CopyFair/CultureBanking®
I have set up a Loomio page to effectively write a collective business plan for a Commons Collecting Society and Intellectual Property Asset Bank. As that's quite a mouthful I call it 'CultureBanking': https://www.loomio.org/invitations/475e91ab6cdd40734c7f.
The concerns and the aims are very close to the P2P Foundations' 'CopyFair' (there was no existing link to that here). I'd like to invite participants to contribute under the broad headings (feel free to add your own) on the page with a view to developing a distributed platform cooperative practice to manage community assets. There are lots of tools already in existence - so just pooling resources is a great start. In East Anglia, we are beginning by, literally, taking control of our cultural assets by first, 'banking' them with peer production licenses. Here: https://www.meetup.com/CultureBanking-Norfolk/events/249647758/ - come if you're in the area! LM
Liam Murphy Fri 18 May 2018 6:14AM
Strypey - We'd probably do better to have had a conversation before we go into the tit for tat adversarials on 'defending projects/positions'. I wont carry this forwards as it's not producing anything. I appreciate the time and interest and I'll follow your references. I think you have misunderstood what I'm doing in one fundamental way: I'm not selling anything for anyone... including independent film makers - that is their job. If they 'flounder on rocks', that is the fault (in my opinion) of their 'independence'. We need each other... I think we're still agreed that CC licenses are not solving the floundering tho! All best, Liam.
Liam Murphy Fri 18 May 2018 6:50AM
PS Strypey - There are 11 open threads here (maybe I'm not understanding the tech and u can't see them?) If you can spare the time to distribute your comments in the places where they might belong - or open a new thread if needed - I'll answer them. Otherwise, we're making a bit of a mess!
This seems to cut across the whole thing tho, so will venture one 'answer':
"Maybe you could talk to them about what you think might work better than"give stuff away"? Other than a handful of anti-commons DRM-mongers like Apple and Neflix, all the online models I can think of are based on some form of free sharing"
I am talking to them about what would work better - been doing little else for the last 4 years: "Stop giving it all away" is what I'm saying to them. It's naive. It weakens nearly everybody else. CB is not based on free sharing - you've just explained why it's different - thanks. 'Not giving it away' doesn't mean you have to use IP to extract endless profits - for nothing. Extract value for something - even if it's a 'guided donation', but then, when there's surplus, that goes back into a common pot - even if that means 'enclosing' some stuff. What the 'common pot' looks like - not my problem - but a nice problem - for the commons. (it's a problem for 'the state' as things stand, but surely something we'd be better put to hypothesising about here..?). The point is, as you eloquently point out - it's a problem 'we' don't yet have coz no-one is making any real money... best, Liam.
Danyl Strype Fri 18 May 2018 9:13AM
@liammurphy
it's a problem 'we' don't yet have coz no-one is making any real money.
This is untrue, just as the "no films" claim was untrue. 'Sita Sings the Blues' is just one counterexample:
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090824/1723375986.shtml
See also: http://freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/artists_should_be_paid_part_3_big_picture/
The HumbleBundles of freely licensed games are another. There are many more. When you start following the Kalahnikov principle, you will be able to correct such mistaken assumptions, and thus make your proposed project more likely to succeed.
There are 11 open threads here
Do you mean in the Commons Transition group or your own CultureBanks Loomio group?
If you can spare the time to distribute your comments in the places where they might belong
Given the responses to my attempts to engage constructively with your proposal here, I have zero interest in doing any further unpaid consultancy work in your private group. Best of luck with your project.
Liam Murphy Fri 18 May 2018 9:58AM
It’s not a private group Strypey. I will follow your links - as I said - and I appreciate it - as I said. It’s not ‘mine’ and I’ve been doing unpaid consulting on it for 4 years. Perhaps ‘no films’ and ‘no money’ are too severe. ‘Relatively few and small sums’ seems more reasonable. Liam
Nick S Fri 18 May 2018 10:41AM
Checking, the CB group does seem to be private in that it is closed, and can't be read by non-members (although presumably anyone can be come a member).
Nick S Fri 18 May 2018 10:23AM
Please be excellent to each other :) @strypey, I'm sure you know you are being relentless in your posting and forceful in your wording, and since this isn't the only forum and you aren't the only one asking penetrating questions about CF/CB, we should empathise with the strain this may be placing on @liammurphy to assimilate the referenced points and respond. (I fail badly at keeping up with all the discussions from groups subscribed to myself, and that's mostly just reading them.)
Anyway, I'm curious, can you paraphrase the "Kalahnikov principle"? A web search doesn't reveal it. My best guess is you mean Kalashnikov, and a search for "kalashnikov design principle" gets this:
Don't design for a perfect world, because the world isn't perfect. Design simple things that are rugged, reliable, simple and easy to use; things that work even when conditions are chaotic; things that work even when they are mostly broken.
http://communicationnation.blogspot.co.uk/2010/02/design-philosophy-of-ak-47.html
Although that doesn't seem like a tool "to correct such mistaken assumptions."
Liam Murphy Fri 18 May 2018 2:45PM
Hi Nick,
Anyone can become a member as far as I’m aware...
I just thought it best to keep it discreet to those with an active interest... was hoping people would self select and invite others in.
I’m happy to open it up though... Is that something I should have a vote on according to (known/unknown?) protocols?!
Liam
Nick S Fri 18 May 2018 3:47PM
I think it's just a question of discretion versus convenience for bystanders. I only mention it because you mentioned "11 open threads" which I infer are on the CultureBanks group and if so can't be seen by Danyl?
Simon Grant Thu 24 May 2018 8:00AM
Alongside Nick @wulee I'd really value reflection on how this kind of conversation could be done more fruitfully. Could we, for instance, make an effort to reflect back what we have positively heard from others? Personally, I hear @liammurphy searching for a way for is group of "creatives" to make a living ("creatives" in quotes simply to acknowledge that there are other kinds of creativity as well). I hear him having a go at what seems to him the most practical route; trying to work in as much commons thinking as he can, and asking for help specifically with his approach, as advocating a completely different approach isn't going to help him.
I hear @strypey sharing some of his huge and valuable experience in this whole commons field, which leads him to the "critical friend" position something like that he wouldn't start from where Liam is starting from.
I hear Liam saying something a bit like "what you're saying isn't helping me, because I can't relate it to where I am starting from", which is perfectly understandable; and I hear Strypey saying something a bit like "if your understanding and experience was like mine, you might be more willing to consider alternative paths", which is also perfectly understandable.
I think we could all agree that if someone is going down a path that others see little virtue in, the others should not be expected to help; also that if someone is attached to a particular path, no one can expect them to change path just by persuasion.
I can personally imagine two ways forward in principle, though to find practical ways could be hard, and both look time consuming.
1. Interpreting that wider experience in terms that make better sense from the more focused starting point, perhaps outlining a path that starts from there. Feels a bit like a business support / consultancy project.
2. Researching other past and present projects that have addressed similar fields, or have similar contexts, to arrive at more hopeful pointers for a way of achieving similar overall goals. Definitely looks like a research project.
Neither is something that I think anyone could be expected to do simply out of the goodness of their heart! But if anyone can think of a way to set up a commons-based research consultancy that could make a living doing this kind of thing, please count me in: I would have loads to contribute! Both kinds of work have human subtleties that aren't immediately apparent; they are arts, not exact sciences :)
Danyl Strype · Thu 17 May 2018 5:57PM
@liammurphy it's commendable that you are so determined to defend your project. This tenacity will be a critical asset for you in this project, because you are walking into a desert, where many have perished before you, and many others survive only because they've learned to travel at night and find water in cactus.
These projects set out with exactly the same noble goal as you; help creators make a living from the work they share as a commons. The opening chapters of some of their stories were told in 'The Power of Open' (http://thepowerofopen.org/) in 2011. I encourage you to have a look at how many are still standing seven years later, how many artist have managed to make a living by working with them, and how were successful enough to be featured in the follow-up book Made With CreativeCommons: madewith.cc. If you want to avoid the fate of those who didn't survive, it would be wise to learn their stories, and avoid the dead-end trails and not-so-short shortcuts they stumbled down.
That's 27 more than the "no films" you claimed. Every film on Vodo.net is also CC-licensed. These are just two sets of examples. A quick web search will turn up many more.
Vodo was created by a group of film-makers with very similar goals to you; get independent film out there, and get it funded by the crowd.
https://torrentfreak.com/p2p-backed-film-platform-to-reward-influencers-101003/
Maybe you could talk to them about what you think might work better than"give stuff away"? Other than a handful of anti-commons DRM-mongers like Apple and Neflix, all the online models I can think of are based on some form of free sharing:
* pay-what-you-want like Vodo and HumbleBundle
* freemium like Jamendo, Magnatune, Spotify, Vimeo, and YouTube
* micropatronage using sites like Liberapay, Flattr, and Patreon
* voluntary subscriptions like the Guardian
* free access to digital copies as promotion for stuff that can't copied (books, records/ CDs/ DVDs, merch, concert tickets) like BandCamp and David Rovics
Can you name an example of a commons behind a paywall on the net that makes anyone a living? Like censorship, the network treats them as damage, and routes around them. Many of those you will pass as you cross the arts revenue desert thought they could make money that way. Their skeletons litter the dune, still wearing their heavily padded paywalls. For why this approach doesn't and can't work, see:
http://trulyfreefilm.hopeforfilm.com/2013/07/how-to-make-money.html
Yes. I've been writing, acting, singing, and playing music since childhood. More recently I got into fire spinning and juggling. Many of my friends and acquaintances are in bands, DJ, produce, make films, and write stories. It's one of the reasons I got involved in CC, I could see that treating sharing as "stealing" was wrong, because the stuff we pay money for has always come to our notice through non-commercial sharing of copies. Finding ways to use free online distribution to put artists back in charge of their art and make a living is something I've been working on for about 20 years.
In case there's any confusion, when I say "license proliferation" I'm talking about the number of different commons licenses, obviously proliferation of the number of people using commons licenses is a good thing ;) Assuming you got that and still disagree, I've given the nutshell explanation in previous comments, along with a number of references. There's no shortcut to properly understanding this. You need to do the reading, and it really is part of the due diligence for a project like CultureBanking.
Anyone can try to write their own copyright license, just like anyone can write their own WordPress. But in most cases, you're better off drawing on work that's already in the commons. Writing your own copyright license requires you to be a lawyer, or pay for a lawyer, if you want any chance of your license being enforceable in the way you expect. This is one reason why choosing from a pool of pre-existing, professionally drafted licenses is better than creating new ones.
The other reason is clarity of intent. CC licenses, for example, cover a range of use cases, and the terms of each license are clearly explained in the deeds. Also, because they are widely used, you don't need to work hard get people to understand what they can and can't do with CC-licensed works.
"IP" is the enemy. It's a misleading corporate propaganda phrase. Copyrights and trademarks, on the other hand, are legal tools, which can be hacked to create our own tools like copyleft licenses, or the Creator Endorse Mark.
Where? I'm not aware of any thread other than this one.
How will this be different from all the existing ones?
Some kind of shared trademark, like CEM or Toi Iho, yes? For what specific purpose? Or do you just mean a logo from CultureBank itself?
I'm really not sure why you mean by this collection of terms. Do you mean some kind of crypto-token thing like FairCoin or Steem?
Final thoughts; NIH syndrome is the enemy of new projects. There's absolutely nothing wrong with strapping together pre-existing components from the commons. This is what most projects do, especially for rapid prototyping at the beginning. It allows you to focus your own work on building the genuinely new bits, that haven't been created by anyone before.
CultureBanking could use an existing media-hosting CMS like MediaGoblin, GNU FM, FunkWhale, or PeerTube (or a few); the CC licenses with NonCommercial use clauses; the Creator-Endorsed Mark for any physical products you sell; and one or more of the existing royalty collection tools like Flattr or Patreon (or Ko-Fi or whatever you think your audience will use). As with any business, the challenge is to build a roster of talent that can attract an audience, and inspire them to buy/ subscribe/ donate. That's where you need to invest your time, finding designers to make your custom electric cars, and people to buy them, not trying to reinvent wheels.