What is Digg?28 Comments
- Borfo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15@ the1kingarthur et. al.
Relinquishing the aspects of one's copyright which prevent remixing does not mean that you're granting a license for defamation.
Remixing could mean creating a satirical edit of the debate, sampling the audio into a song, or simply editing the debate down to a couple of soundbites short enough to fit into a news program.
Even if copyright was relinquished in its entirety, there is other law available to prevent editing the debate in order to present a false and distorted version of the candidate's ideas.
Something to think about is that generally, copyright vests in the person who fixes (ie: records) something. The person who speaks words in a debate is likely not the person who winds up with copyright in a video recording of the debate. (this is more complicated than I've made it out to be here, but so be it... assume the ideas weren't fixed before they were spoken) Generally that would mean that a TV network, not the candidates themselves, would hold copyright in the debate. So, copyright doesn't necessarily directly protect the candidates themselves anyhow - if a malicious person taped a debate with the intent of distorting the views of the candidates, the candidates would not (generally speaking) be able to rely on copyright law to prevent this manipulation, because that malicious person would be the one holding the copyright in what they had taped. ...but there's other means available to prevent such manipulation, such as the tort of defamation.
The point being, the purpose of copyright is not really to prevent defamation in the first place. If the candidates were to stand up and insist on 'open sourcing' debate footage as a condition of their participation, that wouldn't really diminish their ability to protect themselves from malicious distortion of their positions. - dcmjzero, on 10/12/2007, -3/+14people who don't watch the debate aren't stupid- not everyone has time to watch the whole debate. summaries are expected.
"editing by anyone = no accountability + politics = dangerous"
so letting the general public decide what is proper is dangerous? using politician's own words against them is dangerous? WRONG. WRONG. WRONG. by letting the debate be completely free to distribute it lets the largest audience view and analyze it. i guess letting people have knowledge is dangerous. - Trister0, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10It's the editing that scares me. People will just remove context (on both sides) and make people sound like they are saying things they are not. I think it should be shown in its entirety.
- Borfo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8also, Lessig rocks.
- redavni, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8The debate is academic for Digg users. We are going to be able to download the debates the second they are done.
It's the people whose entire online experience revolve around stuff like MSN/Yahoo/ITunes for whom this issue means something. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5"Does anyone actually think anyone would mistake edited content for someone's whole viewpoint?"
It happens every damned day here on Digg. People only hearing part of the story...jumping to conclusions...kneejerk reactions...flamewars. People ALREADY mistake edited content for full viewpoints. - CarpeFishem, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Free ownership and distribution I'm okay with, but think about it. If someone really hates the opposite opponent, they can edit out their strongest arguments entirely, and if someone sees only that user-edited video rather than the debate in its entirety, then the public is even worse-informed than they would be from watching a network news edit of the debate.
- alecks, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4holly shnit. i had no idea there was a debate tonight! Why hasn't there been a digg front page headline about this specifically?
- mthole, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Does anyone know if there is a stream of the debate tonight on MSNBC? I'd like to watch it, but I'll be at work. I couldn't find anything obvious on MSNBC's site.
- thewaz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2No, this is laying the groundwork for copyright reform, which im sure affects all digg users. This is a public debate that we don't even have legal rights to, it's been hijacked by corporate entities.
- str3ama, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Lessig is honestly one of the most underrated heroes of our time ...this guy has been fighting the RIAA/MPAA and Big Media for eons.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Our tax money pays for these debates. Research that our tax money pays for is legaly ours (but good luck getting it) so this should be too.
- Deuterium, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Although I can easily see the Republican candidates supporting this, the Democrats have a dismal record for favoring ideas like this. Given these facts, this idea is dead in the water.
- bjornski, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3And dugg YOU down because you're a whiny, mouthy idiot.
- Konrad9, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Debate?
They can't even RESPOND TO EACH OTHER. - DreKor, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1what's a 20%er?
- bjornski, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Oh look! Being dugg down by the 20 percenters.
Not surprising. - hobophobe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1While I'll agree with the1kingarthur that the full videos should be available (and possibly therefore a provision should stipulate linking to the full videos when offering any edited), I do think people should have the right to the videos and to edit them, etc.
- rr12, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0If you have to have an "account" at nytimes.com to view the story then it's spam.
- bjornski, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Why are you digging the guy down for asking for alternative ways to watch the debate?
Oh yeah! You 20%ers don't believe in debate!
Your guys will GET CREAMED, so you don't want anyone to watch. - Tiak, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1Does anyone actually think anyone would mistake edited content for someone's whole viewpoint?... It seems ridiculous to me, especially if the entire thing is freely available. Unless Google really gets some hatred going for a candidate and renigs on their "Don't be Evil" for Google Video and YouTube, there is absolutely no danger from letting people edit it... Hell, explicitly giving people the right to do this makes it MUCH easier to present fair summarized material on both candidates than fair use would allow without it.
- airwalkery2k, on 10/12/2007, -7/+3So, you don't want to allow us to watch or replay certain clips of a debate? That would just turn into "Go to 12:31 of this clip to see McCain embarrass himself! LOL"
- kjm2664, on 10/12/2007, -11/+0Dug down for being an elitist wanker who thinks they're "l33t" 'cause they can type www.digg.com in their browser.
- patbenetar, on 10/12/2007, -17/+4editing by anyone = no accountability + politics = dangerous
- the1kingarthur, on 10/12/2007, -22/+3"You should also be able to upload it, YouTube it, share it, splice it, and 'remix' it online. That's the argument put forth by copyright-reform advocate and Stanford law professor Lawrence Lessig"
This is so wrong for so many reasons, and sets a very dangerous precedent. If any debate is released to the public, it should be released in its entirety, and let the public decide. Too many politicians and reporters have for years promoted the idea that the general public is not only too stupid to decide on issues of importance, the politicians and reporters feel they HAVE A RIGHT TO TELL THE GENERAL PUBLIC what they should and should not think.
I advise anyone reading this post to not only boycott any uploading of any debate that has been edited, spliced, or other wise manipulated. But to also e-mail the sight that has received the upload, and tell them you are boycotting them. Let your voice be heard!
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