Your post clearly shows the clash of the cultures with your question of what happens when you put technology into other cultures that don’t see commerce the way we do. The concept of copyright doesn’t settle well with certain cultures and in the end is ignored. Even the concept in this country was to protect people creative work for only a short time and then grew into protecting it into the next generation. I wonder what our country founder’s would think of how copyright has been extended out so far to benefit heirs or people that have even bought the rights. This to me would seem to be a clash of cultures itself only through time. As the world becomes smaller and smaller these clash will become more and more evident. Will this idea of copyright be one that is excepted world wide as the Western culture is sought after in developing countries or will it be lessened with the dominance of a country like China and its culture having a greater influence world wide. Time will tell.
Christina Schraeder’s post
After read-watching the plethora of information about copyright laws, sampling, fair-use policies and creative commons, I was was left with a much better understanding of the arguments au courant, but also a couple of questions of my own.
What happens when you put technology in the hands of cultures for which the concept of sharing and commerce is other than our own? I'm imaging the possible mindset of an individual in the culture that I was previously a part of and trying to empathize. In Papuan Amungme culture, not only do men have as many as 10 wives, but, at one time in their not so distant past, Amungme women lived in honai sharing men and breast-feeding the children of their "sisters". They lived communally in every sense of the word. It would have made no sense to them neither to request a fee for nursing nor to lay claim to a particular man of the tribe. Fast forward to today, when several Dani, 'Me and Komoro (Papuan tribes) are in possession of cellular phones. If someone in the “tribe” has music, then why not share it with everyone? And if for some reason, someone in the "tribe" happens to find a way to extract money from others for their recorded music, then they would be considered to have “good mojo/luck/sorte” and therefore their neighbor would likely open the very same music selling business right next door to them. Soon after, it would not be surprising to find fifteen others who've all set up shop in the same area. However, it is unlikely that any money would be made in the end. In Papuan culture, all distant "brothers" of the shop owner would be allowed to take their recordings for free. You can see how this issue would be compounded when your father may have nine other wives. The aforementioned being one of the reasons that most shops are owned by the settling cultures of Papua. Anyway, this is the way of the “developing world” I’ve had the great fortune to visit. I'm simply trying to empathize and can see that if the Papuan's had the voice that the Pirate Bay was afforded, that they might also be saying, "*&$% off!"
I saw the magnitude of the issue firsthand in the Blok M area of Jakarta and Plaza Azul market in Lima; that is, literally blocks of vendors selling bootleg merchandise. Their culture, not like that of the Amungme, did turn a profit despite the overrun market. This speaks volumes to the demand of cheap available, film and music. So, when I overheard someone in the film Good Copy, Bad Copy say something like, Everyone knows the only ones making any money here are the street vendors, I could totally relate. Furthermore, I concur that there is no easy way to put an end to the flagrant disregard for copyright law in other countries.
Could we charge a flat fee for Internet, mobile, or data plans, accepting that downloading would be happening? Sure, here in the States that might work. In some other countries, like Indonesia, only a few would have enough money to have their own connection and most are unlikely to fork-out the extra for unlimited downloading. So someone would still be sharing via USB swapping or hacking into corporate bandwidth and the problem would continue. Perhaps this is another issue for the gamers mentioned on Jane McGonigal’s Ted Talk titled Gaming can make a better world. If enough hours and minds were thrown at this dilemma, it might be solved. Still it is not an easy fix. "Who can compete with free?"
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