PATENT TED TALKS | EMBRACE THE REMIX | WEEK #11

Hey Patent Pals!

Thanks to Abigail for teaching the class last week! I think the Ted Talk videos we watched were extremely interesting and helped put a lot of the work we have been doing in class into some real-world context. For this week's assignment, we are responsible for discussing two of the videos and providing our opinions as well as an analysis of the position of the speaker. Below is the post for my first favorite video - stay tuned for a blog post on my second favorite!

Kirby Ferguson: Embracing the Remix

THE SITUATION

Imagine we are in 1964 and Bob Dylan has reached the climax of his career - he is producing sensational hits at a rapid pace and has been regarded as the "voice of a generation". There is a small group of dissenters, however, who believe that Dylan is stealing his music from old songs.

Now we are back in 2004, and Danger Mouse has taken The Beatles' The White Album and combined it with Jay-Z's The Black Album to produce The Grey Album. The Beatles company sends out countless cease and desist letters for "unfair competition and dilution of [their] valuable property".

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REMIX: COPY, TRANSFORM, AND COMBINE

Remixes take place when you copy the components of multiple songs, alter them, and combine them to make something more unique. However, Ferguson argues that these are not just the basic building blocks for remixes, but for all of creativity in general.

Everything is a remix.

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EXAMPLES IN THE REAL WORLD

He believes that this is a better way to conceive of creativity. Current patent laws run counter to this fact by using the idea of "property" as an analogy.

Ford: But even Henry Ford once said that he "invented nothing new" - he acknowledges that he assembled the inventions of other men that were created centuries before his idea had ever been conceived.

Apple: With the invention of the iPhone, the world saw the implementation of "multi-touch" technology in a commercially accessible product, even though it had been around for decades prior to the launch of the iPhone.

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CONTRADICTION OF PATENT LAW

Ferguson then argues that patent is inherently contradicting its true intent - to promote the progress of useful art. Picasso always had a saying - "good artists copy, great artists steal." And as exemplified by Apple CEO Steve Jobs, this is a very easy mantra to abide by until your idea is being stolen. This is why the contradiction in patent law exists. Though "everything is a remix" seems inherently obvious, in actuality, people are very skeptical about giving up their valuable intellectual property for the betterment of society and the progress of useful art. This is called "loss aversion" - we have a strong predisposition to protect what we believe is ours.