Michael Geist @ Concordia, talk on “Why copyright”
The question is good, “Why Copyright?” If it’s only to fall prey to another type of enclosure (Facebook, Youtube, you name it) then I don’t think we’re doing a very good job. Like I said earlier, my new keyword is autonomy.
Copyright is supposed to be an incentive, a limited time monopoly offered to creators, to enable them to make more and better works available to the rest of us.
Pascal Charest, whom Patrick tells me was sitting just behind me but I never really met, had this rant about the comments:
“But this rant is not about Michael Geist or his presentation, which, again, was very good and will soon be available – it’s about pseudo-scholars plaguing this kind of conference. I’m sorry but I really can’t stand people asking 5 minutes question ending in “Am I right?” Especially when this question was a summary of the last 75 minutes presentation… Arggg. Please, getting a job offering public recognition of your mental skill is easy – very easy – don’t do that while other people are interested.” — Pascal Charest
I think two, maybe three questions were of that type but the rest (well, I had one question and offered a comment) made a lot of sense. Why are we only reacting, as Patrick asked. What about IsoHunt sueing CRIA?
I have to admit this particular presentation left me a little bit on my appetite. But I had great expectations, after reading all the fine analysis by Mr. Geist. I wish he can come back in 6 months, in a greater venue (I organized Copyright 2005 with Stallman, CC Canada, Digital Copyright Canada, etc. for 300 people so I know they’re interested).
I also liked the comment on our two solitudes, and was a bit sad Michael didn’t reckognize that fact we live with in Québec, more particularly in Montréal.
I admit that some questions were very adequate and required an honest answer from Michael Geist. Some even offered good insight inside some less known particularities (never knew the specificity of the two “solitudes” vs press coverage of the presentation of the bill).
But, some where also vanity questions… and there isn’t a lot of actions that can anger like that.
Btw, really look like we missed each other by about a meter… for 1h30… That’s what happen when you take a avatar which isn’t a picture ;-)
Comment by Pascal Charest — 2008/09/16 @ 22:46
The avatar is directly from a picture, done by my friend at http://1984comic.com/ – but it’s a little old, I cut my hair, less beard. And, well, I’m more lifelike in person ;)
Glad you enjoyed the presentation and learned a few things. See ya later!
Comment by Robin — 2008/09/16 @ 23:02
To be honest, I was also disappointed with Geist’s talk. The question period was more interesting in that it showed one part of what’s going on in the field. Still wish there were more dissenting voices. I’m enthusiastically advocating for more reasonable copyright rules and practises but these things take longer to change if complete events are one-sided. We don’t need visceral reactions. We need thoughtful dialogue. Nuance.
When you go to a number of academic conferences, you get used to vanity questions. Even some classroom interactions can be a bit like that. There are ways to deal with them so that they have less of an impact. But vanity questions come with the type of “superstar” presentation we’re talking about (or presentation by “a God,” as was described). You learn to interpret them and the events they’re a part of as being more about personality than about ideas.
Very few ideas were discussed while Geist was on stage.
Comment by Alexandre — 2008/09/17 @ 22:00
[...] Journal of Communication tells us that the Why Copyright? talk by Michael Geist is now online.I mentionned this last week after I went and took the liberty of converting the audio to speex:Why Copyright, talk by Michael Geist 58 [...]
Pingback by IM2 | OQP » Michael Geist, Why Copyright audio is now up — 2008/09/22 @ 20:34