Hemmungs Wirtén
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| Chapter one underlines the historical and theoretical principles which help to shape current understandings of the public domain. The primary argument surrounds the struggle over the right to culture-- is it a common good or a commercial product? This chapter highlights a tremendous tension and struggle over the notion of culture. Is it a communally held activity of individuals and groups or is it a commerce in which industries employ individuals in the production of various things? Is it a common good for all or is it a business where those who can afford it can access it? The chapter highlights how the term 'enclosure', once understood as fencing in public property (the commons), remains prevalent within society today. From this chapter, we learn how yesterday’s 'digging' and 'grazing' became today’s 'googling' and 'sampling' and how the commons and the public domain contribute to such radical transformations. | Chapter one underlines the historical and theoretical principles which help to shape current understandings of the public domain. The primary argument surrounds the struggle over the right to culture-- is it a common good or a commercial product? This chapter highlights a tremendous tension and struggle over the notion of culture. Is it a communally held activity of individuals and groups or is it a commerce in which industries employ individuals in the production of various things? Is it a common good for all or is it a business where those who can afford it can access it? The chapter highlights how the term 'enclosure', once understood as fencing in public property (the commons), remains prevalent within society today. From this chapter, we learn how yesterday’s 'digging' and 'grazing' became today’s 'googling' and 'sampling' and how the commons and the public domain contribute to such radical transformations. | ||
| - | + | ==Key Ideas== | |
| - | + | ===Diggers=== | |
| - | + | *These were organized groups of people who opposed the enclosure of land. they opposed the privatization of land, and dug and tore down fences that enlaced open land. They questioned the authority of those who decided that a portion of land was rightfully theirs. | |
| - | + | ||
| ===Examples=== | ===Examples=== | ||
Revision as of 23:33, 25 November 2011
About the Author
Eva Hemmungs Wirtén is Professor in Library and Information Science (also Associate Professor [Docent in Swedish] in Comparative Literature) at Uppsala University. Her research is focused on the history, theory and philosophy of intellectual property and the public domain. She is currently developing an international research network dealing with Culture, Creativity, Copyright (CCC) based at Uppsala University. She is also working on a new book, preliminarily entitled Libratory Life: Law and the Unmaking of Knowledge, 1976-2006, where she highlights the impact of intellectual property in research and higher education. Eva is also a member of the working group on policy in the COST Action A 32 on “Open scholarly communities on the web” and sits on the board of the newly initiated Swedish research observatory on cultural policy SWECULT.
Abstract
As a result of the digital revolution and the ever-increasing use of the internet, discussions around the conflict between copyright and the public domain are more prevalent than ever before. While these discussions have been hotly debated by legal scholars and in blogs and online forums, Terms of Use is one of the first books to concentrate on the conceptual foundations of the public domain.Taking an interdisciplinary approach, Eva Hemmungs Wirtén reveals the nineteenth-century origins of contemporary phenomena such as blogs, wikis, the 'Creative Commons,' as well as the 'Open Source' and 'Open Access' movements. Hemmungs Wirtén examines topics as diverse as the pharmaceutical uses of plants, the patenting of DNA sequences, and Disney's reworking of Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Books in order to provide a frank theoretical discussion of how nature and culture have been transformed into intellectual property.Timely and provocative, Terms of Use will challenge and inspire readers by providing an original and innovative approach to the understanding of the public domain and its origins.
Summary/Reviews
In Terms of Use, Swedish scholar Eva Hemmungs Wirtén seeks to deepen our understanding of issues surrounding the Internet, digitization and the public domain. These issues are most often discussed today in legal terms, making the public domain “a lawyer-free zone remarkably crowded with lawyers.” The author instead chooses a “stubbornly historical” path, exploring what meanings the public domain and the commons, as well as intellectual property rights and copyright, accrued through time.
Rather than offer a sweeping intellectual history, Hemmungs Wirtén narrows her focus to case studies involving the actual jungle – a decision that she admits readers may find “arbitrary if not downright bizarre” – and the British Empire in the Victorian era. This allows her to examine the commons in reference to imperialism and the jungle as a site for the mining of resources. Within this book, there is a chapter dedicated to plants (such as the cinchona tree, the source of quinine) and how the science commons model developed in the North exploited the South. Control of biological diversity has swung to the nation state in recent decades, which raises its own problems. Such as, more restrictions on use of biological resources by indigenous people. There is a chapter on jungle animals, which were broadly conceived of as useless in the wild and having value only if available for visual spectacle, whether in zoos or stuffed. This takes Dr. Hemmungs Wirtén to modern-day museums and art galleries that commit “copyfraud,” claiming copyright when reprinting works that are actually in the public domain, such as Henri Rousseau’s jungle paintings. The final chapter considers the route from Kipling’s The Jungle Books to Disney’s The Jungle Book, and holds up Disney both as an exemplar of the cultural value of appropriating existing works and as the godfather of copyright litigation.
The public domain today, the jungle and imperialism, the history of intellectual property rights – that’s a lot to cover in 159 pages. Imposing the jungle into the book’s fabric causes particular problems. The 19th-century case studies occupy too much text, resulting in abrupt end-of-chapter transitions to the 21st century. Most puzzling of all, the book’s subtitle actually negates one of the book’s central arguments. Whereas Dr. Hemmungs Wirtén seeks to reclaim the jungle as a site used historically for appropriating biological and cultural resources of value, Negotiating the Jungle of the Intellectual Commons simply reinforces the longstanding metaphor of the jungle as a dark and dangerous place that must be slashed through.
Despite these problems, Terms of Use is an easy read. The book is written with real brio, and the author’s untiring effort to squeeze more research, more 19th- and 21st-century connections, more analysis onto every page is quite fascinating. There are fascinating asides relating to the longstanding peasant right to gleaning (the collecting of stray grain missed during harvest); the Prince of Wales’s 9,000-person hunting party in India in 1876; and the rationing of Disney cartoons by 1970s Swedish television to one hour per year, on Christmas Eve. More centrally, Dr. Hemmungs Wirtén in conclusion makes a compelling case that copyright, originally designed to reward creativity and to spur innovation, is now too often used to hinder innovation. On the other hand, allowing ideas to travel in the public domain, allows for their free exchange. Particularly encouraging the “after-thinking” about existing ideas that is essential in producing new ones. Though it can be difficult to retrace how the book came to that conclusion – is the Victorian jungle, free to all (British), a model for the intellectual commons, then? – Terms of Use is indisputably provocative. Like the commons itself, it lends itself to after-thinking.
from:http://www.universityaffairs.ca/who-owns-the-jungle.aspx
Sources
- The Ins and Outs Of Public Domain
- Imperialism
- Herbert Shiller Theory
- Cultural Industries and Cultural Policies- Hesmondalgh
- Lecture With Eva Hemmungs
- Critical Pedagogy in the Twenty-first Century
- The Loughton lopper who saved Epping Forest
I think it would be a good idea to ask the prof for his paper that he shared with us in class today as a source. He also provided good quotes from Herbert Shiller and David Hesmandalgh pertaining to our chapter which I put under sources.
Chapter 1: 'From Time Immemorial': Customary Rights, Rites of Custom
Chapter Summary
Multiple representations of land permeate and structure the way we think about the public domain (pg 14. The first chapter considers at some length the underlying historical and theoretical principles that have shaped our current understanding of the public domain. Real and metaphorical land (arguments for and against private property) holds a prominent place in this discussion.
Primary Argument
Chapter one underlines the historical and theoretical principles which help to shape current understandings of the public domain. The primary argument surrounds the struggle over the right to culture-- is it a common good or a commercial product? This chapter highlights a tremendous tension and struggle over the notion of culture. Is it a communally held activity of individuals and groups or is it a commerce in which industries employ individuals in the production of various things? Is it a common good for all or is it a business where those who can afford it can access it? The chapter highlights how the term 'enclosure', once understood as fencing in public property (the commons), remains prevalent within society today. From this chapter, we learn how yesterday’s 'digging' and 'grazing' became today’s 'googling' and 'sampling' and how the commons and the public domain contribute to such radical transformations.
Key Ideas
Diggers
- These were organized groups of people who opposed the enclosure of land. they opposed the privatization of land, and dug and tore down fences that enlaced open land. They questioned the authority of those who decided that a portion of land was rightfully theirs.
Examples
Further Questioning
How can the diggers and the loppers of the Victorian Era be connected to Hackers in society today?
Critiques
Further Reading
TESTING
Key Questions/Study Guide
How can the Diggers and Loppers of the Victorian Era be connected to Hackers in the Information Commons today?
Notes and References
Chapter 2: 'Drugs of Virtues the Most Rare': Plants, Patents, and the Public Good
Common Heritage of Mankind & Science Commons:
Key Arguments
Who should own plants? With what limitations and factors?
Are plants used for the public good or for commercialism purposes?
“The universally accepted principal that plant generic resources are a heritage of mankind and should be available without restriction. The idea that no single state can control, let alone own, certain parts of the planet”. Since plants are a creation of "god", then who should decide who owns plants. The reason why everyone should not be given the advantage to own a plant is mainly because people do not understand the use of the plant and what it could cause. Different plants are used for different reasons which can only be figured out by a scientist in a laboratory. Big corporations, companies and government agencies try to control and own plants for both the public good and commercialism reasons. In order for someone to own the rights to a plant, they must get an approved patent. "Patents exist to reward and provide incentives for innovation." Not everyone can receive a patent, one must show the innovation created in the laboratory that will eventually help humans.
Circulating Cinchona
The Cinchona tree is a very important metaphor for patents in a world of globalization and technology. The story begins in the late 1700's when Malaria broke out across countries. Leaders of the countries were in desperate need of a cure for the disease. When they discovered that the bark of a Cinchona tree could cure Malaria and other diseases, the search for the tree became a high priority. The bark of a Cinchona tree contained quinine. Quinine was the antidote to Malaria and other such diseases.
Countries soon panicked in a rush to try and find the Cinchona tree as soon as possible because it was said to be found only in the Amazon. Many European countries wanted control and distribution of the Cinchona tree because it would help create medicine for their people. Producing this medicine would help the country's economy grow, and also help save their people from the horrible diseases.
The Story Goes:
A man by the name of Dr. Bravo owned the Cinchona trees. However, he had died long before the frenzy over the trees began. No one knew who Dr. Bravo was during this time, therefore to everyone in search of the trees, the Cinchona tree was in the public domain for anyone to claim. In 1760, Jose Metis went in search of the tree for the Spanish King Charles III. However, no trees were found. Then in 1865, a man by the name of Mamani found the Cinchona tree and gathered its seeds. Mamani notified his friend Charles Ledger who had been searching for years for the tree. Charles Ledger was originally appointed by the British government to find the Cinchona tree many years prior, but he failed to do so. So when Mamani found the trees in 1865, Ledger had his chance at resurrecting his mission.
When Mamani and Ledger offered to sell the seeds to the British government, the government refused the seeds because they believed the seeds were deteriorated.
Concept of Biopiracy
Definition: The use of wild plants by international companies to develop medicines, without recompensing the countries from which they are taken.
Example
Opium vs. Morphine: Opium comes from the poppy plant and Morphine comes from raw opium. Morphine is primarily used to treat both acute and chronic severe pain. (ex. Labor pains) Negative uses are mainly addiction and drug abuse. Without restrictions on this drug, people could use this plant/opium for wrong reasons and cause danger to themselves. This goes against the universally accepted concept of common heritage of mankind because this plant can not be available to anyone for several reasons.
Further Reading
Key Questions/Study Guide
Links
Chapter 3: 'Telegraphic Adress "The Jungle," 166 Piccadilly': Taxidermy and the Spectacle of the Public Sphere
Primary Argument
...Important to remember, Humans make culture! Therefore culture is human. However, is culture free?
Telling lies
“Is it not yet fully understood that taxidermic representation of objects stands upon a level with pictorial art?” Modern reader- taxidermy is that of art, but art that is somehow also exact science.
taxidermy artifacts-(stuffed animals) represent a revolution in the interaction between human and non-human, illustrate the liaison of science that forms the Victorian staging of the public and the private, and more than anything, they epitomize the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized.- all these dichotomies needed to be explored , and there was no better place to do so than by entering the highly ordered world of natural history museums or zoological gardens, controlled environments that characterized the virtues of classification and the promise of new knowledge.
wild animals resist falling under control- perhaps the least own able of “things” . Roman law: all untamed living creatures, regardless of their habitat were considered resnullius, or belonging to nobody. When captured, they became property of the captor- despite their unownable qualities, in colonization they were acquired owned and commodified as often as they were revered.
From bizarre furniture in Victorian era, to public wonder and awe in zoos, to digital jungle paintings, wild animals illustrate changes to the cultural landscape of enabled and disabled uses.
SPECTRES OF RIGHTS INCREASINGLY IMPORTANT WHEN CLAIMING OWNERSHIP IN A CULTURE DEPENDENT ON THE VISUAL
-theatricality and visuality is chapters focus- from nature to culture.
Big Game Hunting
animals had to be hunted first- tigers bears emus etc went to hunt- empires dominance- boys become men etc “poachers” who invaded and stole
it is as if the act of slaying was a personal assertion of superiority and in addition it confirmed the rightfulness of imperial destiny. discusses cummings book about hunting and killing the giraffe- callousness and reverence.
Photgraphic Gun by etienne jules marey – shoot both the animals and hunt at the same time-gave animals eternal life commons terminology- it was a set for tragedy; that wild animals would never be in danger of depletion was unthinkable and therefore it was equally inconceivable to abstain from what was there for the taking.
to men like john adams, locke’s principles outlines a property politics where subsistence constituted the only right of natives to their land. By substituting the body bison with body cattle, the underlying rationale of the project was to replace savagery with civilization.
hunting= profit seeking, extermination, but mainly for pursuit of science. killing was required for scientific enlightenment and knowledge. killed 28 musk ox to procure one young ox for zoo.
only hunt elephant for tusks-leave the rest for waste.. waste refers directly to the animal not being seen by the proper spectator.
without onlookers, the animal does not fulfil its promise of education and entertainment!!!
left in the wild, the brox rhinoceroses is useless, a classic way of devaluating resources in the commons
altering animals into furniture popular elements of interior decorating in Victorian era. (Feel bad for animal lovers/pita advocates in this chapter)
ex- old fire screen, chairs in horse and tigers skin, elephant foot liquer case, tiger skull lamps- stylish interior to homes.
appear in urban public space, by a way of display and conduct, a wild animal -once perhaps free but deemed wasted in that state- can fulfil is potential for visual use and become a truly public animal.
Hano, Chunee, and Joice Heath, Age 166
roman/british empire proficient in securing wild animals for various purposes of display and entertainment.
animal combats were popular 19th century London menageries- Exeter Exchange- one shilling would let you hold lion cubs, ride elephant and watch animals being fed.
-material and rhetorical qualities –exotic animals were an important/essential part of Victorian life.- strict hierarchical distinctions- purpose to serve man (horse) vs dependent on man(pigs) elephant shot 152 bullets –public got a chance to see him dead in his cage!
people will do anything for profit!! Commodify anything!!
Walter Potter made Sussex Museum of Curiosity an example of very different animals from Wards- a duckling with three eyes, two beaks four legs four wings.
Ward and Potter are worlds apart, but each staged their own representation of animals.
German Firm Carl Hagenbeck was foremost importer of animals but due to finances they branched out to displaying wild people
Metropolitan Jungles
Henri Rosseau- made a play about Wards expeditions- A Visit to the 1889 exhibition fantastic travelling device, a magical carpet ride to the “country of dreams”
the attraction for the museum (Jardin des plantes) was placing the foreign in the visitors reach.
betes sauvages-illustrated book of animals in museum. Kiplings “the jungle book” 1899
world fairs, exhibitions natural history museums, and zoos interacted and shaped the public perception of colonialism and the exotic. The urban identity of these new public institutions even reinforces their power of interpretive hegemony.---
the process of urbanization itself, the way in which the various spheres of public and private were controlled by buildings, both in terms of the layout of the home and the layout of public buildings and parks, structured the expectations of people and their behaviour in these respective domains. It also revolves around forms of theatricality, setting the stage for public interaction—on the street, at the cafe, in the museum, and at the zoo.
olmstead- ‘men must come together, and be must be seen coming together- park regulated coming together.-
design of these new public spaces facilitates the paradigmatic rise of the visual- watching others and being watched in return
public as a problem- verge of becoming agitated and aggressive –potential stampede of uncontrollable Chunee- a crowd that can be so easily transformed into a dangerous mob on the streets could, once moved away from the streets to indoors (or even the gated outdoors, as in the case of zoos), be subjected both to the controlling gaze of others and to the ways of seeing imposed by architecture and landscape.
Ward-universal interest in the animal kingdom displayed by all classes of society, whether in the select few who gain admission of the Sunday, or the masses of the plebian Monday.
taxidermy- control over exotic/wild.
Rousseau’s most famous jungle painting-hungry lion throws itself on the antelope -as if all of our preconceived notions of the jungle come to life in these paintings, but makes them aware of the unauthentic and surreal they are.
Copyfraud
COPYFRAUD: winter 2005, Tate Modern’s jungles in Paris, the first U.K exhibit of Rousseau’s jungle painting in 85 years. –tiger in a tropical storm (surprise!)The equatorial jungle (1909) tropical forest with monkeys (1910)
the national gallery in London may physically control and own tiger in a tropical storm but that ownership alone does not allow them free rein to do as they please with Rousseau’s canvas. Whereas a private owner can restrict access to a painting or prevent it all together, the role of the museum is to hold objects and art in trust, so that public can view and enjoy collections without counterproductive restrictions.
digitization changes this web of relationships altogether . His paintings are still one-of-a-kind objects in a museum or private collection; at the same time they lead a prosperous second life on the Internet by way of museum websites. Over 15 million people a year visit the website for New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, where only 4.5 visit the actual museum. The New Getty Museum in Los Angeles receives around 10.5 million people in website compared to 1.2 visits. Users spend 12-15 minutes on metmuseum and 9.5 on getty.-Our collective memory is fickle as well as short.
photocopier once destabilized not only preconceived notions of what technology was capable of doing, but also helped destabilize the idea of art itself.
!!!Xerox had at once revolutionized the technology of reproduction, but even more significantly, set off a new respectlessness, democratization if you will, in the relationship between producers and consumers!!! The photocopying era presaged the era of digitization; we now enter a new phase in the history of copying and in the understanding of what we mean by an original and a copy in art. recent controversy illustrates the increasing convergence between art and technology, as well as the challenges concerning the ethics of use that inevitably follow from that connection.
Case on pg.102 artist Joy Garnet vs Susan Meislas on “Molotov Man” cocktail painting. Lawyers- the painting went online in different contexts.
the museum is online-could look at Rousseau’s paintings in own home.
What constitutes fair use of someone’s copyright? Are there limits to what we should do with images? !!copyright lasts 70 years after the authors creator!!
copyfraud: falsely claiming a copyright on works in the public domain.
Ward’s abandoned rhinoceros patent wasn’t constituted and was fabricated, he made it look like there was.- Ward understood perfectly how essential it was to use intellectual property rights to create an illusion of proprietorship.
does not give museums a blanket go-ahead to slap a copyright notice on works that have reverted to the public domain. We have to accept their right to limit access to artwork if such restrictions deemed necessary, and have faith in their discretion to exercise caution when it comes to suitable uses of the paintings or objects in the media; we also have to respect their wishes to prevent substandard reproductions from flooding the market.
museums are extremely dependent on the revenues of merchandising; together with ticket sales, membership fees, and fundraising, retail and shop earnings are major revenues.
question before the court was whether it was possible to copyright colour transparencies of public domain paintings. Case on pg.106.
Anyone for who would like to illustrate a book will encounter copyfraud claims. Anyone who tries to put together a bundle of texts for teaching purposes will see the copyright sign in places where it has no business to be. We all sign contracts and agree to licenses because we dread the consequences of uses that may be perfectly legitimate. We are conditioned to think that ‘every work is copyrighted unless proven otherwise” we always begin on the defensive.- if you are not vigilant or easily intimidated you might end up paying for access to works that are in the public domain.- museums etc are among these offenders.
show that not only wild animals functioned as a ‘ornamental’ resource in the 19th century but how such status profoundly related to the staging of imperial power.
of importance is the tension between public aspirations and private rights that collide in the establishement of new public spaces, reinforcing the complexities of an emerging culture of display. The steady increase of deception in order to claim intellectual property rights.
As we enter an era of digitization, the taxidermy mount becomes the digital thumbnail and we find ourselves in a full blown period of copyfraud and an invasive permission culture.
Nothing other than the telling of lies?!
Primary Sources
Critiques
Further Reading
Key Questions/Study Guide
Links
Chapter 4: 'I Am Two Mowglis': Kipling, Disney, and a Lesson in How To Use (and Abuse) the Public Domain
Primary Argument
Primary Sources
Critiques
Further Reading
Key Questions/ Study Guide
Links
Conclusions
More Publications From The Author
Terms of Use: Negotiating the Jungle of the Intellectual Commons (forthcoming, University of Toronto Press, September 2008).
No Trespassing: Authorship, Intellectual Property Rights, and the Boundaries of Globalization (Toronto: The University of Toronto Press, 2004).
“’Don’t Fence Me In’: Travels in the Public Domain ,” New Directions in Copyright Law, vol 6. Ed. Fiona Macmillan. (London: Edward Elgar, 2007).
“The Global Market 1970-2000: Producers,” Blackwell Companion to the History of the Book. Eds. Simon Eliot and Jonathan Rose (London: Blackwells, 2007).
“Litteraturens Lag: att forska om upphovsrätt (tvärvetenskapligt).” Tidskrift för Litteraturvetenskap 3-4, 2006.
“Out of Sight and Out of Mind: On the Cultural Hegemony of Intellectual Property (Critique).” Cultural Studies 2-3, 2006.
“Life, Liberty, and the Relentless Pursuit of Ownership: The ‘Americanization’ of Intellectual Property Rights," American Studies in Scandinavia, vol 35, no 2, Fall 2003.
Global Infatuation: Explorations in Transnational Publishing and Texts. The Case of Harlequin Enterprises and Sweden (Uppsala: Publications from the Section for Sociology of Literature at the Department of Literature, Uppsala University, 38, 1998).
Notes and References
Hemmungs, W. E., & Hemmungs, W. E. (2008). Terms of use: Negotiating the jungle of the intellectual commons. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
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