To anyone with a passing knowledge of copyright, Creative Commons, and The Pirate Bay, the new footer for this website is probably extremely confusing.
First, we have the Kopimi symbol, which is Piratbyrån‘s opposite-of-copyright symbol (i.e. you’re allowed to copy this, in fact please do so). This is then immediately followed by the word “Copyright”. And then to further muck things up, a Creative Commons notice.
What? Cognitive dissonance? In my Internets?
Actually, no. This is all easily explained by the third line: “This notice is not an endorsement of intellectual property law.”
You see, I would love it if I could just slap the Kopimi symbol up there and free everything you see here from the prison of copyright just like that. Unfortunately, that’s not how copyright works.
Wikipedia says “Kopimi is similar to the CC0 license created by Creative Commons.” This is inaccurate, and I’d change it if there were a source for me to cite (Which, since I’ve posted this, now there is, but it would look really bad if I changed it myself, so somebody else should go do it). You see, CC0 contains legal language which, to the extent possible under law, legally releases the work in question into the public domain. Kopimi, on the other hand, is a picture, a word, and a not particularly well-explained website. It is not legally binding.
Perhaps this is exactly what Piratbyrån intended: who cares that it’s not legally binding, because we ignore copyright law anyway. I agree with that sentiment. However, I also acknowledge the reality that not everyone is Piratbyrån. Some people would refuse to make use of a free work if it’s still, legally, under traditional copyright. So I need to add some fine print, for their sake.
Thus, first I add the traditional copyright notice, including the internationally recognized word “Copyright”. This is because, for better or for worse, Plankhead does hold copyright on everything here. I don’t have a choice in the matter. That’s the law.
However, instead of saying All Rights Reserved, the next line is a declaration of Creative Commons licensing. Why the Attribution license, and not the aforementioned CC0? Because plagiarism is bad. If there’s any reason why some kind of copyright-ish law should exist, it would be to protect against that.
Of course, I’m not really sure that the legal system should be used to prevent plagiarism. But, again, the people I’m writing this fine print for care about what’s legal and what’s not, so I might as well throw that in there. If you’re a free-spirited pirate, you’re ignoring everything after the big pyramid with the K, anyway.
Speaking of which, why am I using the Kopimi symbol instead of the perfectly good Creative Commons logos? Because to the people who don’t understand copyright law, and don’t read the fine print, Creative Commons has a branding problem. Says Nina Paley:
“Creative Commons” means “Non-Commercial” to most people. Fighting it is a sisyphean task. So I’m stuck with a branding problem. As long as I use any Creative Commons license, most people will think it prohibits commercial use.
Kopimi, on the other hand, is a brand without connotations to most people. We have the opportunity to establish it as a “do whatever the hell you want” symbol, because that is, in fact, what it is.
So that’s what’s going on with our copyright notice. The legal language is a necessary evil, but unless you’re a lawyer, ignore it all and do whatever you want. As long as you don’t try to pass off something from Plankhead as your own, it’s all good.
MG Siegler Destroys the English Language — Episode 5
Just when I thought that I’d never have to do one of these ever again.
It’s been over a year since our friend MG has committed an act of textual assault (or at least since I’ve noticed). I’d begun to think he’d been reformed, and that perhaps he’d turned over a few new leaves, as opposed to “leafs”. But now, in writing Fast Break: As Of Last Week, Many At Sprint Thought They Were Merging With T-Mobile, MG Siegler has begun to slip back into his old, dark ways — the man he once was coming back to haunt him, reclaiming his soul.
I’m talking, of course, about this atrocity of a first paragraph:
No, MG, this morning’s news doesn’t leave a lot of questions. You do, starting with your second sentence.
“T-Mobile customers want to know what it means for them?”
I’m not sure, MG, do T-Mobile customers want to know what it means for them? You’re the one writing the article, not me.
“AT&T customers want to know what it means for them?”
Or, are these rhetorical questions, MG? Are you expressing shock and disbelief at the fact that AT&T customers want to know what this merger means for them?
“Would-be iPhone buyers want to know what it means for them?”
Oh, no, I get it, MG; it’s not that at all. You just don’t know how to use a question mark.
Really, MG? A question mark? I can understand a semicolon or an em dash — they’re not usually taught in second grade or anything — but a question mark? You don’t know that it’s supposed to be used on questions that you, the writer, are asking, as opposed to simple sentences that are about questions? If you’re making a statement that “T-Mobile customers want to know what it means for them,” then shouldn’t you be using a period? Why do I have to explain this to you? Is it really that difficult to understand? Do you just like using question marks? If that’s the case, there are all sorts of ways to write a sentence which calls for a question mark at the end, so why waste the opportunity on something horribly, horribly wrong?
MG quickly recovers, using a colon properly in the final sentence of the paragraph, and continuing for the rest of the article with no readability-compromising errors. But the resurgence of his former tendencies concern and frighten me, and I recommend that we keep a close eye on him. MG is our friend, and I think I speak for all of us when I say that I hate seeing him like this.