I have not read the book and I certainly don't know the specific text that Disney is objecting to, but I find this situation to be very troubling for the chill it casts over our ability to comment on the world we live in.
We are now in a time where entertainment corporations have run amuck. I have recently written about Sony taking ownership of any artwork submitted by job applicants. In Finland, the police have confiscated the laptop of a nine year old girl for downloading a single song from the Pirate Bay. In addition, they have fined the girl 600 Euros, even though the girl's father has proved that the girl later bought the album and concert tickets for the band in question. Several countries have instituted laws where three copyright violations can result in a user being banned from the internet altogether.
One of the problems with this ban is how arbitrarily copyright violations are enforced. All over the web, there are sites which could be construed to be violating copyright. I say "could be" as a court could decide that material qualifies as fair use. And the copyright holder gets to selectively decide who to prosecute and who to ignore. In other words, if the company thinks the copyright violation is good marketing, it will turn a blind eye.
Beyond the logistics of corporations using the law to arbitrarily punish people, there is the much larger question of who owns history, culture and speech? When culture is manufactured for a profit, do we have the right to discuss it, criticize it and respond to it? Can we use examples to make our case or are we limited by the legal rights of the manufacturer?
As the entertainment corporations are now multinational behemoths with whole staffs of lawyers charged with protecting intellectual property, they use the threat of legal action as a deterrent. The Kimball book is a case in point. In court, it could be argued that any Disney artwork used in the book is fair use. What's one still image from the more than 100,000 frames in a feature film? How is the publication of a still depriving Disney of income? Disney could not suppress a book based on its text without proving libel, but it can suppress a book before the fact by denying the use of artwork and the threat of a lawsuit if a publisher decides to take a chance and publish anyway.
Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident. Disney owns Marvel and denied Sean Howe, the author of Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, the use of illustrations unless they could approve the text of the book. Howe and his publisher decided to forgo illustrations, so the history of a comic book company has no images of the artwork that made the company worth writing about. And as I mentioned above, copyright prosecutions are arbitrary. Howe has a tumblr where he has included images that should have been included in the book and so far, Disney hasn't complained.
How strange is it that in the western world, it is permissible to comment on governments but not on companies that make cartoons? As corporations have increasingly lobbied governments to write laws for their own benefit, we may soon reach a point where criticizing governments is irrelevant and the corporations who should be criticized will stifle all dissent.
I honestly don't mind the owner of visuals to prevent publication of such visuals when used without permission. However, it has grown ridiculously out of hand. Disney's copyright on Mickey Mouse allows them to keep changing the rules with the US Congress they have bought. By continually changing the rules - the length of time Disney is permitted to own the rights. It's unlikely, Disney will ever lose the ownership of Walt's creation.
ReplyDeleteAll we can do is draw our own distorted version of Mickey and call it a parody.
None of this is news to me. I've been doing this "Disney dance" along with Amid since May of this year. My new book has finally made it out of the mouse house gauntlet and is going to press.
ReplyDeleteWho owns history, culture and speech? We both know the answer to that one.
Since Amid's publisher, Chronicle Books, publishes several books for Disney, it seems that the Mouse Brigade has some sway with content that affects them. After all, I'm sure Chronicle doesn't want to see a cash cow head off for greener pastures.
ReplyDeleteIn John Canemaker's book on the Nine Old Men, he briefly mentions Kimball's experimenting with drugs. I wouldn't be surprised if it's stories of this nature that have the Big D suits tightening their purse strings.
This post ties in perfectly to a discussion I had this weekend on the word freedom used so often in presedential debates in a country to our south. If by freedom this president is refering to a systematic elemination of competition or choice, then yes they are free. Furthermore I find that consumer are being forced to buy only what has been "approved" by huge MEGA corporations.
ReplyDeleteSame goes for education, health care and even opportunity over there! By limiting peoples opportunity and options they can herd the masses into whatever pen they feel is fit for that social class. Creating huge disparity between the rich and poor.
More opportunity = More options = Richer society.
The corporations are so huge and greedy that they will attack anything that stands in their way.
Our somewhat free internet may be the next thing that will be under attack and after that our opinions.
We are beginning to see the bad side of capitalism all around the world. It got us to where we are but now it threatens our freedom.
The only way to be victorious in a game where the rules are bent is not to play.
Well, what did he expect ,taking it to the disney sanctioned publishing house...?
ReplyDeleteWell, what did he expect ,taking it to the disney sanctioned publishing house...?
ReplyDeleteYes, it does seem like this shouldn't have been a huge shock to anyone.