[Air-L] public private

Fri Aug 10 13:42:46 PDT 2007

As a producer/director for a large national organization who also works
with Hollywood folks and SAG, I think that the smart thing to do legally
is to get signed informed consent forms and talent agreements locked
down early to protect oneself for future uses both academic and public.
The key is informing ones subjects from the beginning. This is what I
did for my study on edutainment & convergence with my subjects who work
in the entertainment field. As a working producer/director who now is
literally defending my study within the next week or two in higher ed, I
think that one has to be transparent from the outset when conducting a
study; however, I think one has to take certain steps to protect oneself
legally and enable one to have the ability to publish commercially if or
when the opportunity becomes available. I have been fortunate because I
am debating over whether to publish myself or go with traditional
publishers because I have received attention from some folks. My advice
is to be smart and be careful because the MPAA and RIAA are suing people
every day on infringement issues and they are frequently winning out of
court and in the courtrooms because they crafted the legal language and
even wrote it to protect their publishing interests. They also created
an avenue for ordinary folks,like subjects and actors, to sue because of
the issue of digital publishing. The SAG labor fight with Hollywood a
year or so ago brought this issue to light. Why is this important for
us? Because they are creating the law that will impact publishing online
with video, audio and print. Subjects on video have the potential of
becoming future SAG members if they go viral and SAG wants a cut
whenever possible. Just something to thing about in the future because I
see it coming. 

-----Original Message-----
From: air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org
[mailto:air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of M. Deanya
Lattimore
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2007 2:20 PM
To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
Subject: Re: [Air-L] public private

Hi Ed -- I agree with what you wrote that

 >>I reject the notion
 > that even bloggers who publish stuff are giving informed consent to
> become research subjects.
 >>

Consent to become a research subject is a different matter than
citation, as Jeremy's email on the other subject line says.

You, like myself, continue to make great arguments about why the
dichotomy between public and private spaces will not continue to work;
we have got to begin thinking of these things in more nuanced ways.

Let's continue to talk through some of your other points, but I don't
want to see my statement about policy and usage of internet documents
taken as a manifesto on intellectual property or research subject
rights; to generalize to terms that I didn't use from the ones that I
mentioned makes you run the risk of committing straw man fallacies.

So let's continue the discussion in a more amicable fashion --

You may indeed perform a piece of music on a street corner, but once you
*record* your music and post it onto the internet, you're in a different
level of public space.
(Of course, new technology that monitors street corners on video and
enhanced video phones may make it possible for someone to record your
music and make a YouTube video of it... and good luck finding it to
report to YouTube as an infringement unless someone sends you a link to
it.  And by THAT time, hundreds of other people may have downloaded it
to their own computers!  :-)

No one else has the legal right to record your music and pass it off as
their own -- that's just stealing.  But someone may theoretically
download it and use it on their own personal computers, or they may use
it to create a digital piece of artwork without ever letting anyone know
that it is yours; them's the facts of posting online.  They may even go
home and use a few of the words or phrases that they heard in your song
on the street corner and make up a new one of their own, never even
remembering consciously in the first place that they heard yours. 
Derivative? yes; unethical? maybe; possible? yes.

And even my own personal laptop could be confiscated and used against me
in a court of law; computers are FREQUENTLY confiscated these days.
Ask anyone who has been convicted of downloading child porn from the
internet whether s/he still considers her/his own computer as a
"private" space.  It's just not that simple, wouldn't you agree?

It's not even so much a legal issue for most of us as an ethical one;
have you ever checked your computer browser's history to see where your
spouse or child had been on the internet?  We have *got* to stop
dichotomizing private and personal space when it comes to electronic
communication technology or else we'll never get anywhere good with
public policy.

Best!
Deanya

Ed Lamoureux wrote:
 > sorry.
 > I don't agree
 > On Aug 10, 2007, at 10:55 AM, M. Deanya Lattimore wrote:
 >
 >> If people did not want their information to be considered
"published,"
 >> then they should write it on paper and keep it under their
mattresses,  >> not type it into large databases that are collected,
spidered, and  >> searched by other online tools.
 >
 > excuse me. "Publishing" something does NOT remove intellectual
property rights. In fact, those rights first become attached to the
ideas when they are "published" (put into form). When I play a song I've
written on the street corner, or in a bar, or at a concert, I'm
"publishing" it "in public." Doing so does not give ANYONE permission to
use it without my permission. "Fair use" allows the use of very small
portions of it for teaching or research, but only under certain
conditions. And the Teach Act modifies those allowed uses even  further
in the case of online educational purposes.
 >> So by default for me, all internet work has been intended for  >>
publication.  Maybe to limited audiences, like when someone posts pics
>> of themselves getting drunk in Facebook, but the fact of the matter
is,  >> it's still more in the public space than in the private one.
 >
 > I think that the notion that the internet is a public space is
contestable. I would argue that the network of computers, routers, wires
and other technological stuff are almost ALL privately owned entities .
. . sort of like a great land filled with connected  malls . 
. . a mall is not a public space at all... it's private land  often
FILLED with people doing stuff in the presence of others. But  the
internet is not at all like public lands (city, county, state, federally
owned public space).
 >
 > Further, even if there is a "public feel" to internet published
stuff, and putting aside for a moment the implications of the DMCA,  the
Teach Act, and copyright law (not to mention a ton state laws concerning
"rights of publicity and privacy"), I reject the notion  that even
bloggers who publish stuff are giving informed consent to  become
research subjects.
 >
 >
 > Edward Lee Lamoureux, Ph. D.
 > Associate Professor, Multimedia Program  > and Department of
Communication  > Co-Director, New Media Center  > 1501 W. Bradley  >
Bradley University  > Peoria IL  61625  > 309-677-2378  >
<http://slane.bradley.edu/com/faculty/lamoureux/website2/index.html>
 > <http://gcc.bradley.edu/mm/>
 > AIM/IM & skype: dredleelam
 > Second Life: Professor Beliveau
 >
 >
 >
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