So, my name is Nina Paley, and I'm an artist.
I made a feature film called "Sita Sings the Blues".
In 2012 I freed "Sita Sings the Blues"
under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike license,
copyleft license***.
That was after a ***** **** year
of navigating the copyright licensing world.
And this chart shows you a result of that.
All these different songs licensed
from all these different corporations for all this money.
You know, songs owned by multiple people. Bam.
Anyway, I'm going to show you the trailer.
So, I hope we have audio, and we should turn off the lights.
Here we go.
But you know what Sita does then?
How she actually is able to tell these people where she…
She drops her jewelry along the way.
And that's how they were able to find her.
It went all the way to Lanka.
How many times did she drop the jewelry?
She was wearing a whole lot of jewelry in the forest.
I mean, no, remember, she's not wearing any jewelry
'cause she left everything before she left Ayodhya and she came…
Oh, she left everything?
Right, she just came in her Sanyasi clothes.
So, my boyfriend told me
to put ***** ********** ***** take me seriously.
And it's a lot of people have seen it.
After I released "Sita Sings the Blues",
I joined QuestionCopyright.org as an artist-in-residence.
QuestionCopyright.org does not do any political lobbying.
We don't focus on the law, but according to the website,
"We are trying to change the terms of the debates
"so that copyright reform efforts aren't stuck always reacting
"to industry rhetoric that equates copying with theft, plagiarism,
"and the abuse or destruction of the original work."
With QuestionCopyright I did a project called "Minute Memes".
It's a series of animated shorts.
They're supposed all be a minute. One of them is 2.5 minute.
And they are about sort of reframing the copyright debate
or about some concept
that needs to be addressed in the copyright debate.
So, I'm going to show 2 of these.
The 1st one is called "Copying Is Not Theft",
and it addresses the idea that copying is theft which is not true.
Here we go.
And by the way, do you get those things here when you buy a DVD?
So this is the 1st frame of "Copying Is Not Theft".
Copying is not theft.
Stealing a thing leaves one less left.
Copying it makes one thing more,
that's what copying's for.
Copying is not theft.
If I copy yours you have it too.
One for me and one for you,
that's what copies can do.
If I steal your bicycle,
you have to take the bus,
but if I just copy it,
there's one for each of us!
Making more of a thing,
that is what we call "copying".
Sharing ideas with everyone,
that's why copying
is fun!
Okay. The next one is called "All Creative Work Is Derivative".
This one is the long one, so relax.
So, I'm an artist and an activist.
And after 3 years of working with QuestionCopyright.org
I realized that the most effective activism I could do
was to be an artist, was to make art,
the best art I could make, and free it.
And it turns out that that's the most radical activism I can do,
because it's the riskiest.
Calling my muse inevitably leads me to violate copyright law.
And if I'm willing to be the artist that I am,
I'm going to take that risk.
So, what about copyright law?
In August of this year Rick Falkvinge,
who is the founder of the Swedish Pirate Party,
published an article called
And from that article here is a quote,
"People who think they have the moral right to control
"what other people discuss, transmit, use, and copy
"simply are not going to abandon that point of view.
"They will assert that right as superior to any civil liberty, forever.
"… Viewpoints of society don’t change
"because people in society change.
"Viewpoints of society change
"because people defending the obsolete viewpoint die out.
"In other words, prepare for another 40 years of corporate bullshit."
So, the question for*** me
is "What do we do," whoops, "for the next 40 years?"
Sorry.
So, the 1st thing we could do, which many people are doing,
is try to work with the law.
And there are 2 main ways people are doing this in United States.
The 1st is expanding fair use.
Fair use is the so called exceptions to copyright law,
and they include parody, in US **** ****** parody, but not satire,
some transformative uses, some educational uses, commentaries,
and making backup copies for personal use sometimes.
Unfortunately, fair use is fairly weak in US courts,
US courts have made many decisions against it
and it costs lots of money and employs lots of lawyers to assert it.
That's said, I do believe in fair use.
And it's definitely worth working on making it more robust.
Another strategy for working within the law
is promoting free licenses,
usually that means Creative Commons licenses.
I release "Sita Sings the Blues"
under Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike license,
that's a strong copyleft license.
Creative Commons offers all kinds of licenses,
and most of them are not actually free licenses,
so that's sort of one problem
with that as a solution
to the problems of copyright.
But the bigger problem is that most culture
is not under free license and is not going to be under free license.
Our whole history, the last 100 years…
There is almost no way
to get the last 100 years of works under free licenses.
You can do it now, and I do it with my work,
but our shared cultural history is still not accessible to us.
I've actually been encouraged by some people
just to ignore works that aren't under free licenses.
And for me it's like I have to ignore history,
I have to ignore culture, I have to ignore,
you know, my species, that's all around me.
So that's not really ******* solution.
So, what about solutions
that are not directly involved with the law?
One of them is what I call an "unlicense",
although I do use Creative Commons Share Alike license.
Pretty much all of my work now
I put what I call a copyheart message on.
It's not a license, it's just a message that says,
"Copying is an active love. Please, copy and share."
instead of a "c" within, you know, circle, it's just a little heart.
It's not a license; it does not have any legal code behind it;
it's not about the law; it's not enforced by the state.
But I like it for this reason because it bypasses the law.
And I'm trying to reach people on a level that's not law.
Trying to reach people on the level of love really,
which is how culture reaches us.
And then the most popular thing to do
is to ignore the law altogether.
And that is what's happening in the world.
It's happening in US; it's happening here.
It's a very simple solution.
It has nothing to do with theory or activism
or formally licensed free culture or anything you or I say.
I do a lot of speaking about this and…
What's very exciting to me is that this movement
of people sharing files and sharing culture…
It doesn't matter what I say. People are doing it anyway.
And more people doing it all the time.
It's a very powerful popular movement.
And it's just a natural outcome
of digital technology and the human right to share culture.
And that is sort of related to
copyright civil disobedience
which is how I'm framing my activism now.
I also call it "intellectual disobedience".
Civil disobedience is defined variously as,
"the refusal to comply with certain laws
"as a peaceful from of protest,"
and, "refusal to obey governmental demands or commands
"especially as a non-violent and usually collective means
"of forcing concessions from government."
So sometimes disobedience is to change government,
and sometimes it is just to have moral integrity.
So as an artist, I build on works that I love,
and that have historical resonance,
and that touch me on some profound level.
Cultural connection is a tender and delicate thing.
It is an expression of love.
The law aspires to be a hard codified set of rules.
Couple years ago I set out to listen to my heart above*** the law.
This takes some discipline. I'm in the habit of self-censorship
and have trained myself to recoil from certain kinds of culture out of fear,
fear so ingrained I don't even register it.
But because I ***consciously set out to ignore copyright,
before I even knew what my next project would be,
I caught myself in the act of denying inspiration.
The song was "Go Down Moses" performed by Louis Armstrong.
I was thinking about making a movie
based on the Book of Exodus from the Bible, the Old Testament.
And I was researching music on the theme.
The song was perfect, and I immediately dismissed it without thinking.
Than I remembered my promise to ignore copyright,
that I'd committed to disobeying the law before disobeying my muse.
Realizing I'd censored myself led me to reconsider.
The song really is perfect, and now I have a scene plan for it,
although I had not animated it yet.
Since than I'm giving myself permission
to use any song that inspires me.
My criterion for selecting songs or images or anything, themes
is what is best for the art.
I'm serving the art; I'm serving the project; I'm serving culture.
And I'm sorry, copyright fans,
but in my world culture is not property.
Copying is an active love, and no amount of arguing will change that.
Just as Rick Falkvinge says,
"People who think they have the moral right to control
"what other people discuss, transmit, use, and copy
"simply are not going to abandon that point of view."
So I will never abandon my love of culture and freedom of expression.
So you can drag me to the guillotine, but I'm not going to recant.
I haven't made the Louis Armstrong piece yet, but I did use
another fully copyrighted work called "This Land Is Mine",
song by Andy Williams, lyrics are by Pat Boone,
and the melody is by Ernest Gold from the 1960 movie "Exodus".
I'm glad to show you this clip. It's actually the last scene
of my new movie which is called "Seder-Masochism".
But it's the 1st I animated.
It may enhance your enjoyment of this clip
to know that the movie "Exodus" has been called a "Zionist epic"
and the song "This Land Is Mine" was phenomenally popular in 1960s
and was a kind of theme song for Israel as a Jewish state.
So this is 3.5 minute.
And here we go.
This land is mine,
God gave this land to me,
this brave and ancient land to me.
And when the morning sun
reveals her hills and plains,
then I see a land
where children can run free.
So take my hand
and walk this land with me,
and walk this lovely land with me.
Though I am just a man,
when you are by my side,
with the help of God,
I know I can be strong.
Though I am just a man,
when you are by my side,
with the help of God,
I know I can be strong
to make this land our home.
If I must fight, I'll fight
to make this land our own.
Until I die…
This land is mine.
See, that's the copyheart.
Copying is an active love. Please, copy and share.
So, I am a Jew, and I have this Jew card to prove it.
And I have more Jew cards,
so if anybody wants a Jew card, please, come up to me,
I have enough to share, just fill in your name.
There's actually a pretty strong fair use argument for this cartoon
because it is parody meaning
that it does comment on the song itself.
There are probably some lawyers out there --somewhere in the world--
willing to defend me if I'm sued over it.
However, not all my uses of music in "Seder-Masochism"
will be as clear-cut.
They are all transformative which should be fair use,
but they are not necessarily parody and not necessarily political***.
The scene I'm currently working on
is about the latter parts of the Book of Exodus
including ******** animal sacrifice
and the construction of the Tabernacle.
You know, I've read Exodus for the 1st time like a year ago.
Just researching it. It's a long story.
I grew up observing Passover but never haven't read Exodus.
So I've under a minute of animation to show you,
but I did make some placeholders
so this minute of the song will be consistent.
You'll see a big sing that says "placeholder".
Please, know that this is a work in progress.
Things are going to change, they'll be camera moves.
Just a work in progress.
And a song is a surprise. So here we go.
Too many broken hearts have fallen in the river.
Too many lonely souls have drifted out to sea.
You lay your bets, and then you pay the price.
The things we do for love, the things we do for love.
Communication is the problem to the answer.
You've got her number, and your hand is on the phone.
The weathers turned, and all the lines are down.
The things we do for love, the things we do for love.
Like walking in the rain and the snow
when there's nowhere to go,
when you're feeling like a part of you is dying.
And you're looking for the answer in her eyes.
You think you're gonna break up,
then she says she wants to make up.
"The Things We Do for Love" by 10cc
Okay, that's all I have there.
So, as you can see, the content of this work
has nothing to do with copyright,
but it's production and released to.
And it's very exciting for me as an artist to be able to do
all of this stuff, like art, like real art,
that's not just writing more essays about copyright,
but really getting into copyright stuff
and, you know, political activism
just by making and releasing the film.
So, speaking of making and releasing the film,
how am I going to do that?
So step 1 is I'm going to make the movie I want to make,
I'm going to ignore copyright,
and I'm not going to ask for permission from anyone
as a matter of principle.
And give me 3 years to do that.
It'll take out 3 years to make this film.
Maybe it'll take a little bit longer. It's not like I have any deadline.
Step 2 is
I'm going to release a legal redacted version
with all of the songs, all the contentious songs, will be removed.
So you will be able to buy a DVD
but wherever one of these contentious copyrighted songs comes in,
it'll just turn it off and replace it with commentary
perhaps explaining why those songs aren't there
and perhaps explaining the state of the law
that prohibits those songs from being there legally.
It will be legal to sell such a DVD.
And in so doing, it'll actually encourage people
to find the real version on sharing sites
which are proliferating and for which I'm very very grateful.
I actually am incompetent
and have yet to successfully use BitTorrent or anything like it,
but I am aware that
I owe a great debt to the people that create and use these systems.
And I want to encourage more use of them.
So "Sita Sings the Blues"
where I painstakingly and expensively legally cleared all those old songs
that were supposed to be in the public domain in the 1980s
but don't even getting*** started.
I did all that to encourage legal sharing.
"Seder-Masochism", I'm going to redact all those songs
to encourage finding the world beyond copyright law
and thanking those who created it.
Now what about money?
Well, to make money, I sell scarce goods
like T-shirts and prints and plastic disks and all kinds of things.
None of this will contain copyrighted music.
The more free content is shared,
the greater the demand for scarce containers of it,
that's what I learned with my free movie "Sita Sings the Blues".
I'd never made more money in my life than when I freed my work.
The previous 25 years of my work
is all locked up or was locked up on copyright.
So the light bulb went off.
And that is when I actually started making money.
And actually, I can talk at length
about how I get more money by freeing my work, but to sum it up
it's you use the unlimited resource to sell the limited resource.
You know, my business is selling limited resources
like items***, like objects, T-shirts, and disks.
So, I'm all set*** except for how to show the movie in public.
My dream is for people to be able
to view it in public on a large screen together.
Unfortunately, because of the law,
that would be very very risky for a venue to do
because then the venue would be possibly doing civil disobedience
along with me.
So the question I have is
will copyright be sufficiently reformed anywhere in the world
for my film "Seder-Masochism" to have a theatrical premiere.
Will it premiere in Afghanistan?
Supposedly, Afghanistan has no copyright law right now.
So that's pretty good candidate.
Will it be Iceland?
Is anybody here heard of the Modern Media Initiative in Iceland?
It's pretty cool what they are doing there. It's taking a while,
but they have this idea for becoming a free speech heaven.
And if they expand fair use sufficiently,
I may be able to premiere it there. So go Iceland.
Or could it be Poland?
You know, certainly it'll be Poland
before the United States.
So, you know, my hope is that
you will make it possible for me
to see you again in 3 years with this movie.
Thank you very much for having me.