Some time ago, David Turner wrote:
> But this is off-topic for CNI-copyright.
I have given a lot of consideration to the view that content issues are off-topic for copyright lawyers. While lying in bed yesterday with both hamstrings torn from an over-zealous stretch for the try line while playing touch Rugby (why do men about to enter their sixth decade try to recreate glory days?), I did something I rarely do. I watched TV news. And what was on? Another funeral for one of our Bali dead - and how keen the mainstream TV channel was to zoom in to the face of a boy, probably no older that 10 or 11, as he mourned the loss of his mother, the wife of a former footballing international. The cameraman dutifully captured each tear as it fell down the boy's puzzled face. I am sure those of you in NY and the wider US have had many such tele opportunities since 10/11 due to the distribution rights that relate to them.
It is copyright law that allows this TV station extensive commerical rights that result in its exploitation of this boy's pain. Furthermore, our privacy laws would not allow this boy or his family any redress for this violation of their remembrance as journalism is exempt from such controls. No doubt such a show would claim freedom of speech.
Now what was this televsdiual product? It is a property right we create and promote. If copyright is a property value that allows a licensee or owner by assignment of material, I don't see how one can isolate copyright from content. The law protects the content and gives it a set of proprietorial rights to be exploited for commercial gain. (International rights backed by TRIPS and the WTO). If our aim is to make students respect copyright (as Nancy Willard aspires) then perhaps one of the problems young people have is that when they see dubious content they are able to ascertain that respect for the laws that maintain rights in such content is a difficult concept to take on board. Thus the puzzled look on the grieivng boy's face as he looked straight into the cameraperson.
> I know this is probably hard to understand for someone from a country
> with a "Office of Film & Literature Classification", but freedom, too,
> is a possible societal value. And it's one that the American legal
> culture values highly.
While our country may decide that in certain circumstances the use of copyright to promote certain damaging materials to minors is not a good thing (a quite different matter to that I mention above which is about exploitaition of a minor to create a product), this does not reduce our cognitive capacity to evaluate the assertion that freedom is an absolute value. This assertion is incorrect.
Some years ago I read through coronial records of as siege here called the 'Cangai Seige'. During that siege journalists from a major current affairs show flew a chopper to the scene and, according to the Coroner, put the lives of the children being held hostage and the police at risk in order to get an "exclusive", an exclusive over which I am sure they would wish to maintain copyright.
The Coroner found:
All sorts of assertions can be made in the name of freedom of the press. Freedom, if one reflects for a moment, cannot be exalted to such an extent that it becomes an absolute which would then become the source of values. (P. D. Gould, NSW Deputy State Coroner)
Nor should freedom be exalted when it is used to support the intellectual property of free marketeers who wish to exploit children and teenagers by exposing them to ultra-violence and sexualization at an all-too-early age.
> (And, of course, at least 33 media scholars disagree that violent media
> cause violence -- see
> http://www.fepproject.org/courtbriefs/stlouis.html)
This is impressive evidence. Yet one does wonder. Given the efforts of tobacco companies in hiding evidence that was contrary to their point of view behind legal professional privilege, one wonders if similar contrary evidence in the case of prolonged exposure to ultra violence and other unsuitable material is now subjected to legal privilege in offices of the producers and creators of this material.
I repeat my point that the impact that viewing (or playing in games) ultra violence is a matter of 'common sense' - there is little need for a court to consider expert evidence.
But even if a did consider expert evidence was necessary, consider this - the creators of the material themselves question prolonged exposure to it - there are news reports showing that Spielberg and Tom Cruise go to considerable lengths to control the viewing of their own children. Here also is an abstract from Australian Psychologist Volume 36 Number 3 2001: Video Games and Aggressive Behaviour by Gabrielle Unsworth and Tony Ward' University of Melbourne: Research in recent years indicates that children and adolescents are spending a significant amount of time entertaining themselves with video games. This work has lead to an investigation of the relationship between the playing of video games and violent behaviour. In this paper we provide an overview of the key findings of the above research, and outline possible mediating factors, including (a) individual/ physiological differences, (b) reality perception, and (c) contextual features of violence. Finally, we discuss the use of clinical intervention, education, and filtering software as strategies for managing the possible violent effects of video games. The inconsistencies in the findings from a vast body of research and the rate of advancement in video game technology make it difficult to draw any firm conclusions about the relationship between exposure to video game violence and aggressive behaviour. However, it is concluded that there is preliminary evidence that violent video games may have an antisocial effect on young players. It is therefore recommended that Australian policy makers actively intervene at an educational level.
I also point you to this research by Craig A. Anderson, Ph.D., Professor & Chair, Department of Psychology, Iowa State University at http://www.youngmedia.org.au/mediachildren/05_07_violence_anderson.htm - Young Media is an Australian organsation that examines such issues as we speak of here.
Late in the day I tuned to our home-grown spoof - CNNNN - a suggestion to solve our current drought was to blow up parts of the Continental Shelf and tilt Australia so water flows in from the East. Only problem is my home town is at the most easterly point. Alas I will have to climb up the light house even with my bung legs in order to breathe. >From there I could eat my mouth watering Tilt BurgerTM I bought from Fungry's (See: http://www.abc.net.au/cnnnn/fungrys/s713571.htm). You get two specially slanted patties, off-centre lettuce and sliding beetroot on a crooked sesame-seed bun. Now that's a good idea to copyright. How will I express it in material form?
While I abhor their methods and results and believe they should be hunted down with the utmost vigour, sometimes I wonder whether those radical Muslims in the hills of Bali and Afghanistan that clearly hate us so much might not have a few valid points.
Regards,
Graham Bassett
Converging law, information technology and education to foster an autonomous cyberspace
Graham Bassett BA, DipEd, MInfoTech, LLB (Hons)
PO Box 1565
Byron Bay NSW 2481
Australia
Tel. 0414986158
bassett[_at_]ozemail.com.au
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~bassett/
> On Mon, 2002-09-30 at 01:48, Graham Bassett wrote:
> > Nancy and list members,
> >
> > In my view, Columbine was wrongly decided - it was correct in a legal
> > culture that emphasises the value of property (be it real or
intellectual).
>
> I know this is probably hard to understand for someone from a country
> with a "Office of Film & Literature Classification", but freedom, too,
> is a possible societal value. And it's one that the American legal
> culture values highly.
>
> (And, of course, at least 33 media scholars disagree that violent media
> cause violence -- see
> http://www.fepproject.org/courtbriefs/stlouis.html)
>
> But this is off-topic for CNI-copyright.
>
> --
> -Dave Turner
> GPL Compliance Engineer
>
Received on Sat Nov 02 2002 - 06:02:38 GMT
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