Caring About Copyright
My Reflection About Copyright and Licensing
After completing this week’s module from my DGST101 class regarding the importance and guidelines for copyright, fair use, attributions, Creative Commons (CC) license, etc., I’ve come to view the way we regard pieces published to the internet differently. Previously, I’ve always had preconceived negative connotations with copyright – solely based off of how unnecessarily complicated it seemed and how scary the consequences may be if you are caught copyrighting. However, I didn’t realize all of the ins and outs of copyright until now, and how it begins. Before, I had thought it would be a lengthy process to have those words usually seen at the bottom of an internet page, “This work is licensed under…” meaning that there are plausible restrictions to using said person’s work. However, I’ve now come to know that copyright begins right when the piece of work is created! In fact, it is solely up to the creator (not the US Copyright Office) on how the work is shared. Therefore, I’ve found the components of copyright to be incredibly helpful in allowing creativity, innovation, and boundaries all in the same sense. Copyright allows others to create imaginative pieces of work, while still allowing respect for the original creator – yet another amazing perspective of the internet! Reflecting on this, I chose a fairly flexible CC license for my work. I made use of the CC license chooser to help produce the best license to support my work and boundaries. Therefore, I wanted those to be able to use, remix, and work upon my original piece without being restricted to the same boundaries as myself – all while still giving myself credit for the original work.
Effects of Ethically Using Other’s Work
My Thoughts on Being Ethically Creative
After considering the fact that CC licensing allows for the respect of an original creator’s boundaries, it would be completely inconsiderate to ignore the guidelines of usage for the creator’s content. Thus, leading to unethical usage of another person’s work. Examples of this can be using images for a blog post, like the one above, and not attributing who and where the image originated from (assuming it didn’t come from a copyright-free resource). Instances like I mentioned previously happen more often than not, leading to bigger companies dropping requests for copyright takedowns like grenades (as cleverly put by Casey Fiesler in her TedTalk, “How the Internet and Copyright Fuel Creativity”). These grenades frequently take down pieces of work that are covered under fair rights (often for commentary, etc.) due to the fact that it’s intimidating to fight for set rights against a big company. Thus, it’s incredibly important to take the extra minute or two to ethically use other’s work by properly attributing the original creators based upon their CC licensing – in order to allow everyone to continuously be creative and innovative.