Slashdot Mirror
Tanya Grotter and the Magic Double Bass
Slate has a piece about Harry Potter and copyright worldwide that is a disguised call for copyright reform. Well written, well argued, extremely good argument, won't be picked up anywhere else.
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
Overall, I found the article somewhat weak. While the author made some very good specific points, he often harped about the quality of the localised ripoffs. Specifically, the author referred to the original as "superior" to the localised versions which incorporated a culture's own mythology and history.
Having written a large number of editorial articles in the past, I think I understand where this author is coming from. The author may be attempting to appeal to those who are staunch (some might say zealous) supporters of the Harry Potter and its creator Rowling by appealing to their vanity.
Unfortunately, I think the tradeoff wasn't worth it. The end result is that anybody *rational* who reads it (anybody who can understand the innate quality and indeed superiority of characters adapted to the mythos, legends, and history of a given community) will see this HUGE flaw in logic and will doubt the rest of the article.
I know I do, myself - even though after careful examination I agree with his specific points, I wish such careful examination wasn't required.
Barclay family motto:
Aut agere aut mori.
(Either action or death.)
There's a thin line between knock-off and parody. National Lampoon's "Bored of the Rings" and "Doon" were obvious Parodies of "Lord of the Rings" and "Dune." (Second part of sentence gratuitously inserted for the caffeine deprived.) "Harry Potter and Leopard Walk-Up-toDragon" appears to create sufficient confusion by mixing Harry Potter characters and Tolkien characters without permission. This should not be allowed unless it is clearly sold as a satire. "Tanya Grotter" is clearly trying to ride the coat tails of the Harry Potter hype. Tanya Grotter appears to be somewhat derivative of Harry Potter. However, most "grown-up" reviews of Harry Potter point out that J.K. Rowling's work borrows ideas from all sorts of other previous works. Derivation, in and of itself, is the way that literature advances. It is not a reason to use copyright law to suppress a work.
It has to be said: if McDonald's had patented, trademarked or copyrighted the 'plastic burger joint', they'd be suing Burger King and Wendy's, and never mind the competitive market...
It also has to be said, that if Rowling has registered "Harry Potter" as a trademark, then she has to fight anyone diluting that trademark. Just like anyone else defending their trademarks - defend it or lose it.
This article is just weak. First off, it makes the argument that the ripoff works are okay because, while they may tarnish the characters, to block them would be some sort of crime against a free market. Then right at the end, the author suddenly decided to talk about parody, but actually admits that the copycat works are not works of parody. The 2 Live Crew analogy is particularily terrible, it's the writer's way of framing the issue beside a case that everyone agrees on, but it really has nothing to do with the books in question.
If this was about the publishers attacking small fan-fiction sites, that'd be one thing, but this is a case of people making millions and millions of dollars by copying (no, not always word for word, but stealing characters, etc. is still stealing), in a pure act of commerce. You can hate JK Rowling for being rich and blocking these books, but you at least have to credit her for caring about the books, the people the article is defending are pure commercial opportunists.
sig:
See the "..for smart people" banners Wired runs here? Look elsewhere guys.
or just use the themes and ideas of Potter (as in Tanya Grotter's case)
How can you copyright themes and ideas? Does all future fantasy work now violate their copyright? There's nothing totally original and new there. I don't see a problem as long as its not using the character names or trademarks, or claim to be written by Rowling, or if the author has Harry Potter in one hand and a pen in the other. How many works were "inspired" by Tolkien? If its just a little *too* close, go ahead and sue. But I dunno how someone fighting with a grenade launcher infringes on Harry Potter.
1) Read the copywrite page again.
The images and characters are owned by warner brothers (which in turn are a subsidiary of Time-Warner, but saying that Time-Warner owns it is still imprecise), but the books are publishing rights are owned by the publishing company.
2) Where would we be without the Shannara books? Tolkien didn't publish enough for the voracious readers and we wanted more in the same genre that was invented by those books!
The same can be said for the original sword & sorcery books created by the Conan the Barbarian series (which actually generously allowed many authors to write books on it), and the spy novels that started with the James Bond books (yes, they were books first).
Do you think that this is any different? People want more than seven books! Sure, those seven will be revered and treasured, but we want MORE books about ordinary kids doing magic.
Killing off the "copies" will obviously be doing the world a great disservice.
Well...mostly. I'm sure that there are some porn-related Harry Potter knock-offs that don't exactly scream good literature.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
The fact this character is an invention of someone else's fantasy (a russian man writing about a girl instead of a british woman writing about a boy) means the characters, even in the overlap, will not be the same.
The girl could have been given any (more dissimilar) name at all and there would have been little anyone could do to stop the publication. Clearly the issue isn't with someone writing a parody, but only with someone besides AOL profiting from that parody. And in that regard, I call shenanigans!
...it still propagates what I perceive to be a very big misconception about what copyright is really for. The Constitution of the United States, in the copyright clause, has specifically stated that the purpose of copyright is "to promote the progress of science and the useful arts", not specifically to provide authors like J.K. Rowling with an incentive to continue writing. Richard M. Stallman (whatever you may think of him) explains this very well in this article. Copyright law is not a monopoly granted by a (responsible) government in an attempt to strike a balance between the rights of authors and rights of the public, but rather as an attempt to balance two different, sometimes conflicting rights of the public: the public wants a lot of good quality works for its consumption, and the public also wants these works to be available at low cost. Stallman makes a nice analogy between this dilemma and that of building public works projects like buildings and dams. For public works, a government would want to build the best and safest public works, while at the same time it wouldn't want to spend too much money to do so. Nobody will build a bridge or dam for free, of course, so the government then has to decide how much money it is willing to spend for the public's welfare. For copyright legislation, the government is not spending public money, but the public's rights and freedoms.
Well, the United States government has done, with the current travesties of law like the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act and the DMCA, the equivalent of having contractors build a bridge that totally covers the river. And worse yet, it is attempting to wrestle other countries into making similar laws apply there as well, under the pretext of protecting international trade.
Yes, copyright law all over the world is in bad need of reform, but without remembering its original purpose for existing in the first place. Authors are granted these copyright monopolies not because they were the original creators of the work and they are entitled to it, but because it is supposed to serve the public interest. A lot of the misapplications of copyright restrictions mentioned in the article mainly boil down to violations of this principle.
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
Good post! Funny and insightful. I do find it very amusing that some people forget that every piece of literature produced for the last few hundred/thousand years could be considered a "ripoff" of everything else. Rowling rips off mythology and rips off Lucas, who in turn rips off mythology himself. Virtually every great or popular work of literature these days rips off some sort of legend; even the apogee of Western literature is a badly-disguised ripoff of the Odyssey. And that was probably a take-on of the Epic of Gilgamesh. Need I go on?
Note to M1-ers: a curt but otherwise insightful message is not "Flamebait" or "Troll".
The article isn't an argument to apply carefully current copyright law (which allows satire, use of excerpts in criticism, etc.). Rather, it's an argument that copyright laws are not being used to protect the rights of an author to profit from their own work but instead are diminishing the ability of others to make new product that might be loosely, or even directly, based on the original work. While this might sound like the author doesn't like copyright at all, rather she seems to be saying that copyright should be more literal and only prevent TRUE copying of material. In her example, she's advocating the ability to publish a book where Harry Potter meets Gandalf while still being against someone simply selling bootleg versions of "Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone."
The fact is, this sort of "artistic dictatorship" is a relatively recent invention. I don't know of any art that doesn't derive from other art, do you ?
:
Begin rant
The common theme behind excessive and restrictive patents and lengthly and restrictive copyrights is what has me disgusted. Our progress, both technological and cultural, relies heavily on derived work. Inventors and artists alike borrow ideas and add their own to create new technology and works, and the thing we find most appaling is that some people would slow this progress, stop it entirely if possible, to reap more than their fair share of rewards. Sure your invention was great, it will help people and make us happy, but the next guy's invention will be even better, so get the hell out of his way.
I think copyright is neccesary, but why must it be so long ? And why cover derivative works at all ? I think patents are neccesary, but how can they be so broad ? Why should one person stop all others from persuing an entire area of innovation ?
Money money money money money. Bastards.
In Soviet America the banks rob you!
Did you read it or you just repeat after others?
Tanya Grotter is completely based on Russian folklor fantasy story tails, which I heard more than 3 decades ago from my grandmother. And I won't be surprised to find out that Harry Potters stories are based on west-europen folklor. So, who is stealing what?
Less is more !
Yes, though not suddenly. This has always been wrong.
"If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're right." -
Yes, everything is derivative work.
Or as a famous scientist (Newton?) said, "If I have seen further, it was because I stood on the shoulders of giants".
Too bad that a very long perspective in economics is non-existent.
Evolution of Language Through The Ages: 6000 BC : ungh, grrf, booga 2000 AD : grep, awk, sed
You can say that if you want, fine. But then next time someone offers you a couple hundred million dollars to simply sign your name on a piece of paper, either refuse or you are an unmitigated hypocrite. I know what I would do, and I have a pretty good idea what you would, too.
I think there is a world market for maybe five personal web logs.
And this is how the machine feeds..
This is a hugely daunting and depressing topic since when you think about it, those in power - the rich and their corporations - have not only put their fist down in the U.S., but also abroad with the WTO. It is quite useless to argue this point to all the copyright and patent holders since to them, the issue is very cut and dry - it all, 100%, comes down to profit.
They will not recognize the fact that yes, like Newton, we all stand on the shoulders of giants before us - this is only useful to those willing to 'share' and those who don't have anything. But how does that affect the members of a board - who usually sit on other boards - when they go home every night to their nice little private castles, shutting out the world? Why, it takes away what is theirs, which of course, threatens their existence, their comfortable life. This is so obvious with the current administation, btw. So obvious.
This is all possible, obviously, because of money. These people who run these corporations who lobby our government - and who stock it - have truck loads of it. I have many talks with my close friends about this and we all agree indeed that this is the Matrix. Not the sci-fi version, but the version of control. Not to turn us into a battery, but to turn us into a mindless follower willing to die or buy for the top percent who can afford pretty much anything.
Look at other examples:
DMCA - control of your sewing patterns you dig out of the trash; control of the xbox that you purchased.
Palladium - control of the computer that you purchased
DRM - control of the information that you purchased
EULAs - not only control of the software you bought (lawyers like to call it 'the license you bought' which of course, can be revoked at any time), but the ability to not be responsible for anything negative that might come of its use. Think viruses, crashes, etc...
There are probably only a very few ways out of this. Maybe you can play the game and become one of the haves and then make the same rules and propagate the same sort of attitude as the people in charge do now - some call these 'society's rules'.
Or maybe you'll become well to do and fight those rules and pursue the ideas of fairness and liberty for all. Ideas that exist in all cultures and in most religious texts, i.e., common sense.
Or maybe you'll scrape by and fight for those ideas of fairness and liberty, yet hold a grudge forever knowing you're on the short end of the stick and you probably won't have a 'comfortable life'.
Or, maybe you'll just be one of those who doesn't care and just goes with the flow. Not really content, but not caring enough to stir things up. Contributing to causality without know anything of it.
Regardless of what path you take, it will take the voices of many to 'wake up' and realize that these laws will only benefit a few - the few who can continue to afford it. They have nothing to do with fairness and justness for the whole and everything to do with greed and control by the few. Only when everyone, like the founding fathers and mothers and all other revolutionaries around the world, stands together can we make an impact. When divided, we fall.
It may not seem like it, but this really is what the people and corps who push these laws count on. In smaller numbers, all are more easily controlled. Which is the ultimate goal for them as the Slate story shows. Free your mind...
Do you think Tolkein didn't copy mythical monsters from the oldest legends? Everyone borrows from everyone else. This is a fact of life.
:)
You are correct though, derivation is the way literature advances. A derivative work could be itself more innovative than the original. Certainly Weird Al does a better job on some songs than the original artists did.
The larger question though is, is copyright and patent law broken. Of course I know that will get a resounding yes on Slashdot, but what can be done to fix it?
It seems no matter what limits are put on an author's monopoly of their work it will be arbitary, but many of the kids reading Harry Potter today will never see the day they can legally create derivative works. This is a total disservice to the culture for the benefit of a very small group of people. The temporary monopoly of copyright was given as an incentive to create. When it becomes something that discourages innovation and creativity it has gone too far.
The whole concept of intellectual property in this country has gone too far. It's unfortunate though, that I don't see anyone fixing it. The people who could fix it (the senators etc...) have too many hands in their pockets to come up with something fair for the public. Moreover, I don't believe they really understand technology that well to begin with, and techonology is a large part of why intellectual property laws are so screwed up. I don't know what it's going to take to get these people to open their eyes.
More piracy could have many effects, one could be a huge clamp down and further extension of ridiculous copyright and patent laws. It could also have the opposite effect, but that is unlikely. I wonder what kind of activism could be used successfully to make the powers that be realize this particular branch of law is entirely broken?
[sigh] We're in for a ride the next 20 or so years.
It has to be said: if McDonald's had patented, trademarked or copyrighted the 'plastic burger joint', they'd be suing Burger King and Wendy's, and never mind the competitive market...
... however, clearly now that they have been extended to life+70 years for artists, and 95 years for corporate "art", any such balance in the tradeoff has been lost.
While you cannot 'copyright' the idea of running a burger joint, ever since the 1980s you've been able to patent it under US Patent law.
Fortunately for burger lovers everywhere, McDonalds, Burger King, et al (i.e. the fast food business model) predates that appallingly ill-concieved change in patent law, and so we do have a competative marketplace in that regard.
However, as eBay and others have shown, we are now facing at least a generation or longer of time where the most innovative and promising approaches to business will enjoy little or no competition as a direct result of allowing said business models to be patented for 20 years (and probably extended to other areas when they expire, allowing them to last even longer).
Goodbye free market.
Copyright destroys competative markets as well. It has been judged, rightly or wrongly, that this is an acceptable tradeoff to allow authors and other artists to work full time on their craft, rather than being forced to hold down a day job at the same time. Perhaps this was true when copyrights lasted 14 years
We should have Harry Potter knockoffs, just as we have JRR Tolkien knockoffs (Eddings, etc.), and just as we have Gibson knockoffs (indeed, he created the cyberpunk genre). This is how an innovative series of books leads to entire genres of fiction, creating entire new markets. JK Rowling is a greedy, shortsighted ass to do this, but more importantly, copyright is a dysfunctional, destructive, negative-sum system in its current form. Indeed, any system that preemtively destroys entire genres of literature or entire new markets just to protect the profitability of one work is inherently negative-sum, destructive to everyone. This is true of patents (and epitomized by patents on software, mathematics, and business models), and it is true of copyright in its current excessive form.
So, lest we dismiss the example the article's author gave initially, under our current regime of laws, if McDonalds came into being today, there would be no Burger King, for at least 20 years, possibly longer. And if JRR Tolkien were written today, much of the fantasy literature of the world would likewise be banned (remember, even 30 years ago copyright wasn't nearly as draconian as it is today).
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Speaking as one of the Older Generation around here [g] I've noticed a general downslide in both creative and manufacturing quality over the past two decades, and I think it is largely attributable to the corporate control of which you rant. There is no incentive toward quality when the consuming masses will consume it regardless, either thru lifeling training (most kids now have never *seen* real quality in many goods and services, so don't know what they're missing) or thru lack of alternatives.
Or as I describe the roots of the often piss-poor service and quality of goods around Los Angeles: It doesn't matter if there are 6 million people who know it's Crud. There are 6 million more who don't know any better or can't tell the difference, and will buy it anyway. So why spend the extra dollar or go the extra mile to make your goods and services better than the next guy's?? Who cares, since you can sell it anyway, and can make more profit by cutting corners. So now instead of a clear market dichotomy between original quality (which many people are willing to pay for) and cheap knockoffs (which was once a separate market), the entire market has become cheap knockoffs, with no better choices available even if you want them.
The fact that corporations and individuals can now so readily clamp broad controls against would-be competition only makes matters worse.
For all we know, maybe one of these Harry Potter lookalikes would be the start of something great and unique, if only it were allowed to grow in its own way.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?