strictx (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} strictx) wrote,@ 2004-04-29 16:28:00 |
|
Well, how 'bout them apples.
It seems that ClearPlay has finally got its hardware on the market! Hooray!
This is essentially the famous (or in-, depending on whom you ask) DVD-editing (-censoring?) computer program -- the germ of what might yet become a fascinating lawsuit -- stripped from its Windows/Intel prison and stuffed into a home DVD player. I don't know if I love this product, but I sure as hell love the idea of this product.
Not the idea of ever, ever using it, mind you. At least, not as intended. (More on that, further down.)
There are many questions which the market presence of a device like this one should introduce. Without giving each one its proper exploration, I can suggest some. What is the director's true role, apart from his colleagues, in the sculpting of film entertainment? Is it even possible to generalize such a role? Can the words "art" and "artist" be reasonably applied to things like Sex in the City and Vivendi Universal? Should they? Should our expectations of artistic integrity change when the art looks more like commerce, or the artist more like a manufacturer?
I have to dismiss those issues, for now. I'm interested, but I'm not competent to write about it. Truth be told, I'm really not competent to write about copyright either -- but I'm going to do it anyway, since I don't know any better.
I'm not a lawyer. But I shouldn't have to be: the answers should be simple.
As I understand it, the Copyright Act doesn't recognize moral rights or rights of integrity except for the creators of certain works or visual art. Defacing a newspaper isn't a criminal act; defacing a limited-issue reproduction of a painting might be. Okay, so there's one right that filmmakers don't have.
They do, however, have their names somewhere in the movie, or on the copy's packaging, and the Huntsman lawsuit is (hopefully) going to explore some of that. See, that's not a copyright matter, because motion pictures aren't in that special "visual arts" category; plus the directors, as work-for-hire agents, have no direct copyright interest anyway. But it is, the DGA seems to think, a trademark issue. They seem to conclude that a ClearPlay version of a work is inarguably deficient or, at least, violative of the director's integrity. It's an argument that provokes some empathy, when you ponder a world in which the name "Martin Scorsese" conjures a thought that can be expressed without the word "blood."
Empathy aside, there's another obstacle the DGA faces. I generally either mistake people for being far smarter than they actually are, or far dumber. So, my calculus on this matter should be qualified with that knowledge. But, even when I'm leaning toward the "people are stupid" mindset, I have never beleived that humans could be as contemptibly dim as the DGA does. For an trademark dilution case, the DGA is forced to assert that there's a "likelihood of confusion" -- that is, a ClearPlay customer might be tricked into believing that his ClearPlay movie experience is either (1) the true work of the director, or (2) authorized by the director. ClearPlay has basically killed (2), with disclaimers and whatnot. But to believe that (1) is true ... my god, the sheer contempt of human dignity. To think that somebody would deliberately seek and implement a product like ClearPlay, and then either forget or misunderstand that they are operating a product like ClearPlay ... it is astonishing.
I mean, given my own prejudices on artistic integrity (I like it), I tend to stick ClearPlay's potential customer base into the "dumb" side of the human brain spectrum, at least as a default matter. So I'm not arguing that this is a crowd of braniacs; I'm just saying they're not that stupid; not as stupid as the DGA has to argue.
Anyway ... sorry, got carried off in the trademark crap. I don't even like trademark; I like copyright. I'll have to continue this later, because that's the shit I'm ticked about.
Goodnight!
It seems that ClearPlay has finally got its hardware on the market! Hooray!
This is essentially the famous (or in-, depending on whom you ask) DVD-editing (-censoring?) computer program -- the germ of what might yet become a fascinating lawsuit -- stripped from its Windows/Intel prison and stuffed into a home DVD player. I don't know if I love this product, but I sure as hell love the idea of this product.
Not the idea of ever, ever using it, mind you. At least, not as intended. (More on that, further down.)
There are many questions which the market presence of a device like this one should introduce. Without giving each one its proper exploration, I can suggest some. What is the director's true role, apart from his colleagues, in the sculpting of film entertainment? Is it even possible to generalize such a role? Can the words "art" and "artist" be reasonably applied to things like Sex in the City and Vivendi Universal? Should they? Should our expectations of artistic integrity change when the art looks more like commerce, or the artist more like a manufacturer?
I have to dismiss those issues, for now. I'm interested, but I'm not competent to write about it. Truth be told, I'm really not competent to write about copyright either -- but I'm going to do it anyway, since I don't know any better.
I'm not a lawyer. But I shouldn't have to be: the answers should be simple.
As I understand it, the Copyright Act doesn't recognize moral rights or rights of integrity except for the creators of certain works or visual art. Defacing a newspaper isn't a criminal act; defacing a limited-issue reproduction of a painting might be. Okay, so there's one right that filmmakers don't have.
They do, however, have their names somewhere in the movie, or on the copy's packaging, and the Huntsman lawsuit is (hopefully) going to explore some of that. See, that's not a copyright matter, because motion pictures aren't in that special "visual arts" category; plus the directors, as work-for-hire agents, have no direct copyright interest anyway. But it is, the DGA seems to think, a trademark issue. They seem to conclude that a ClearPlay version of a work is inarguably deficient or, at least, violative of the director's integrity. It's an argument that provokes some empathy, when you ponder a world in which the name "Martin Scorsese" conjures a thought that can be expressed without the word "blood."
Empathy aside, there's another obstacle the DGA faces. I generally either mistake people for being far smarter than they actually are, or far dumber. So, my calculus on this matter should be qualified with that knowledge. But, even when I'm leaning toward the "people are stupid" mindset, I have never beleived that humans could be as contemptibly dim as the DGA does. For an trademark dilution case, the DGA is forced to assert that there's a "likelihood of confusion" -- that is, a ClearPlay customer might be tricked into believing that his ClearPlay movie experience is either (1) the true work of the director, or (2) authorized by the director. ClearPlay has basically killed (2), with disclaimers and whatnot. But to believe that (1) is true ... my god, the sheer contempt of human dignity. To think that somebody would deliberately seek and implement a product like ClearPlay, and then either forget or misunderstand that they are operating a product like ClearPlay ... it is astonishing.
I mean, given my own prejudices on artistic integrity (I like it), I tend to stick ClearPlay's potential customer base into the "dumb" side of the human brain spectrum, at least as a default matter. So I'm not arguing that this is a crowd of braniacs; I'm just saying they're not that stupid; not as stupid as the DGA has to argue.
Anyway ... sorry, got carried off in the trademark crap. I don't even like trademark; I like copyright. I'll have to continue this later, because that's the shit I'm ticked about.
Goodnight!
