Getting copyright right
Last night I ended up staying awake way too late because, as I was about to go to bed, I came across these two posts by Salon’s Farhad Manjoo over at his Machinist blog. Apparently J.K. Rowling is suing some fan over his attempt to publish a print version of the Harry Potter Lexicon, an online encyclopedia for the Harry Potter universe. Now hardly a day goes by where I don’t read about someone suing someone over copying something, but what surprised in this case were the reader comments.
Many readers of the post were very upset over how critical Farhad was being of J.K. Rowling. They maintained that she had every right to stop the books publication, and seemed to think it absurd to suggest otherwise (they also seemed upset that Farhad had called Rowling greedy, since profits for her planned encyclopedia will go to charity, but that’s another story). In most cases, people felt that Rowling should have control over the world she created, and perhaps more importantly, someone else should not be able to profit from her work. My response in turn: “NO NO NO!!!”
I have not read a single Harry Potter book, but because I live and breath, I know that Harry Potter has had a significant impact on millions of people. For whatever reason, the events, people, creatures and magical thingamajigs which make up the Harry Potter books (and movies) matter a lot to people. There is absolutely no reason Rowling should be able to claim ownership over facts about these entities. Even if she can do so legally, there is no reason why Farhad’s readers should be leaping to her defense.
In today’s wonderfully high-tech, internet-enabled, fully digitized society, our copyright law is in a state of flux. There are lots of undecided questions about what should and shouldn’t be protected. The answers to these questions don’t need to be based on current laws or loosely related precedent, they can be based on the roll that we, as society, want copyright to serve.
When Farhad wrote about Prince’s crazed attempt to sue his own fan sites, everyone agreed that the singer was out of his mind. When the RIAA successfully sued a woman for over $9,000 dollars per downloaded song, folks were understandably concerned that the penalty was unfairly harsh (although in this example, the woman was in clear violation of the law). For some reason, though, when fantasy fiction is involved, judgement goes out the window.
Copyright law isn’t about making piles of money, it isn’t about preventing other people from making piles of money, and it certainly isn’t about providing artists complete control over their work (see “fair use“). It’s about providing a way (and I’m quoting the US Constitution here) “to promote the progress of science and useful arts.” J.K. Rowling is doing just fine. She has already written her Harry Potter books, and she’s going to write her own Harry Potter Encyclopedia no matter what. Meanwhile, a book like the Harry Potter Lexicon only makes money because it’s based on books (and movies) that a very succesful. If the Lexicon gets published, nothing bad happens.
In contrast, a legal victory for Rowling actively prevents “useful arts” from being produced. The Harry Potter Lexicon is a genuinely valuable to many people (particularly those who write Harry Potter fan fiction), and some of these people would like to have a printed copy. In fact, Rowling herself has praised the Lexicon’s utility. If a court decision prevents the site’s creators from making money, it actively discourages others from creating similar reference material. Don’t people want this type of site to exist?
Too often discussions of copyright litigation focus on who has the god-given right to make money off a given work of art (example!). This accomplishes very little. Instead we need to consider why certain work is or isn’t valuable, and then decide accordingly how best to promote it. On a related note, if you like this post, feel free to give me a dollar.