm a racist, and proud of it.
It makes you clear-thinking. And if saying THAT makes ME racist, I'll see you in hell, pal.
I think the WW2 veterans have a better case against the movie Pearl Harbor.
If corporations can 'own' ridiculous things like sentences and pictures why not let peole 'own' their culture ?
__
L.
No, you missed the point. He looked like a frigging gnu.. IRL, would you be attracted to a woman covered in hair, and resembled a wildebeast?? I've seen more ridiculous things in my time..
Why do I keep typing pythong?
This is what i was hoping for in Shrek, something that didn't do what a disneyfied fairytale does with being completely predictable and end up being stupid. The orignal childrens book Shrek did a great job of this.
the movie kept some of the same themes, but disneyfied the whole second half of the story (with the love interest) making that part just as boring as any other love story.
This is what i was hoping for in Shrek, something that didn't do what a disneyfied fairytale does with being completely predictable and end up being stupid. The orignal childrens book Shrek did a great job of this.
the movie kept some of the same themes, but disneyfied the whole second half of the story (with the love interest) making that part just as boring as any other love story.
Somebody just made a stupid movie this year called "Dude, Where's My Car?". Does that lock up the trademark on the word "dude"? Nope.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
When I was younger there was a great pressure to preserve the Maori Culture. The problem then was not that too many people were using the Maori language, but that not enough people were. The young Maori were learning English, and not Maori.
I believe the Maori have a right to maintain their culture and beliefs, however in the 1980's when I was going to school they made Maori a compulsory subject for all. My point is that the Maori in New Zealand have made a big deal about promoting the language.
So to turn around and then start trying to control who speaks it is rather odd. I would have thought it is a good thing to have a major toy company choose to create toys which have some cultural relevence to our country and culture, since Maori is usually all but ignored outside NZ.
Maybe now Robert Johnson can sue the RIAA for all the artists who have ever ripped off the blues to make commercia rock n roll.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I detest the doubling of letters simply to indicate long vowels. "Mori" is the most proper spelling, if you have a Unicode capable browser (MSIE or Netscape 6.0).
Earlier versions of Netscape can be fixed with:
placed in the header section of the page HTML. If your browser's working properly, the following table will make sense.
Macron,Unicode,Chr,HTML
A U+100 Ā
E U+112 Ē#
I U+12A Ī
O U+14C Ō
U U+16A Ū
a U+101 ā
e U+113 ē
i U+12B ī
o U+14D ō
u U+16B ū
Blancmange
hey galvatron! nice to see ya still in action, and posting stories to Slashdot! i'm a big fan. like when you obliterated Starscream, damn, i'd been wanting that to happen for years! keep up the great work!
your fan,
Pezpunk
i could live a little longer in this prison
Maybe I should get a class action suit going for all my Murphy bretheren and sue Budweiser, Miller, Coors, TGI Friday's and anyone else who pushes getting plastered next March 17th. Guess we can let Guiness slide on this one.
Children are growing up right around us without a clear sense of history because of all the 'tales for children' that exist to make learning easier. We don't pass along cultural identity to our descendants by showing them finger-paintings of the Mona Lisa (well, not usually). Why should we be bothered that the Maori would like to prevent that from happening to them?
We also don't try to sue artists that fingerpaint the Mona Lisa, do we?
"And like that
- If a culture cultivates or uses a certain plant, it should have rights to any derivative or research created by pharmaceutical or agritech companies. For instance, a cardiac drug that is a less toxic, more effective variant of a compound in a psychoactive plant used in a culture's ceremonies is the property of that culture. (We'll also repeat falsehoods about how patents can then bar the culture from continuing to use or cultivate traditional crops.)
- Drugs or tests influenced by patient studies belong to the patients. If a diabetes susceptibility gene is identified in Pima Indians who consented to participate in a study, a therapy targetting that gene should belong to the tribe.
- But selling a product based on the culture that these people actively created, that's fine!
Really, this sounds like different rules apply when Lego, computer games or other fun things are involved. Sort of like how the whole "Free! Open source! RMS! Napster! Gimme! Gimme!" line gives a games a total exemption from criticism. Hey, games are important.Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
-- .sig are belong to us!
All your
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
but where does *education of children* fit into this discussion of intellectual property? lego has done something good, in my opinion - they've created something at least *vaguely* culturally accurate to portray a Maori or Polynesian group. children who play with these legos won't think of Polynesian cultures as the grand 'other'... this is quite unlike Hollywood, or other groups that mangle culture to fit whatever story they're doing.
Comes as a mini CD-ROM in the Technic set # 8531 "POHATU"
These are the sets they have started making reciently which look kind of like the old mail tube rabbits (or like the canisters used by some drive up banks)
Now - if a language is an intellectual property of a loosely defined group called "nation", then what about learning that language by people who are not members of that group ("foreigners")? Are people all over the world infringing on the intellectual property of the nice folk living in England by learning English?
That's insane...
A cartoonish representation of practically every culture known to man, and deep, deep pockets. I'll bet some lawyers in Vegas are salivating right now....
+5:offtopic,but anti-American
The submitter's intro is full of misinformation and half cocked conclusions. The Maori are not suing Lego. They are CONSIDERING a suit against Lego.
The basis of the suit is somewaht understandable it is not in my opinoion- ridiculous. Lego is copyrighting and trademarking the Maori's words like McDonalds is doing to the english language. If lego uses and copyrights their words then there is an even greater possibility that Lego will sue the Maori for using their words freely since large corporations are more litigous then any tribe or indigenous people have ever been.
Also if the you are considering this suit without the legal document of the Hague convention ratified it has very little to do with the Hague Convention however odious the Hague Convention may be.
NO LOGO
"The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words." -Philip K. Dick (1928-1982)
But Mcdonald's is trademarking idioms and phrases. Maybe the English speaking people of the world can sue Mcdonald's for attemtping to control the literary commons?
NO LOGO
"The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words." -Philip K. Dick (1928-1982)
No it was the other way around. McDonalds sued someone from the MCdonalds clan for ahving a store named McDonalds.
I am from New Zealand (Although not Maori), and can assure you that the vast majority of Maori people don't give shit about this sort of thing.
As usual is is a small vocal minority claiming they speak for the majority
I'm suing to stop all games, music, software, etc. that exploits my native language: English.
Let's see RIAA and MPAA choke on that one.
-- I have monkeys in my pants.
Their main argument appears to be trademarking of their culture. While I agree that England is rarely portrayed in a non comic manner, the point here is that nobody's tried to add the English culture to their large list of IP.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
I can think of many people who would be pissed if all of a sudden Lego started making Jesus Legos and games, horribly botched the story, and then claimed their product was "made up in Denmark without reference to any particular culture."
These people are fighting the "monetizing" of their entire lifestyle. When people stand up to Microsoft, its heroicism (or insanity), but when somebody fights the gross overgeneralization of their religion, thats ludicrous.
On another note, the CNN story also features the classic "hole in the satellite picture:" the Maori believe that Lego is allready taking steps to trademark their own culture. This story covers the other side pretty well, but its a shame that neither story was written by a good journalist, who would be objective enough to cover both side's concerns.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
Here were have another example how copyright, patents and similar things do lead into bizare situations because there are so unnatural laws.
But as long as you could earn money with it, nothing will change. Hopefully someone will come up with another more natural concept to protect authors and there works without introducing artifical laws.
Jan
As corporates continue to seemingly copyright and patent everything in sight and sue anyone even APPEARING to voilate these "rights" I think it entirely appropriate that a culture sue over appropriation of it's heritage. The law DOES occasionally work two ways, and the corporates are slowly suing themselves into a corner. BTW: Although you may believe the contrary, America has been a litigious society since the first puritans. In those days verbal slander was enough to go to court over.
"That's no moon"... Obi-Wan Kenobi
Troll Alert:
All your culture are belong to use
Thank you for your time.
--
I just couldn't remember what the Ruffles slogan is. :-/
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Not that it's anyone's dream to be colonized and overrun by Europeans, but as such things go, the Maori have it pretty darn well off.
Rather than being subjugated, they signed a peace treaty with the British - which the British actually more or less adhered to, because their attempts to conquer the Maori by force were not exactly wildly successful.
Today, Maori is a national language in New Zealand, taught in all schools, and available for use in all official transactions. There isn't another place on earth that can say that (okay, maybe Paraguay). Maori are far more a part of the mainstream society in terms of social and political influence as well as economic participation than the Aborigines in Australia or the Native Americans in the USA and Canada.
My guess here is that you have a relatively small group of silly people who've decided to try to make news, not some major mass movement fueled by widespread righteous outrage.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS
Unless a lawyer tells someone who they should sue and why, most people wouldn't come up with this stuff by themselves. Sure, they aren't too bright for listening to a lawyer, but if there is money involved, intelligence sometimes gets misplaced. :)
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Oh bother.
I know that people's immediate reaction is to call this ridiculous, but perhaps they should think for a moment. In an absolute sense it is ridiculous that Maori (ps Maori is the plural, please don't use Maoris) should be able to sue over the use of polynesian cultural symbols, and language. For one thing it would indicate that there is one group of Maori and they are all that are allowed to use these terms and language. This is obviously nonsense. But in a relative sense, we live in a world where intellectual property is a very important commodity and why should a European company be able to profit from Maori culture. I'm sure that if a Maori iwi produced a Lago clone thay would get sued pretty fast. It is imperative that indigenous people try and prevent the commodification of their culture. This does not meant that noone can speak Maori, use Maori names etc. All it means is that noone should be able to use these in a commercial sense.
Like Disney. Disney has stomped all over their culture and intellectual property rights. Ever visit the Polynesian Resort in WDW? If these guys go after Disney for royalties they could trade in their loin cloths for some boss Fubu threads. I'm kidding of course. This has got to be the the most mind boggling story I have seen in some time.
'Same speed C but faster'
Looks like the price of Civilization III just went up, A LITTLE BIT.
Getting upset when your culture is misrepresented is one thing. Getting upset because someone has a tattoo that vaguely resembles a tattoo that you have is something that belongs in biker bars. And getting upset because someone has adapted your culture in a clever way so as to make a game, well, that's the Maori way.
I won't be taking anyone in NZ that particular game this year.
Dancin Santa
While Goethe could not enforce his copyright on Faust today and we would laugh if his heirs would try to stop anyone from using his work, the RIAA _will_ make sure that they are able to enforce Madonna's copyrights in a hundred years from now, just as Disney does with Mickey Mouse.
The only reason why the Maori case seems so silly to us is because nobody knows exactly which person invented which part of their culture.
I'm no fan of IP law at all, especially with all the whining of poor artists and companies being deprived of the fruits of their hard work. But in the context of what goes on with Napster, the GPL vs. Microsoft etc. I think the Maori claims are only too understandable.
Cro-Magnon spokesman Korg has issued a press release stating that the Cro-Magnon are suing Blue Seude for infliction of emotional distress.
Their suit, Korg contends, stems not from the repeated use of the phrase "Ooga-Chaka", but from the tens of thousands of hours of airplay afforded to "Hooked on a Feeling? one of the worst songs ever recorded. The Cro-Magnon claim that this threat to human survival affects their 70,000-year-old culture the most, and is amplified by their innate susceptibility to the introductory refrain. They concluded that the effect is deliberate, according to the release.
Also named in the suit are several hundred radio stations, '70s-night disco bars, and Cher ("just for the hell of it", said Korg).
--Blair
Old age and treachery almost always overcome youth and skill.
Anyone who tries to sell Cracker Jacks outside of the U.S. should watch it after this one...
As a New Zealander, all I can say is:
For the love of God, get me out of this P F@#$%$# C hellhole now!
Some facts for those who want to feel sorry for us:
- Ngai Tahu has had two "full and final" settlements awarded to it in the past 50 years.
- If a Maori does worse in any way, in anything, than me, that's my fault. Not my long dead ancestors. Not their long dead ancestors. And certainly not their own fault! Oh no, it's mine.
(This is the meaning of "Equal Opportunity" according to one of my management lecturers*)
- At the University I study at, Medical school is competitive entry (surprise surprise). But there are two guaranteed spots for Maori. If there are only two Maori doing first year Health Sci, and they come somewhere near the middle, they are admitted to 2nd year Med - ahead of people who scored significantly better than them.
Can you imagine the reaction if there were two guaranteed spots for whites? Or foreign students?
- Again, in the medical school, if you fail a course, thats it basically - your out. But if your one of the magic two then you can resit. And if you fail again, you get extra, personal help from your tutors and lecturers. And if you fail again, they will essentially sit beside you in the exam and talk you through it.
Needless to say this is hideously unfair to the smart, hard working Maori who end up as brilliant doctors, but get unfairly tarnished with the PFC brush.
- Last year, the Maori were awarded several cellphone spectra to auction off. The "professional" legal reasoning behind this was that, in the form of visible light from the stars, the Maori used the electromagnetic spectrum to navigate to New Zealand, hence, under the Treaty of Waitangi, they have a lien on this electromagnetic spectrum.
- The Maori weren't even here first - the Moriori (sp?) were here some centuries before. There aren't any left today because the Maori's killed them all. If they want us to own up to what our ancestors did then they can damn well do the same.
If saying that this situation is wrong makes me racist, then f%$# it, I'm a racist, and proud of it.
*Management is bad for soooooooooo many reasons it's not funny.
There's no $$$ in 'team'...
www..--..net - for incisive, w
It seems the problem is the Maori people are pissed from the possibility (or fact) of Lego trademarking these Maori names, so nobody (not even Maori people making traditional toys or something), could use them. That's a radically different way of reporting the issue, IMHO.
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
This brings up a good point. Which country would they sue in? Lego has yet to sell the sets in New Zealand, and may never choose to. What would New Zealand courts care about about what a Danish company sells in Denmark?
Free unix account: freeshell.org
... The British should sue the asses off the American studios for consistently lying about it's history, and portraying them in a bad light.
Linguist, hacker, and perl father, Larry Wall, has written Microsoft asking for sales of the software to be suspended, saying Microsoft's use of perl and several modules like XML::Parser infringed upon the rights of perl hackers everywhere, specifically their rights to their language and culture. "See, the perl culture is like this onion [slices onion]. Microsoft is like this big rotten spot here. See, the onion was in a bag in my basement, and we had a leak a while back. I found this onion on the bottom. Microsoft is like that rot you see there," said Wall in front of a crowded perlmongers group. He then added, "praise Jesus."
Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, replied, "These guys are idiots. They've got a horrible language that we would never even consider using. Their artistic license is like a tumor growing off that malignant GPL. But what would innovators like Microsoft expect from such amateurs? Keep in mind most of these perl people are fans of that substandard piece of crap called Linux. This Larry Wall guy is off his rocker."
--
I have just a few comments to make...
First off, after looking at the picture, it's safe to assume they weren't about to make a computer game out of whatever it is they're doing.
Second, isn't it time we all share our cultures? Didn't anybody tell these people that it's good when people embrace your traditions? 100 years ago we would have given them the big "FREAKS" stamp, taken over their country, and forced them into the casino business or something, no culture for you.
Of course, maybe I just can't relate, I'm American, it's not like my roots go way back. My family is like german-english-swedish, a collection of the top 3 European assholes in history, maybe I should shut up about culture. What do you other cultureless Americans think? Do we have the right to criticize here?
spacefem.com
Maybe Lego Co. could build them some plastic block houses to replace the grass-and-dung huts they're living in. Nahhh, they'll probably run out of roofing peices right at the end and start crying.
Quick, bust out the Photoshop...
It also seems extremely odd (at least to my apparently extremely skewed mind) that the Maori complain constantly about "cultural segregation" and "discrimination" toting the ever-brandished ideal of combining the European-New Zealand and Maori-New Zealand cultures, and then pull stunts like this. No, no double standard here...move right along.
PS, I am not a pakeha. "Pakeha" means "dirty white pig". I am a white. If any Maoris want to call me a pakeha, I presume they will have no objections to me calling them niggers.
A word can paint a thousand pictures
From a *moral* point of view, how is protecting a trademark or copyright on a work of fiction or photograph created by an industrialist so different from what the Maori are attempting to do? Maybe you don't believe in copyrights, but even copyleft is based on copyright law and the notion that a creator of a work can have some say in its use.
Numerous examples of other cultures that have been pilfered from and allowed it have been posed, but let me pose one closer to the truth (as I see it): I create a game that's a work of fiction "drawing on several cultures." (even if we accept Lego's assertion, there are problems). I have characters named Charlie Brown and Asterix who drive deux cheveauxs, ride pedersen bikes drink coca-cola and wear dickies and apollo moon helmets.
If they instead rode a horse named Altivo, wore lederhosen and drank mead, I wouldn't have a legal problem. Why? I guess because the people that made that stuff up were too busy not dying of disease by 30 to bother with copyrights and trademarks.
Deriving work from that of your ancestors is still stealing, but your current culture is derived from the ancient one and icons and tales of yore are going to resonate with you. It's still a good idea to be respectful and accurate so you don't look like a boor or a moron.
The problem is that western culture has been through the mish-most of self-reexamination so much that creative works can become inbred and stale (cf Britney Spears). Some cross-pollination becomes necessary. The desire to appropriate and derive from other cultures is certainly understandable, but it's not yours (or Lego's) to take.
No, no!
If there is no IP protection for cultural heritage, then there would be no incentive to produce culture! We wouldn't have any folk tales, traditional songs, languages, superstitions or national anthems today if their creators hadn't been eagerly anticipating bringing a lawsuit against LEGO hundreds of years later!
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Mmm... delicious white marbles...
I don't know about New Zealand intellectual property law, but if it's anything like the U.S., then how can a culture & spoken language be construed as intellectual property? Do the native speakers have a patent filed on it? If so, when will that patent expire?
The purpose of intellectual property law is to provide an incentive to innovate, not to stifle others from using the innovation. That's why there's an expiration for the patent. Furthermore, the patent must be filed within a certain amount of time after the innovation has been announced or put to public use. This amount of time in the U.S. is one year. I suspect that this language/culture has been around longer than that...
uh, Slashdot, last time i checked you thought you did...
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"i was saying gnu-rd"
The issue at stake, to me, isn't whether we decide to sue somebody for making a finger-painting of the Mona Lisa, but that we should try to curb the 'dumbing-down' process of understanding other people, places, historical events, and particularly artistic works with specific cultural values that they push just as hard as the 'representations' we see every day. How many children that saw Disney's Hunchback do you think know that Hugo's novels actually embody a fairly radical political viewpoint that's not close to mainstream even in this day and age, and that it's not a love story about an unfortunate fellow and a girl, but a tale of obsession and how a twisted body ultimately reflects a twisted soul. In these very important aspects, disney's creation bears NO resemblance to the original whatsoever. They've used the images and the name-recognition of an old story and used it to sell their agenda, as another reader so excellently pointed out. Is one incident like this enough to get upset about? Of course not. But when this sort of thing starts to pervade our media culture as much as it has, you really need to be careful about what you let be represented by whom, because our children (and many of our adults, if you're talking about the US) aren't aware enough of who is doing the talking. Most of them don't start to understand that the voice of the media isn't the voice of objective fact until they're in high school, or later, and by then it's too late. You've lost something significant. Remember, this isn't something that requires legal action, but I do applaud the Maori (or some of them, or some of their lawyers) for being careful, and aware, of these issues. Taketoshi -lit geek on the loose.
It's all iffy territory, really. There are folks in the US who get pissed because Disney commodifies traditional western cultural symbols, fairy tales, and works of art (Hercules, Pocahontas, Hunchback of Notre-Dame), and I know I'm one of them. They don't necessarily blatantly misrepresent something of cultural significance, but they remove many of the 'difficult points' to make it more accessible. Unfortunately, when you do that you often remove a lot of the very subtle but highly important elements of it that you've overlooked in your 'popularization.' Remember, culture IS what it seems to be. Children are growing up right around us without a clear sense of history because of all the 'tales for children' that exist to make learning easier. We don't pass along cultural identity to our descendants by showing them finger-paintings of the Mona Lisa (well, not usually). Why should we be bothered that the Maori would like to prevent that from happening to them? -lit geek on the loose
While I don't agree with the groups request that sales of the game be halted (it'd be a pretty good way of advertising maori culture I would have thought), I agree entirely with them wanting to know if Lego are going to trademark/patent the character names and or cultral concepts. The character names seem to be taken directly from the maori language so in my opinion, Lego has no right to them. This could just be a misunderstanding I guess :)
Here's a link to a NZHerald article that puts a different spin on the issue. While I'm at it, here's a BBC one as well. Another paper (the Dominion) had this and this to say.
And the poster seems to misunderstand the Hague Convention, which protects established IP rights, not new concepts of cultural sensitivities, no matter how many groups endorse these concepts. The nice thing about hiring a lawyer (or having one in your family) is that they'll write letters for almost nothing. Actually litigating something gets VERY expensive - and I doubt the Maori people want to waste their money, as much as my colleagues in the legal profession would be happy to take it.
Yeah, I'm a New York Lawyer. That's the good news, and the bad news.