Hey, hey, Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves here and-- What? What do you mean you don't know who I am?
Well, anyway, I attended the "CC for photographers: amateur to pro" (iSummit 2007), and I have to say I was somewhat disappointed with how it turned out. Oh, not that Joi Ito was a bad host, which he wasn't, or that the mostly absent Digital Garage team added little to the discussion.
No. I was disappointed because I am an amateur (but enthusiastic) photographer, and the workshop title was quite misleading. Ito-san spent five minutes explaining some basic concepts of digital photography, like setting contrast and exposure or why the RAW format matters, and then one hour and twenty-five minutes discussing legal matters with the audience.
I can't blame him, however, since it was the audience's demand, but I really, really get bored of long, long legal talk and "what-if" scenarios. Look, as an artist, Creative Commons licenses work for me and that's all that matters. If I was paranoid about every aspect, every little thing, I wouldn't even get out of home, much less license whole artistic endeavors under Creative Commons. I care too much about what I do but, seriously, there's always implied and unknown risks on anything you may do. I guess it's a matter of personality.
Most of the audience was pretty active and involved in the discussion, including notable guests like Mr. Wales from Wikipedia fame, and topics ranged from light concerns like which license to choose to crazy stuff like asking for people's permission to publish a picture where they may show up. Crazy for me, because if I shot a landscape and someone just happened to be there, I wouldn't go meet them to ask for their permission to publish the bloody thing.
However, quite a few people were concerned about this. Mr. Wales, for instance, mentioned that he only licensed under CC photos that feature no people, and if people did show up he would rather keep all the rights given by Copyright law, instead. I believe the concern was that if images of people are allowed derivative works, or be used on commercial situations, those people's reputations may be hurt.
After some thought, I do understand it's a valid concern, but I wouldn't go as far as follow this Austrian guy's suggestion of changing the CC licenses so as not to allow this kind of behavior without permission. I mean, gee!
The bloody paparazzi, however, should always ask for permission no matter what. They are parasites that earn their money only by hurting people's reputations and respecting no one's privacy. No, strike that. They should get put out of their misery, instead.
Moving on... there was also quite a few people in the workshop worried that their work may be ripped off. Sorry to tell you, but this may happen either you license your work under CC or not. Abusive and evil people are everywhere, and this is always a concern, but nothing that CC can help you with. If this ever happens to you, you should contact a lawyer, for you are still the Copyright holder even if you use CC-BY. You have rights. But, please... can't we just talk about photography?
tags: dubrovnik croatia media-events photography dubrovnik joi-ito summit07
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