Slashdot Mirror
Obama Requests Creative Commons for Presidential Debates
Presidential hopeful Barack Obama recently submitted a letter to the DNC asking for the Presidential debates to be licensed under the Creative Commons. This move would give everyone the freedom to share, recut, and edit the debates as they wish. "I am a strong believer in the importance of copyright, especially in a digital age. But there is no reason that this particular class of content needs the protection. We have incentive enough to debate. The networks have incentive enough to broadcast those debates. Rather than restricting the product of those debates, we should instead make sure that our democracy and citizens have the chance to benefit from them in all the ways that technology makes possible."
boxlight
While I would also like to have more info on what his position is on copyright law, this is still an great thing. Things like this should be in the public domain. Not only is it important for people to watch these debates, but they also need to discuss them, both in their private lives and in public. This gives anyone the freedom to quote the original source, which should be a given in a democracy in matters concerning politics. It may not work out to Obama's advantage; there may be people who use what he said in the debates to discredit him. However, that would happen anyway. Now there will hopefully be a somewhat higher standard of evidence, because bloggers/unofficial journalists will be expected to quote from the original source, and maybe even provide the pertinent video footage. It's possible to take things out of context and twist the meaning of statements, but making the debates accessible to everyone can only make this more difficult.
According to Lessig's blog, John Edwards has also written a letter supporting this idea.
While he's at it, he can do a little politicking to remove software patents, or at least reform it to the point where patent trolls cannot possibly profit (or insanely huge corporations cannot lock out competition with it)?
It's fine and dandy to talk about wanting CC applied to debates, but he's in a position to make far more fundamental changes in his current Congressional position. Let's see him prove he's more than just a typical politician who likes to mouth a few buzzwords for attention here and there.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
That's complete bull -- that sort of thing is the very definition of fair use. The notion that a candidate would ever pay to use an opponent's debate answers in an attack ad is completely absurd.
What Obama wants is people passing around videos of him on YouTube.
How does it follow that someone who supports creative commons supports stealing webpages? I agree that everything that comes out of a politicians mouth (Especially during an election campaign) must be treated suspiciously. But this is not a campaign promise - it is only a request to return the political debate to the publics hands. And O'Bama is taking quite a chance hear - let's face it, releasing this under creative commons opens him up to the very real possibility of being edited by some person to look like a complete creep. So I congratulate him - here's hoping he'll be able to continue being this forward thinking in the future.
http://timcol6.freehostia.com/
From research I have seen recently in economics, it appears that about 15% of people are always prone to good (i.e. fairness, reciprocity, sharing, kindness, loving, etc.) , 5% of people have sociopathic tendencies and will tend to act selfishly with callous disregard for others. The rest pretty much do as their society tells them. That means they will be good in a good society and evil (selfish, dishonest, lacking in empathy, harmful to others, etc.) in an evil one.
Most societies are prone to evil. Most socioeconomic systems are founded on evil premises. Therefore, most people in the world are prone to evil, but they would be just as prone to good in a better system. Still, your optimism and assumption of goodness are themselves a good thing. "Doing what society tells them" is another way of saying "doing what other people expect of them," and you are doing your part by expecting good things of people.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I'm not trying to troll, but I've seen transcripts and whatnot of presidential speeches, addresses, and these things broadcast on TV and radio, and I've never noticed or heard of copyright before (unlike sports, movies, TV programs, etc).
Presidential speeches -- ones actually given by the sitting President -- are in the public domain, as a product of a U.S. government official created during the course of their duties.
However, a campaign speech that someone gave while running for election wouldn't necessarily be in the public domain, nor possibly would a campaign speech given by the President (since it's arguable as to whether campaigning is really part of his official duties as a U.S. government employee). Now, in reality, I don't think I've ever heard of anyone blocking the publication of transcripts of campaign speeches -- they're usually pretty easy to get -- but I expect that they're copyrighted either by the candidate's committee (the nonprofit corporation that also holds all their campaign money, and employs the speechwriters).
In addition to that, which would be the copyright on the text of the speech itself, the networks who broadcast the speeches and debates also claim copyright on the video recording (although other networks use clips from each other without formal permission, under Fair Use, all the time: e.g. Jon Stewart frequently shows news clips with the originating network's banner blurred out). It's an open question in my mind whether this is defensible: copyright law in the U.S. doesn't protect "sweat of the brow" or simple movement from one media to another, but it does protect something that is 'fixed' into a medium. The question then is whether, if you record the President giving the State of the Union, are you actually fixing that speech into a medium, and deserving of copyright protection? Or has the President (or his speechwriter) already done the creative act, by writing the speech, and the TV camera is simply mechanically reproducing this. I would like to believe the latter (actually I'd like to have a blanket law that anything recorded, written, spoken, or performed in the U.S. Capitol or any other place where the Legislature is in session is automatically in the public domain, but I'm not getting my hopes up), but I suspect that the courts would probably find for the networks. (There's probably precedent on this somewhere but I'm too lazy to look.)
But you're right to think that actual Presidential speeches are free and clear; if you want to print out the State of the Union and make it into wallpaper, or perform it in front of an audience, or sing it to your dog, nobody's going to stop you.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
and everyone else. If you think your ideas are far superior, you want everyone to have access to as much information as possible.
Wait, why haven't the other candidates proposed this before?
Disclaimer: I am not an Obama supporter, but I'm with him on this issue.