Vid Review: RiP!: A Remix Manifesto
Brett Gaylor, RiP!: A Remix Manifesto, Released November 2008
Gaylor believes that corporate control of intellectual property is hurting the progress of culture by putting restrictions on creation. He sums up his position in a four-point "Remixer's Manifesto":
Culture always builds on the past
The past always tries to control the future
Our future is becoming less free
To build free societies you must limit control of the past
Gaylor supports his claims with a history of intellectual property law, and examples from music and film. He also discusses intellectual property, copyright, remix, and piracy with like-minded individuals such as Gregg Gillis (Girl Talk), Lawrence Lessig, Cory Doctorow, Dan O'Neill, and Gilberto Gil.
I agree with most of what Gaylor says. I believe that copyright law needs to be made less strict in order to foster creativity. I believe that remix and mash-up are healthy ways of responding to a piece of media, and represent distinct pieces of art from the art from which they are drawing.
Gaylor's presentation of the history of intellectual property law was very informative. From his description of early intellectual property law which was designed to protect creators, to how copyright law has changed over the last century to favor control of culture by individuals, Gaylor gives a succinct but effective overview.
I liked that Gaylor got many different people to discuss intellectual property and remix with him, from creators like Girl Talk and Dan O'Neill, to lawyers like Lawrence Lessig, to politicians like Gilberto Gil.
The film does it's best to cast the opposing side in a negative light, using dark filters and ominous music several times when people who support strict copyright are shown. It makes an attempt to vilify them using the cinematic equivalent of strategic rhetoric, rather than seriously considering their arguments and making counterpoints.
Except for a few lines, such as a clip of Lessig saying "This is remix. This is not piracy." the film fails to make a distinction between online piracy and remix. It places mash-up creators such as Girl Talk in the same category as people who committed online piracy such as Jammie Thomas. While the grey areas of both are worth discussing, it is important to make a distinction.
Apart from a few brief mentions, the film failed to discuss alternate intellectual property laws and processes, such as open source and creative commons. Gaylor very much supported public domain, in an "all-or-nothing" approach that did not consider changes in our perception and execution of copyright law that could give us a balance between the current strict control and the information anarchy against which early intellectual property law was trying to protect us.
Where do we draw the line between sampling for remix and piracy? Some pieces billing themselves as "remix" are barely altered versions of the original (and in my opinion boring and not worth my consumption) while I feel other, more complex remix pieces are obviously distinct works of art. At what point does something stop being "piracy" and start being "remix"?
Obviously, Gaylor thinks that the actions taken by corporations against individuals who are found to have committed online piracy are extreme, but taking music you have not paid for is stealing. What would be fair action? How can we balance discouraging piracy and not having ridiculous fines for downloading a few dollars worth of songs?
Gaylor encourages viewers to take the film and produce new versions of it through remix and editing. I wonder what edited and remixed versions of the film exist, what additional perspectives these films portray, and whether they do a better job in the places the original fell short.
The film made good points about how modern copyright has restricted creativity by criminalizing actions which allow creators to build upon past art while being unable to enforce this criminalization. It also succeeded in making me feel passionate about wanting to fight against modern copyright law and support remix. That being said, it didn't do a great job and fairly portraying the opposing side, or offering more moderate solutions than throwing out copyright and placing everything in the public domain. I agree with Gaylor that copyright law needs to be made less strict in order to foster creativity, but I believe the way to do so is with a fundamental change to how we view and execute intellectual property law, and the implementation of more creator friendly systems of intellectual property protection, such as open source and creative commons, which still protect the original creators' rights to their creations.
