[-empyre-] July on empyre: Reclaiming creativity as agent of change

[Simon Biggs]

July on empyre soft-skinned space
http://www.subtle.net/empyre

Reclaiming creativity as agent of change

Moderated by Simon Biggs (UK/Australia) with co-moderator and discussant
Magnus Lawrie (UK) and invited discussants Shu Lea Cheang
(Taiwan/USA/France), Paolo Cirio  (Italy), Jussi Parikka (Finland/UK), Saul
Albert (UK), Julian Oliver (NZ), Michel Bauwens (Belgium) and Simon Yuill
(UK).

Dear empyre subscribers,

Established during the so-called "age of discovery", cities such as London
were not only loci of empire but trading hubs. At that time European nations
exercised power at sea. However, there were other players on the high-seas -
the pirates, portrayed as scavengers and thieves but also as social
innovators and redistributive "Robin Hoods".

In the context of a rapidly growing global communications network, in which
our IP is traded and which governments and corporations seek to control,
what might be the role of the pirate? The media regularly report examples of
minor IP theft; individuals downloading or sharing content. More recently
the activities of Anonymous and Lulz have gained attention. This raises the
question of piracy as political imperative, social compact and tactic of
economic subversion.

The UK government's recent Hargreaves Report "Digital Opportunity: A Review
of Intellectual Property and Growth" considered whether "...laws designed
more than three centuries ago with the express purpose of creating economic
incentives for innovation by protecting creators' rights are today
obstructing innovation and economic growth?" (Hargreaves 2011) The report's
short answer was "yes". Its longer answer offers some positive suggestions;
for example, encouraging distribution and open access to orphan works.
However, more disturbing conclusions, driven by vested interests and
political considerations, threaten open access to intellectual property.

The most worrying recommendation is the creation of an IP commodity market;
bringing together rights' holders and other business interests to create
"the world's first Digital Copyright Exchange", making "...market
transactions faster, more automated and cheaper". This recommendation is
made, by Hargreaves' own admission, after receiving "evidence" from some of
the largest IP holders on the planet, including Pearson, News Corporation,
Reed Elsevier and the European Publisher's Council. Hargreaves proposes a
market "...providing the services global players use to license their
content for world content markets". This would benefit large-scale IP
holders and speculators. "Supported by other moves to achieve easier cross
border licensing in the EU, bulk licensing of large digital collections and
a common code of practice for copyright collecting societies, the UK can
aspire to be the leading service support centre for IP matters in the
European time zone." If implemented this would herald the full marketisation
of creativity and confirm it as a speculative commodity.

This month's discussion on empyre considers the motivations and potential
value of the pirate ethos as an alternate model of creative and economic
activity, especially in relation to intellectual property - perhaps the most
subjective and transformative of all forms of property. We propose that
piracy, including its modalities of vagrancy and vandalism, offers a
contrasting model that may allow us to reclaim creativity and innovation
from the chilling instrumental visions of governments and corporations. In
what often appears a black and white world pirates come in shades.

Hargreaves, I (2011) http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview.htm - accessed 24 June
2011

This months guests on empyre, in the order of the weeks they will be sharing
their "intellectual property", are:

Shu Lea Cheang works with net-based installation, social interface,
networked performance and film/digital production. Her work traverses hard
and soft, sex and polities, fiction and reality, fantasia and earth-bound.
Cheang co-initiated Kingdom of Piracy (since 2002), an online, open work
space which explores piracy as the net's ultimate art form. For KOP, she
created BURN (2003), commissioned by FACT, Liverpool and shown as part of
Zone of Urgency at Venice Biennale 2003.  Currently she is working on UKI,
(2009-2012), a viral performance/game project which merges corporal virus,
viral codes and bio-hack in a scenario of code-sexing frenzy.
http://kop.kein.org , http://kop.kein.org/burn , http://www.u-k-i.co

Paolo Cirio works as media artist in various fields: net-art, street-art,
video-art, software-art and and experimental fiction. He has won prestigious
art awards and his controversial works have been sustained by research
grants, collaborations and residencies. He has exhibited in museums and art
institutions worldwide. As public speaker he delivers lectures and workshops
on media tactics. His works include Google will Eat Itself, Amazon Noir and
Face to Facebook.
www.paolocirio.net

Jussi Parikka is Reader in Media & Design at Winchester School of Art
(University of Southampton). His books include Digital Contagions: A Media
Archaeology of Computer Viruses (2007); The Spam Book: On Porn, Viruses
and Other Anomalous Objects from the Dark Side of Digital Culture (2009);
Insect Media: Archaeology of Animals and Technology (2010) and Media
Archaeology: Approaches, Applications, Implications (2011). Homepage and
blog: http://jussiparikka.net

Magnus Lawrie is an artist and PhD candidate at Edinburgh College of
Art. He has participated in hackspaces and wireless networking communities
in Scotland and elsewhere in Europe, including the Chateau Institute of
Technology and the Electron Club in Glasgow. He is the recipient of the
ELMCIP studentship award, researching creative digital writing practices.

Saul Albert is a PhD researcher at Queen Mary University, London, on the
Media and Arts Technology Programme (http://qmat.net/saul) where he is
working on Conversational Aesthetics. He works with The People Speak
(http://theps.net) creating 'tools for the world to take over itself', and
co-organises Dorkbot London (http://dorkbot.org/dorkbotlondon), a local
chapter of a global group of 'people doing strange things with electricity'.

Julian Oliver is a New Zealander based in Berlin. Not just an Artist but a
Critical Engineer, working since 1998. His work has been presented at many
museums, electronic-art events and conferences, including Tate Modern,
Transmediale, Ars Electronica and the Japan Media Arts Festival. His work
has received several awards, including the Golden Nica at this year's Prix
Ars Electronica for a collaborative project with his studio partner Danja
Vasiliev. Julian has given numerous workshops in software art, hacking,
artistic game-development, information visualisation, UNIX/Linux and open
source development practices. He is an advocate of free software, working
exclusively with free and open source software in his own practice.
http://julianoliver.com

Michel Bauwens is founder of the P2P Foundation, a global collaborative
interested in understanding and promoting peer production, governance and
property in every domain of human life, as well as open and free (input),
participatory (process) and commons-oriented (output) paradigms. Its aim is
to see how the p2p ethic, open infrastructures, and institutional ecology of
peer production can become the new core social norm. With Frank Theys,
Bauwens co-produced TechnoCalyps, the metaphysics of technology and the end
of Man, a 3-hour TV documentary. The resource base is available via
http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net

Simon Yuill is an artist, programmer and researcher who has published
with MUTE, Variant and MIT Press. He is currently working on projects
with Constant VZW (Brussels) and The Strickland Distribution (Glasgow).
http://www.constantvzw.org
http://www.strickdistro.org



Simon Biggs | simon at littlepig.org.uk | www.littlepig.org.uk

s.biggs at eca.ac.uk | Edinburgh College of Art
www.eca.ac.uk/circle | www.elmcip.net | www.movingtargets.net



Edinburgh College of Art (eca) is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC009201