Emergent Properties, Virtual Mashups and Internet Performance Art
Background
The Pussy Riot Gangnam Style Player (PSP) was not written to breach anyone’s copyright, or to test the limits of copyright law. It was written as an example of code that might allow people to make mashups without infringing copyright. The original Punk Prayer Gangnam Style performance and Romney Shaduppayaface is here. Another example can be found here.
“Might” is the key word here. And in the spirit of Eminem in 8 Mile, we’re going to try to make the case for the copyright troll. Please feel free to use this post as a starting point for any takedown notice or other action you choose against this player with a long and ungainly name.
PSP raises one question. Can we use code to enable expression and creative imagination on the Internet out in the sunshine and not in the shadow of copyright infringement? The virtual mashup is performance art. It does not make or distribute derivative works. It takes original works and creates a collage of ideas that may have little or nothing to do with the raw materials used. And the raw materials are used, not copied. Virtual mashups allow original performances to take place locally all across the Internet, without the need to copy and redistribute the performance. Each PSP play is a unique performance with unique e-merging and communication of ideas from the performance artist to their audience.
Dead Presidents
Randy Newman’s “satirical” new song “I’m Dreaming” puts race front and center in the upcoming election. He almost makes an empathic argument. He makes the ironic case for the cracker voter, and he does it so well that the target of his derision will likely not even notice, and will be humming the tune on his way to the ballot box.
Go watch and listen. And then come back to set the record straight on all those dead presidents, with the Pussy Riot Gangnam Style Player virtual mashup of the Newman video and a historical tour-de-force sung by Jonathon Coulton.
I love synchronicity. How come Coulton sings about Taft when Newman does too? How come the line “Hoover screwed the pooch in the great Depression” fits so well? Also Andrew Johnson+Richard Nixon and impeachment, Hayes and Reconstruction, Roosevelt and the Nazis, Garfield’s eclipse/assassination…
Hey Sexy Lady. The Punk Prayer Gangnam Style
This is a virtual mashup. No copyright owners were harmed in the making of this movie. Because it was never made.
