written for
The Many Masks/Masques of Heidegger: Technology, Poeisis and Humanism: A Literary Theory Research Group Symposium
May 7th, 2014, Vancouver Island University
The Seminar for Advanced Studies in the Humanities
Directed by Richard J. Lane and Emily Marroquin
Where Heidegger and Doctorow Intersect
in the Creative Commons Licensing of Pirate Cinema.
It might seem odd to discuss a science fiction novel for
young adults at a symposium that focuses on an article by Heidegger, but there
is a place where the interests of the philosopher Heidegger intersect with the
interests of novelist Cory Doctorow. That place is the issue of Creative
Commons licensing. The novels of Canadian author Cory Doctorow have all been released in free digital download format simultaneous with each title's release in print format. This controversial marketing paradigm is a crucial element in Doctorow's creative paradigm and in his entrepreneurial activities in the emerging digital economy. For the release of his 2012 novel Pirate Cinema, Doctorow has amended his usual Creative Commons License for this novel to indicate that no derivative works are to be allowed without permission. This subtle but significant change shows how Doctorow, like Heidegger, is calling for an understanding of technology which primarily involves creativity.
In the article “The Question
Concerning Technology” Heidegger stated: “It is said that modern
technology is something incomparably different from all earlier technologies
because it is based on modern physics as an exact science.”[1] It
could similarly be said that modern publishing
technology is something incomparably different from all earlier publishing
technologies because it is based on modern technologies of exact copies of a
text. There are certainly publishers who are attempting to manage differently
the rights to books published through the modern technology of electronic
format – differently, that is, from how they manage the rights of books
published in print format, and that difference is brought to public notice by
Cory Doctorow in his published statements on publishing, copyright, and
creativity.
Where Heidegger’s article discusses technology which
primarily involves creativity, the philosopher is clearly discussing matters of
publishing, distribution, copyright and other rights, saying that
Unlocking,
transforming,
storing,
distributing,
and
switching
about
are
ways
of
revealing.
But
the
revealing
never
simply
comes
to
an
end.
Neither
does
it
run
off
into
the
indeterminate.
The
revealing
reveals
to
itself
its
own
manifoldly
interlocking
paths,
through
regulating
their
course.
This
regulating
is,
for
its
own
part,
everywhere
secured.
Regulating
and
securing
even
become
the
chief
characteristics
of
the
revealing
that
challenges.[2]
There are, of course, regulations
by
some
publishers
for
the
security
of
digital
rights
management
(DRM)
of
books
in
electronic
format
(e-books). These regulations
are far
stricter
than
those
in
place
for
printed
books.
As
Doctorow
discusses
on
his
website,
DRM
for
e-books
does
not
permit
book-buyers
to
loan
e-books
to
friends or put
an e-book in another format or device, treating such acts as piracy which costs the publisher
the
loss
of
a
sale.
“The
entertainment
industry
calls
DRM
'security'
software,
because
it
makes
them
secure
from
their
customers,”
wrote
Doctorow
in
a
column
for
the
Guardian.
Doctorow
is not the only writer who disagrees with DRM software for e-books; in interviews,
Neil Gaiman has said, “Everyone who discovered your favorite author by borrowing
a book, raise your hand.”[3]
As Doctorow wrote on his website's page for his novel
Little Brother, “For me -- for pretty
much every writer -- the big problem isn't piracy, it's obscurity. Of all the
people who failed to buy this book today, the majority did so because they
never heard of it, not because someone gave them a free copy.”[4]
Doctorow's opinions are made clear not only in his interviews and nonfiction writing; he states on p 292 of his novel Pirate Cinema through his protagonist, “I think that a law that protects creativity should protect all creativity, not just the kind of creativity that was successful fifty years ago.” In particular, one type of creativity that
Doctorow promotes is the creation of derivative works. Derivative works are based on published works, and take many forms such as e-books in new formats, translations, or illustrations and other objects. Some derivative works are sold commercially. For example, the entire text of a 2010 novel by Doctorow, Little Brother, is now available printed on a poster from Litographs, a company that buys advertising space on Doctorow’s own website. This poster is a derivative work, sold commercially with permission.[5]
“Copying
stuff
is
natural.
It's
how
we
learn
(copying
our
parents
and
the
people
around
us),” wrote Doctorow
on
his
website
to
answer
the
question
Why
do
you
give
away
your
books? “…There's no way to stop it, and the people who try end up doing more harm than piracy ever did. The record industry's
ridiculous
holy
war
against
file-sharers
(more
than
20,000
music
fans
sued
and
counting!)
exemplifies
the
absurdity
of
trying
to
get
the
food-coloring
out
of
the
swimming
pool.
If
the
choice
is
between
allowing
copying
or
being
a
frothing
bully
lashing
out
at
anything
he
can
reach,
I
choose
the
former.”[6]
Long before and after Abbie Hoffman published
his
1971
bestseller
Steal
This
Book, people have been loaning books, selling them second-hand or
giving them away, and some people have been distributing
copies
or
derivative
works.
Nobody
has
to
steal
a book
by
Cory
Doctorow.
He gives
away
electronic
copies
of
his books for
free
on
his
own
website,
and
makes
them
available
to read in
several
formats
such
as
PDF
files
or
MOBI
files.
His novels are released with Creative Commons licensing.[7] For his
earlier novels such as Little Brother, Doctorow has chosen “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike.” In
contrast to his earlier novels, the Creative Commons licensing that Doctorow
has chosen for his work Pirate Cinema is
“Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs.” On his website's
page for Pirate Cinema he lists several files containing the text of the
novel. “These
downloads
are
licensed
under
a
Creative
Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs
license,
which
lets
you
share
it,
provided
that
you
do
so
on
a
noncommercial
basis,”
Doctorow
wrote
below
the
list.
“If
you'd
like
to
make
a
remix,
please
get
in
touch
with
us.”[8]
The main difference
between
the
NoDerivatives
and
the
ShareAlike
licensing
is
that
Doctorow
is asking people
to
let
him
know
if
they
are
making
a
derivative
work,
simply so
that
he
can
discuss
any
translations
with
his
foreign
rights
agents.
He explains on the website that he wants to make it easier for his agents to
work with foreign editors, and adds: “I promise you that if you write to me with a request for a non-commercial
derivative
use,
that
I
will
do
everything
in
my
power
to
see
that
it
is
authorized.”[9] With this small change in his
novel’s licensing, Doctorow is regulating the transformation and distribution
of his novel, challenging the DRM approach to “unlocking,
transforming,
storing,
distributing,
and
switching
about” (to use
Heidegger’s phrase) of e-books.
Issues of copyright and licensing are of interest to book agents as well as lawyers, such as Stuart Langley[10] who has written about the copyright issues in Pirate Cinema for the website Law and the Multiverse, and also for cultural anthropologists such as Brian Thom[11], who wrote in his thesis about Coast Salish literature challenging colonial power. Even for people with a vested interest in copyright
and licensing, deconstructive and performative notions of subjectivity and aesthetics are pretty stuffy when they come from people who aren't – or don’t think they are – constructors of aesthetic works. Heidegger’s tone throughout his article is stiff. By contrast, there's something heartfelt and authentic in the statements by Doctorow's teen protagonist as he learns during the novel to think of himself as one kind of artist among many. “We all use other peoples' words! We didn't invent English, we inherited it!” insists his young protagonist. “ ...All the dialog ever written is inspired by other peoples' dialog. I make new words out of them, my words, but they're not like, mine-mine, not like my underpants are mine! They're mine, but they're yours to make into your words, too!”[12] It
might be unexpected to link Heidegger with underpants, but that esthetic
challenge is appropriate from Doctorow, who has received multiple literary
awards, most notably the Prometheus Award for works that dramatize the perennial conflict between
liberty and authority, expose or satirize abuses of government power, and
champion individual rights. The only other intersection between Heidegger’s
article and Doctorow at this time is Heidegger’s focus on poesis and Doctorow’s naming of his daughter Poesy – a small and
tenuous link between minds that are unexpectedly alike in spite of all their
different works.
Works
Cited:
“About
The
Licenses.”
Creative
Commons. Web. Undated.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/
Doctorow, Cory. “Little Brother: About This Book/FAQ.” Craphound.com. Web. Undated. http://craphound.com/littlebrother/about/#freedownload/
-----. Pirate Cinema.
Tor Teen, 2012.
-----.
“Pirate
Cinema:
Download
For
Free.”
Craphound.com. Web. Undated.
http://craphound.com/pc/download/
-----. “What happens with digital rights management in the
real world?” Guardian. February 5, 2014.
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2014/feb/05/digital-rights-management
Gaiman,
Neil.
“Gaiman
on
Copyright
Piracy
and
the
Web.”
OpenRightsGroup,
YouTube. Web. February
3,
2011.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Qkyt1wXNlI
Heidegger, Martin. “The Question Concerning Technology.” Martin Heidegger: Basic Writings from “Being
and Time” (1927) to “The Task of Thinking” (1964), rev. ed., edited by
David Farrell Krell. Harper: San Francisco, CA, 1993.
Hoffman, Abbie. Steal This Book. Pirate
Editions/Grove Press: New York, NY, 1971.
Langey,
Stuart.
“Pirate
Cinema
by
Cory
Doctorow.”
Law
and
the
Multiverse. Web. March 15, 2013. http://lawandthemultiverse.com/2013/03/15/pirate-cinema-by-cory-doctorow/
Thom, Brian. "Chapter 2 The Island Hul'qumi'num Coast Salish people in the 21st Century." Coast Salish Senses of Place: Dwelling, Meaning, Power, Property and Territory in the Coast Salish World. PhD Thesis, McGill University, 2005, p 73.
[1] Heidegger,
Martin. “The Question Concerning Technology.” Martin Heidegger: Basic Writings from “Being and Time” (1927) to “The
Task of Thinking” (1964), rev. ed., edited by David Farrell Krell. Harper:
San Francisco, CA, 1993, p319.
[2] Heidegger, p322.
[3] Gaiman, Neil.
“Gaiman on Copyright Piracy and the Web.” OpenRightsGroup, YouTube. Web. February 3, 2011. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Qkyt1wXNlI
[4] Doctorow,
Cory. “Little Brother: About This Book/FAQ.” Craphound.com. Web. Undated. http://craphound.com/littlebrother/about/#freedownload/
[5] Customers can
also buy a t-shirt or totebag with much of the book’s text at http://www.litographs.com/products/brother . For each sale of a poster, Litographs donates a new, high-quality book to the International Book Bank. http://www.internationalbookbank.org/ .
[6] Doctorow, Cory. “Little
Brother: About This Book/FAQ.” Craphound.com.
Web. Undated. http://craphound.com/littlebrother/about/#freedownload/
[7] The novels of Cory Doctorow are released with Creative Commons licensing,
which For his earlier novels such as Little Brother, Doctorow has chosen “Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.” Stated simply, anyone is free to share the material in any medium or format, and to adapt or remix, transform, and build upon the material, under the following terms:
Attribution: You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your site.
NonCommercial: You may not use the material for commercial purposes.
ShareAlike: If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.
No additional restrictions: You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as the license terms are followed.
In contrast to his earlier novels, the Creative Commons licensing that Doctorow has chosen for his work Pirate Cinema is “Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported.” Stated simply, anyone is free to share this work with others, to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format, under the following terms.
Attribution: You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your site.
NonCommercial: You may not use the material for commercial purposes.
NoDerivatives: If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.
No additional restrictions: You may not apply legal terms or
technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the
license permits. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as the
license terms are followed.
Doctorow notes on his website’s page about Little Brother the following:
And in the meantime, I draw your attention to article 2 of all Creative Commons licenses:
Nothing in this License is intended to reduce, limit, or restrict any uses free from copyright
or rights arising from limitations or exceptions that are provided for in connection with the copyright
protection under copyright law or other applicable laws.
Strip away the legalese and what that says is, "Copyright gives you, the public, rights. Fair
use is
real. Fair
dealing is real. De minimum exemptions to
copyright are real. You have the right to make all sorts of uses of
all copyrighted works, without permission, without Creative Commons licenses.
Rights are like muscles. When you don't exercise them, they get flabby. Stop asking for stuff you can take without permission. Please!
[8]
Doctorow, Cory. “Pirate Cinema: Download For Free.” Craphound.com. Web. Undated. http://craphound.com/pc/download/
[9] Ibid.
[10] Langey, Stuart. “Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow.” Law and the Multiverse. Web. March 15, 2013. http://lawandthemultiverse.com/2013/03/15/pirate-cinema-by-cory-doctorow/
[11] “Finally, I recognize that the existing coast Salish Literature often emphasizes and challenges the legacies of colonial power, particularly as such power has been applied to shaping modern landscapes in the Coast Salish world. I argue that a loosely phenomenological anthropology, which is attentive to narratives of history and culture, and which brings together divergent theory and data on territory, property, language, history, cosmology, and mythology, contributes a subtle understanding of the ways Coast Salish people resist these colonial powers.” Thom, Brian. "Chapter 2 The Island
Hul'qumi'num Coast Salish people in the 21st Century." Coast Salish Senses
of Place: Dwelling, Meaning, Power, Property and Territory in the Coast Salish
World. PhD Thesis, McGill University, 2005, p 73.
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