So I have this page on my site about copyright for collage artists. It's not legal advice or anything, just the information I turned up while I was researching the issue for myself. I made the page because there's so much misinformation floating around online about copyright, and I got tired of having the same arguments over and over with people who are utterly convinced that their particular misinformation is correct. I wrote everything I knew up on a web page and added links to the Copyright Office website so people could check it out for themselves. I tried to leave out my opinions because I didn't want to add to the din of competing theories. Of course I have opinions about what copyright law should be, and how much appropriation a careful artist can probably get away with, but that's not the point of the page.
The copyright page didn't used to get much attention, but I think someone must have referenced it in a book or something. Because the past few months I've gotten much more email related to it. Most of them are just to say thanks for collecting this information, which I really appreciate. Or to ask a specific question about usage, which I usually don't answer because I'm not qualified to give legal advice and I don't even have enough time to keep up with correspondence with my friends.
Occasionally though, I get a message that really annoys me. (And if you, dear reader, found my journal through the copyright page, please don't be offended. I'm clearly not talking about you.) Usually these are from people who are convinced that they've found a never before discovered loophole in copyright law which makes their unauthorized usage totally legal. The most common one is the idea that if they are using Photoshop to apply filters to a copyrighted image, they are changing every pixel. So therefore their copy is a new, original creation, not a derivative work.
Pardon me for saying so, but that's absurd. If that were true then every copy of everything would be an original work, because it wouldn't contain any particles of the original. A photo of a painting, a burned copy of a CD, a reproduction in a magazine or book of a photo, a photocopy of a book, heck every published copy of a book: all these would be new creations, not derivative works. Obviously that's not the case.
But I digress. The point is that I used to write back and try to explain the flaws in these theories, but would always get mired in interminable debates that reminded me why I stopped having these discussions in the first place. So now I just don't answer these messages and I feel much better. (I should point out that it's not the leaky theories that annoy me; it's the endless debates, the expectation that I will research the leaky theory for them, even repeated requests from one guy that I phone him to discuss it!) Last night, though, I got a message that took the cake:
"I'm an artist, who dabbles in collage. I find your site to be very informative, but I'm a skeptic. Can you tell me a little about your experience and credentials, regarding copyright law? "
Um, no. That would be no. I cannot and will not tell you anything about my experience or credentials. The former because I already explained on the front page of the copyright site, and if you couldn't take the time to read it there, why should I write it out again. The latter because, as I say on the page, I have no credentials. Just the ability to find information that is readily available.
I guess I should be ticked off but this message is just funny. My credentials? It's not like I'm a journalist, or a university instructor, or anything like that. I'm just some idiot who put up a web page. My information is free, and worth every penny.
The upsurge in attention was almost certainly due to Teresa Nielsen Hayden linking to you on October 18, http://nielsenhayden.com/lighter/archives/2004_10.html. I hope that at least some of the people who found you through that have stayed to read your journal.
Um, try http://nielsenhayden.com/lighter/archives/2004_10.html (without the period at the end).
Oh yeah, I forgot about Teresa Neilsen Hayden's link! That must have caused a lot of the traffic. Though I think the increase in comments had begun before then, and one message mentioned something that sounded like a book -- "I learned about your page in So-and-so," something like that. But you're right, Making Light must be largely responsible for the traffic.
ps, I was reading a thread on another LJ about beginning posts with "um" in online discussions, and whether or not it indicates an insult, or just uncertainty/verbal throat-clearing as it would in speech. Between my post and your comment, we've produced examples of both uses. Funny!
I have seen an online forum that specifically forbade starting posts with "um", because it almost always was intended as an insult. this was a forum in which insults were considered to be counterproductive rather than amusing.
Yeah, televisionwithoutpity.com does that & they came up as an example in the thread I was reading. It's possible for it not to be an insult (witness Kevin's comment above, clearly "um" means "oops" there). But when I've seen it in a discussion group, usually it meant "only an idiot would say that." Like the written equivalent of talking very slowly with exaggerated pronunciation to suggest that the other person is too stupid to comprehend normal speech.