Copy, Rip, Burn

David M. Berry

Description

From downloading music and movies to accessing free software, digital media is forcing us to rethink the very idea of intellectual property.



While big companies complain about lost profits, the individual has never enjoyed such freedom and autonomy.



Berry explores this debate in a concise way, offering an ideal introduction for anyone not versed in the legalistic terminology that - up until now - has dominated coverage of this issue.



Looking at the historical development of the free software and the open source movement he examines its growth, politics and potential impact, showing how the ideas that inspired the movement have now begun to influence the wider cultural landscape. He explores whether free software offers us the potential to re-think our relationship with technology in the information society.



This book will appeal to students of media and journalism, and anyone interested in new opportunities for creating a truly independent and democratic media.
Acknowledgements

Preface

1. The Canary in the Mine

2. The Information Society

3. The Concept of the Commons

4. From Free Software to Open Source?

5. The Contestation of Code

6. The Poetics of Code

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• Social Science
• COMPUTERS
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Cultural studies
• Anthropology
• Networking
• Social
• Culture

Informations

• Publié par: Pluto Press
• Date de parution: 20 septembre 2008
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781849644556
• Langue: English

Extrait

Copy, Rip, Burn
Berry 00 pre i 5/8/08 12:05:39Berry 00 pre ii 5/8/08 12:05:39Copy, Rip, Burn
The Politics of Copyleft and Open Source
DAVID M. BERRY
PLUTO PRESS
www.plutobooks.com
Berry 00 pre iii 5/8/08 12:05:39First published 2008 by Pluto Press
345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA
www.plutobooks.com
Copyright © David M. Berry 2008
The right of David M. Berry to be identifi ed as the author of this work has
been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7453 2415 9 Hardback978 0 7453 2414 2 Paperback
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data applied for

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
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Berry 00 pre iv 5/8/08 12:05:41CONTENTS
Acknowledgements ix
Preface x
1. The Canary in the Mine 1
2. The Information Society 41
3. The Concept of the Commons 79
4. From Free Software to Open Source? 98
5. The Contestation of Code 147
6. The Poetics of Code 188
Notes 202
Bibliography 234
Index 253
Berry 00 pre v 5/8/08 12:05:41
Berry 00 pre vi 5/8/08 12:05:41For Trine, Helene and Henrik.
Berry 00 pre vii 5/8/08 12:05:41Prometheus: I caused mortals to cease foreseeing doom.
Chorus: What cure did you provide them with against that
sickness?
Prometheus: I placed in them blind hopes.
Chorus: That was a great gift you gave to men.
Prometheus: Besides this I gave them fi re.
Chorus: And do creatures of a day now possess bright-faced
fi re?
Prometheus: Yes, and from it they shall learn many crafts.
Chorus: These are the charges on which –
Prometheus: Zeus tortures me and gives me no respite.
Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound
Berry 00 pre viii 5/8/08 12:05:41ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Writing a book is never a solo endeavour and I would like to thank
all those who contributed in a number of different ways to make
the fi nished book possible. In particular I would like to thank
Caroline Bassett, Michael Bull, John Holmwood, Christopher May,
William Merrin, Giles Moss, William Outhwaite, and Darrow
Schecter, for their engaging arguments, critiques and generosity
in sharing ideas, concepts and theories that have infl uenced my
work. I would also like to thank Trine for being there.
ix
Berry 00 pre ix 5/8/08 12:05:41PREFACE
The world is one and common to those who are awake, but that everybody
who is asleep turns away to his own.
Heraclitus (2006, Fragment 89)
This book critically engages with the activities and theoretical
exchanges between the free/libre and open source software groups
who write and share computer code online. I place these groups
in the context of the expansion of intellectual property rights
and look at their discourses surrounding the enclosure of the
‘intellectual’ commons. In particular, I explore how free/libre
software and open source software (FLOSS) articulates productive
forms of self-knowledge and discipline (such as through discursive
formations and code), which appear to establish a potential for
uncoordinated and decentred models of creativity. In doing so, I
investigate how code designates what is prescribed and what is
not, what is articulated and what is silenced; how code structures
our lives and our subjectivity. I hope to uncover the way in which
the open source and free software groups are challenging our
existing liberal categories (around cultural production, knowledge
ownership and authorship) both in economic terms (that is, as
a new form of commons-based peer production) and in terms
of political liberties (for example, the question of free speech,
democracy and its connection to code).
First, I am interested in the disciplinary nature of knowledge and
power and this is an important element in my
political-economyinfluenced approach. Secondly, I am interested in political
intervention as practice. Thus this book forms a normative project
of both explanation and a contribution to further praxis in the
fi eld of creative research. Thirdly, I wish to offer readers a set
of concepts that can be used both to think creatively about the
questions I raise but also to offer political possibilities.
x
Berry 00 pre x 5/8/08 12:05:41PREFACE xi
Heidegger (2000) called for a more profound interpretation
of the epistemology of technology, arguing that technology is
a special form of knowledge – a form of truth or disclosure.
Here then I would like to explore the extent to which the social
practices of the FLOSS groups are introducing a rupture or break
with the immediately given and accepted ‘nature’ of technology.
That is, rather than abandoning technology, these groups
foreground technological approaches to the world and bring
the given of technology into fuller consciousness. In a related
manner, a politics of code asks fundamental questions about
human relationships with complex technologies, technologies
whose complexities sometimes exceed the human ability to
manage their interconnected parts. Below I examine the activities
and discourses of the FLOSS groups’ approach to a ‘politics of
code’ and whether they could contribute to such a Heideggerian
project of disclosing technology.
Much of the literature on the open source movement is
scanty theoretically – essentially popular journalism – or takes a
particularly liberal approach to the understanding of the subject.
Questions regarding the motivations of actors are addressed as
individual preferences of groups operating within the sphere of
artistic or cultural production and this individualistic outlook
1informs many rational-choice-oriented approaches to this issue.
To date a great portion of the literature is heavily concerned with
questions of legal theory and intellectual property connected to
the idea of the Romantic artist. The Romantic artist is the idea of
an original author or auteur, as the French describe ‘artistic’ fi lm
directors, who has somehow wrought an original creation from
nothing (ex nihilo), which is sometimes considered to be an act
of genius. Clearly this liberal and one-dimensional explanation
of creativity leaves a lot to be desired; in contrast I argue that
2creativity requires a social environment to fl ourish.
By focusing on questions of collective creativity and desire I feel
that we are better able to question the notion of the Romantic
artist and also to offer the possibility of collective action as a
creative moment. The common is a key aspect to thinking in
terms of the ways in which a ‘technology of the common’ could
Berry 00 pre xi 5/8/08 12:05:41xii COPY, RIP, BURN
raise critical awareness of the collective moment in production.
But it also contributes positively to new ways of approaching and
applying methods of working, which legitimate and encourage
the fl ourishing of social action and political practices.
This book also aims to question the assumptions of the
‘information’ or ‘creative’ society. One of the most common of
these is the argument that ‘incentivation’ can encourage individual
creativity and hence economic growth. Thus the motivation for
the artist, musician, designer or writer is explained purely through
their desire for profi t; to stimulate their creativity and innovation
more intellectual property rights (IPR) legislation is required. The
argument for a ‘creative’ economy can therefore be used to cast
everyone in the unlikely Thatcherite model of one-dimensional
profit-motivated entrepreneurs rather than complex and
multifaceted human beings. Additionally, there is built into much
of the legislation a bias towards an understanding of creativity
through the creative acts of lone genius, singularly creating works
out of nothing. But as we must constantly remind ourselves, behind
every musician, composer or author there is an army of teachers,
friends, peers, producers, editors and managers who all contribute
in different ways to the fi nal artefact. No woman or man is an
island and creativity is always a collective achievement.
There is a tension between the monopolistic granting of property
rights in information and the democratic needs to expand the fl ow
and access to this information. Copyright and other intellectual
property laws seek to restrict access so that only those able and
willing to pay might make use of the work. This restriction of
access may therefore actually reduce the ability of certain members
of society to get the information they require in order to make
informed social, economic and political choices and widen the
gap between an ‘information rich’ and ‘information poor’. The
actions of the free software and open source movement which
are predicated on a sharing of both the structural code and the
content that sits upon it (i.e. the algorithms and meaning of the
code), places it squarely in confl ict with the owners of copyright
and other intellectual property rights. It does so particularly when
understood in relation to the hugely profi table content industries,
Berry 00 pre xii 5/8/08 12:05:41PREFACE xiii
which must be able digitally to restrict distribution and copying
in an informational market relying on a notion of scarcity. This is
because if the code is open, there is no way in which the protection
methods, commonly known as digital rights management, which
serve as the locks on creative works, can be kept secret. This is one
of the critical is