At 10:48 AM 6/9/2003 -0400, Joseph Pietro Riolo wrote:
>On Fri, 6 Jun 2003, Michael Graham <mgraham[_at_]marshallip.com> wrote:
> >
> > I am sorry. Attribution should be required -- Shakespeare to the
> > contrary. It seems to me to be both courtesy and truthfulness that
> > require this. The idea that plagiarism must be permitted to protect
> > "Freedom of Speech" turns my stomach.
Requiring attribution in the reproduction of public domain works brings up several interesting problems. In the visual arts (and in literature too -- even for drama ascribed to Shakespeare), attribution is a consequence of opinion, and opinion frequently follows the flow of fickle fashion. What would happen were I to reproduce, say, a famous painting like the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Friedsam Annunciation, the one once attributed to Jan Van Eyck, but now ascribed by the MMA as "probably" by Petrus Christus.
http://www.metmuseum.org/collections/view1.asp?dep=11&full=1&item=32%2E100%2E35
So under a regime that requires attribution information, what happens were I to claim that this work is, say, by neither of the above, but, rather, an early work by Rogier van der Weyden (even though most experts would agree that my opinion would be foolish and uninformed)?
Under such circumstances, what happens to my freedom of scholarly speech? Would I be required always to accept the attribution of the museum that holds the work? Who would have standing to prosecute such an offence? Who is being harmed?
There is actually a case about this for which I don't have a citation. Around 1965 an owner of a panel bought as by Raphael sued an historian who claimed it was not by the hand of this artist. (The scholar, maintained the owner, ruined the painting's value.)
One of the basic tenants of freedom of speech is the right to make a fool of oneself. I think that sufficiently covers the issue at hand. Sometimes it takes history to reveal the fool. Indeed, the history of attribution is often just as interesting as the history of the work itself.
Be that as it may, any pro attribution regime that intends to be serious would insist that the sources of the reproduced work be attributed and identified, too, and, then, the sources of the sources. As Scalia noted in his Dastar opinion, one would be forced to chase down all the tributaries and sources of the Nile.
Current art frequently will question the very notion of attribution. Accordingly, we see from time to time contemporary artists reproducing key monuments and affixing their own name to the copies -- as a way of recontextualizing the notion of authorship and appropriation. To require verifiable and accurate attribution in such cases would be to wound the intention of the artist.
I don't think that the requirement that Mr. Graham proposes will do much to curtain plagiarism. The wager that plagiarists make is that nobody will recognize their source. Those who bet that nobody will identify the source certainly won't have any motive to identify it themselves. ...which reminds me of a story (probably apocryphal) about the student who unwittingly handed in as his own, a paper that his professor wrote many years ago. The student received an "F" with this note: "It was a lousy paper when I wrote it thirty years ago and you've done nothing to improve it."
Now, if, you'll excuse me, I must return to my reading of a few plays often mistakenly attributed to Shakespeare -- Today, I mean, those written by Christopher Marlowe, tomorrow ...
See: http://www.bardweb.net/debates.html
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