Quote: I ... think that legal systems (such as copyright) can be and are increasingly used to limit, contain, rationalize and commercialize kids' culture. And this happens in a variety of ways - through the elimination of opportunities to generate content, or by placing restrictions on what and how that content is generated (limiting freedom of expression and undermining children's agency); through corporate claims of IP ownership over child-generated content and submissions; and by teaching kids from a very young age a corporate reinterpretation of copyright law...ignoring fair use and obscuring the principles upon which copyright was based in the first place.

Quote: The application of these rewards and punishments, however, is quite arbitrary. Teachers have enormous discretion in giving punishments and rewards. In the criminal realm, the Minister of Magic can follow or bend the law depending on how he relates to specific people. The use of magic is punished depending on who the person is that commits a particular illegal act.

*snort*

aredwitch

I had to start a new post because things are heating up.

In a new twist, TechCrunch blogger Michael Arrington, who banned AP (Associated Press) stories from his blog due to the latest madness (see extensive coverage on my previous entry), has now decided to call in his own attorneys because the AP has quoted his blog without paying him a dime.  He has sent a takedown order to the AP based on the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.

Fair Use Smackdown! 

Techcrunch: The AP Has Violated My Copyright and I Demand Justice

Also today, the AP promised to meet with an unknown and rather shady group called the "Media Bloggers Association" to form new guidelines, and yet not one story has leaked from the media about it. 

UPDATE: According to a blogger on The Washington Post, AP has issued a statement that this matter is now closed!  You can read it at the link because I don't dare copy their sacred words: 

AP Says Drudge Retort Excerpt Matter Closed ~ No Official Policy Announced

Rogers Cadenhead: Writes About His Meeting with the AP Attorneys  ~ 
The Stanford Fair Use Project offtered to help him.

My friend Bluestocking has posted some new enlightening essays for your summer reading pleasure:

It Ain't Libel If It's True!

and . . .


Copyright Through the Annals of Time, Part One

Yes it all started with the fabled "book curse."


Let's take a trip to the "Lego Hogwarts Library" shall we? I've never heard Madam Pince sound so convincing (and alot like Norman Bates' mother from Psycho):

Kevin Smith writes in the Duke University Copyright Blog:

Imagining Fair Use

The judge has rejected a request by the Yoko Ono for a preliminary injunction that would prevent the distribution of the film. Ono claimed that the use of this short clip without her permission was copyright infringement. Given the vastly different political perspectives involved, it is unlikely permission would have been forthcoming. But the judge ruled that it was also unlikely that permission was necessary, since there was a strong claim that the use was fair use. Since one of the criteria for getting a preliminary injunction is “likelihood of success on the merits,” Ono’s request was denied because the judge felt it was unlikely she would succeed on the underlaying claim that using the clip was infringement.

. . . Nor does the film Expelled compete in any way with the market for the recordings of John Lennon. And in a traditional transformative use case, the owner of the original may not have much desire to license the use if asked, since the proposed new use often subjects the original to criticism or ridicule (as in this case). Transformative uses are often those uses where there is a strong possibility that the copyright owner in the original work would use his or her rights to suppress the new speech; fair use is the remedy that prevents this censorship by copyright.

For me, this role of fair use in preserving copyright as the “engine of free expression” is especially clear in this case (for an explanation and discussion of this quote from Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises, see this report from The Free Expression Project). Free speech is always hardest to accept, and most important to remember, when one disagrees violently with what is being said. In this case, I personally have little use for the claims being made in the movie “Expelled;” they strike me as inflammatory and hard to defend with real logic or facts. Nevertheless, the right of the movie producers to make those claims is inviolate, in my opinion, and it is important that they have the tools to make their case in the best way the can. Fair use is an important tool to support creative expression, whether I agree with the content of that expression or not. The arguments being made in the movie may fail, but the judge got this decision exactly right when he ruled that the producers could use the tools they did (including a small part of another’s copyrighted expression) to make those arguments." 

( Read More Opinions of the Verdict Here )

What makes this so disturbing, is that for those of us who feel that this book frankly, is no big deal, and should be published under the guidelines of “fair use”, we have been called “JK Rowling haters”, or “Steve Vander Ark lovers”. Simply because, we are exercising out inalienable right to disagree. We are not “true fans” 

GASP!!! We disagree!!!

Now, the Star-Bell Sneetches had bellies with stars.
The Plain-Belly Sneetches had none upon thars.
Those stars weren’t so big. They were really so small.
You might think such a thing wouldn’t matter at all.

But, because they had stars, all the Star-Belly Sneetches
Would brag, “We’re the best kind of Sneetch on the beaches.”
With their snoots in the air, they would sniff and they’d snort
“We’ll have nothing to do with the Plain-Belly sort!”

...When the Star Belly Sneetches had frankfurter roasts
Or picnics or parties or marshmallow toasts,
They never invited the Plain-Belly Sneetches
They left them out cold, in the dark of the beaches.
They kept them away. Never let them come near.
And that’s how they treated them year after year...

~ Dr. Seuss

The other day, I posted a comment from the writer Karen Brown, author of Prejudice in Harry Potter. I had originally seen the comment on Kristin Devoe's Daily Prophet blog, and I posted it Here in a discussion of Tim Wu's New Yorker Article.

I did not know Ms. Brown, but I wrote an e-mail to her inviting her to comment further, which she did. I never meant to drag her into a huge controversy or cause problems for her in any way, and I am so sorry. I have quoted dozens of bloggers in the past few months to show different views, and several of them have decided to comment here with no drama.  

I was just trying to give a balanced view of the case, since I have been criticized for my own bias. I felt that Ms. Brown had a refreshing view, since she is a fan and supporter of J. K. Rowling, but was wishing that fandom would tone down their criticism of Steve Vander Ark and let the legal system decide the fate of his book.

But due to unfortunate things that have been said in the past few days, Ms. Brown has been drawn into some accusations and threats, both public and private. She feels her statement is being misconstrued and her views distorted. This has caused her a great deal of distress, and she decided to state her own view in a public setting.  Therefore Karen has put out a Press Release:

Caught on the Wrong Side of Harry Potter Fandom 

"Unsurprisingly, the fan reaction has been visceral, in all sorts of directions. I particularly like being compared to Rita Skeeter. Obviously there is much more I would have liked to have put in - there were hours of interviews, and great contributions from Sheryll Townsend that were cut in their entirely to my dismay. But overall the thrust of the article was to describe the feud over Steven Vanderark in fandom, and his punishment therein.

Ironically, the article itself seems to have led to even more feuding in fandom.
Melissa Anelli in particular feels she has been misrepresented; though I am not sure I see why. Briefly, I mention and quote language to the effect that her and other leaders in fandom have been strong supporters of Rowling, and tough on Steve Vander Ark. This no one can deny. It is also true that Anelli herself has a good relationship with Rowling, and is writing a book, on fandom, with her blessing. These are the facts - and I didn’t refer to her as having mushroom hair, so she ought be happy.

Perhaps I will end with a para that was cut from the piece that seems to capture things:

Sheryll Townsend, a forty-eight year old Slytherin and fellow member of Harry Potter for Grownups (she calls herself a “list elf”), said, “Fandom tends to eat their own.”

"I fully expect that the outcome of this lawsuit will be:

1. Publication of Lexicon will go on without any problem or prejudice, because it clearly falls within the copyright law's provision for scholarly work, commentary and review.

2. Rowling will be forced to pay Steven Vander Ark's legal fees, since her suit was utterly without merit from the start.

3. People who hear about this suit will have a sour taste in their mouth about Rowling from now on. Her Cinderella story once charmed us. Her greedy evil-witch behavior now disgusts us. And her next book will be perceived as the work of that evil witch. "

( Follow the Yellow Brick Road to more Entries )

( Read all the Pithy Comments Here )

Trial Transcripts!!!    

Selected Quotes of the Day

"I believe the flood gates will open," Rowling said, her voice rising. "Are we the owners of our own work?"

"Copyright law does not permit an author to suppress a book because she doesn't like it," he said. ~Anthony Falzone, Defense Attorney

“I can’t simply take the expert’s opinion as my own.” ~ Judge Robert Patterson

Again, Judge Patterson interrupted, and addressed Rowling directly. “Can you imagine anyone reading [the Lexicon] for entertainment value?”  

“Quality shouldn’t matter,”. . . If the Lexicon is lousy, Falzone concluded, the answer is not to suppress it, but for Rowling to write her own. 

( Read the News Under the Cut )

I had a feeling I would be using my Twilight Zone icon alot today. Can you hear the music?

I just found a blogger who took notes today in court, and this just deserves it's own space.  

Now, to me, it isn't just weird because they are discussing magical creatures in court, it is the fact that JKR believes there is only one "correct" interpretation of "Alohomora."  I always thought it came from "Aloha" since I don't speak West African.  So if someone misinterprets the books - say they don't believe Dumbledore is gay, or that Snape is a big evil dodo bird - then they need to be set straight (or not straight, as the case may be)! 

NY Times Blog: J. K. Rowling and the Courtroom of Muggles

April 14, 2008, 3:02 pm
By Jennifer 8. Lee

As the author J. K. Rowling took the witness stand on Monday to testify in the copyright lawsuit over a Harry Potter encyclopedia, the line between her magical world and the muggle courtroom became somewhat blurred. The lead plaintiff lawyer apologized for saying the name of the villain Lord Voldemort out loud. Albus Dumbledore was quoted in opening arguments for his admonition of when you must “choose between what is right and what is easy.”

Ms. Rowling, when asked to define what wizard cards were, explained in a matter-of-fact matter that they were cards of famous wizards that came with the purchase of a chocolate frogs. (Her lawyer had to explain to the judge that outside the books the cards only existed in a video game). And while the lawsuit was filed on Oct. 31, the lawyers noted, “The fact it was filed on Halloween, your honor, was just a coincidence.” 

When asked to discuss the similarity of the Lexicon’s definition of Chinese fireballs on the stand with her own writing, she said that it was not like a giraffe, where if she and Mr. Vander Ark were describing the animal, they might inevitably use the same words. “It’s not as if we are describing something that exists outside my imagination,” she said.

It was clearly an emotional issue for Ms. Rowling, who had flown in from Scotland to testify. She was given a box of blue tissues after she said, “I really don’t want to cry because I’m British.” 

“Alohomora,” a spell that opens doors in Harry Potter’s word, does not come from “aloha,” the Hawaiian salutation, she said on the stand. Rather it derives from a West African term meaning favorable to thieves, she said. 

The courtroom at the federal court house at 500 Pearl Street was considerably more packed than other copyright cases (like Viacom v. YouTube/Google). There were reporters, law students, copyright groupies, legal scholars and even a young fan or two (shouldn’t they be in school?).

Occasionally, the muggle world would come in focus. When the lawyer apologized for struggling with the pronunciation of “occamy” (a creature resembling a winged snake that was a play off of Occam’s Razor), Ms. Rowling said: “You can pronounce it any way you want. It is not a real thing.”

JKR arrives at the courthouse: