FINAL PROJECT - Poster Remix: Fair Use

The Justification of TV Show Poster Remixes

Television is frowned upon in this day and age, but it’s also starting to become obsolete! Luckily there are new shows always coming out and capturing the attention of all audiences. The question is: What keeps them wanting to watch the show besides the characters and the plot? Some shows rely on their poster illustrations and in my opinion, that’s all that matters.

So for my remix project, I decided to create a few of my own TV show posters and place them on top of several other TV show titles that we all should know. The project itself is a short video explaining the TV show titles that I made and questioning whether my creation is against copyright or not. I approached it in a literal form; meaning that if I made a poster for the TV show, “The Walking Dead,” I would probably draw a tombstone with a pair of shoes on top of it. The illustration says the show title, but there are not any characters or any art from the actual show. So, is this wrong? In my opinion, I argue that it is an act of fair use.

I chose to do this type of remix project because I think that one’s own original artwork and creative ideas should be illustrated; whether it’s a TV show poster, a movie poster, or possibly a simple brand name.

In Unit 3, we talked about privacy, ownership, and copyright. I personally don’t think this project violates the copyrights of the TV shows I depicted. But really is “copyright?” It’s merely a form of protection given to authors or creators of ‘original works of authorship.’ In my case, I made simple derivatives of the artist’s work. However, will anyone be able to even guess what TV show poster I remixed? This brings me to the only exception to creating works like my remix project: Fair use. In its most general sense, fair use is copying any copyrighted material for a limited and transformative purpose. I believe I have exemplified a “parody” of certain TV shows and interpreted the show title in my own way. Because of the fact I didn’t utilize any real characters or show art, I didn’t violate any copyright laws regarding the specific TV shows. My remix doesn’t mock or ridicule the original, but it is a creative way to illustrate a TV show.

According to Chander and Sunder’s article, my approach to this project would be considered a “Mary Sue.” “The Mary Sue serves as a metonym for all derivative uses that challenge the hegemony of the original” (Chander and Sunder, 2007). ‘Mary Sues’ are all around us. This concept illustrates that people challenge the original work(s). If there were no challenges or a build off of a previous work, our culture would be at a stand still. At the end of the day, and to be on the safe, give credit where credit is due. That’s what fair use is all about. If you want your work to be under fair use, make sure you factor in these guidelines: “the purpose and character of your use, the nature of the copyrighted work, the amount and sustainability of the portion taken, and the effect of the use upon the potential market” (Christen, Lecture Notes, Washington State University Professor). 

Blog #6 Important takeaways

Given the readings, I think that one of the most important takeaways is the concept of free vs. fair culture.  Copyright and fair use are really confusing subjects. The issues involving these two concepts can be puzzling, obscure or vague at times. Many people in the world think that if something is available for use on the internet, not used by anyone to make a profit, or out of print, then it is alright to use it and manipulate it in any way they want to. On the contrary, sometimes people think that they cannot use any copyrighted works at all without the permission of the original author, artist or producer. Neither of these points of view are correct. However, an increasing number of people want to provide others with the right to use their own work without being charged or having to get permission. So the question that is begged here is: When is it ok to use material that is not our own original work? For some people, the answer is never. Some artists never want their work to be built upon; and others consider it a tribute of sorts and allow it as long as they are credited properly. I believe that in any case, crediting the originator is a must. You can completely transform a song or the plot line of a movie to make it look nothing like the original; but in the end, the credit must be given to the person (or people) you got your crazy idea from. 

When if all information was free? Think about it! Everything that a person can search or create…absolutely free of charge; with no repercussions. I think that the world would go nuts; wouldn't you? Especially if everyone gave up on copyright in today's age; no one would have rights to anything. Whatever your neighbor can create is yours and whatever you can create belongs to your neighbor. That doesn't seem fair, right? What is the point of making something new if it's just going to be remixed the next day and stolen right out of your hands? A comment from the  "Does Information Really Want to be Free?" article said, "Culture is a dynamic process. It should not be fossilized with rigidly enforced rules about what is and what is not permissible" (Christen, [Auldclootie], 2012). Remix culture is a very sensitive subject being that there are TONS of DJs who create mash-ups sampling from several musical artists. However, I personally have never seen a mash-up with a song that wasn't credited to the proper artist. So is the dance music industry finally becoming a calm venue where you can use any song in your mash-up? Or will there be a random point in time where someone's going to stop the creator from creating. There has to be multiple creators. If one person makes something and no one else was able to build off of it, then what would our culture be? The truth is this: WE WOULD HAVE NO CULTURE! There wouldn't be anything to look back on. The original artists wouldn't be given tributes if there were not remixes and mash-ups of their songs. The fact that remixers credit the original artist keeps the original creation at bay. On the other hand, if everything was a free-for-all, the originator would soon be forgotten. There would be no original creator and all of us would be "fake."

What would the culture of the future look like if we continued to use music in the same was we do and remix in the same way every time? How would today's age be different if we still had to deal with copyright problems from the past? These are excellent questions to ponder. The concept of culture is what stuck with me throughout the whole semester. Culture doesn't have to be  music; it's movies, standard customs, books, papers, photos and other types of multimedia. After watching the "RIP a remix manifesto," I was even motivated to go out and remix something; because I can! 

The video below explains why the code for fair use in online video got created, and how the code can help you create online videos that illustrate fair use of copyrighted material.

  

Copyright School

A pretty useful video I stumbled upon. Talks about how to reverse getting your video taken off of YouTube. (counter-notice)

Simple Representation of fair use

Fair Use logo

This is an interesting, yet creative logo.

Blog 5

FAIR USE IN MUSIC

The song that I chose for this blog is Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger." This song title is very common and I personally don't think that if anyone has these words in their song, they're not stealing; unless you're Kanye West, in which case, you are stealing. In the music video on whosampled.com, Kanye depicts Daft Punk, themselves, and repeating their song title, "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger." Kanye's song, "Stronger," is in no way, shape or form an innovative creation. With the use of Daft Punk's title, I'm assuming there was some sort of collaboration between Kanye and Daft Punk. I mean come on, I would have tweaked the sample just a little bit. Kanye just overlapped the sample, slowed it down and provided rap lyrics. I could have made a song called "Harder," which talks about how hard work pays off in the long run. Kanye decided to just use the word, "Stronger" (how original). Is it a coincidence? I think not. The ego of Kanye is really big, but the creativity he has is small. I have seen Kanye and Daft Punk perform together before, so I'm hoping that he got permission from them. In any case, it would be considered stealing otherwise. Being that Kanye didn't take the sample from Daft Punk and create something brand new with it, I personally don't believe it's under fair use. However, Kanye most likely got permission.

Despite Kanye's poor creativity skills, there is another song that intrigues me. This song is the Blsck Eyed Peas', "Boom Boom Pow." There's a line in this song where one of the members says, "harder, better, faster, stronger," however, the line after that was, "texting ladies extra longer." After hearing this, I don't think that there was anything flawed by the black-eyed peas. The member of the group was simply rhyming with their subsequent lyric. In this specific case, I don't think the use of "harder, better, faster, stronger" is creative nor original. It's not like the words, "harder, better, faster and stronger" are copyrighted. There are songs that mention those words and I have heard about a big lawsuit coming from Daft Punk at all. Because of this, I think it's covered under fair use. I'm not sure if the black eyed peas had to credit Daft Punk, but I personally don't think that they have to because they're  just using the words to rhyme with. I believe anyone should be able to use that sample in their song; it's just four simple words. It's like like they took the entire melody of the song and put it on replay while they start rapping over it...(*cough* Kanye *cough*)

Intellectual Property