Building a Derivative Dance Culture
On the Creative Commons blog, I came across a post about an "Open Art" show that is taking place now at the University of Florida. A student group, Florida Free Culture, is hosting this show in which the art work on display is made available under what is called a Creative Commons "Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0" license.
What this means is that anybody can download the images of the artwork, which are in a Flickr photo pool, and then modify or remix these images to create altered or augmented versions of the original. For example, one of these images could be edited and modified in a photo editing software program to create a more abstract version of the initial photograph.
In essence, users who download these digital images from the show are given permission under this Creative Commons license to create derivative works. From a copyright standpoint, a "derivative work" is a complicated concept that I don't fully understand. But I take the general premise behind this term as being a new work (book, artwork, choreography, etc.) that is built upon an existing work.
One of the things I realized about the Flickr pool is that all the photos are uploaded by the same person. I would have thought that an "Open Art" show organized by a group of students would have included work from a number of different contributors. But, in the end, it doesn't really matter since I just wanted to use this Creative Commons art show as a possible model for dance.
Creating a Derivative Dance Festival
An understandable tendency for choreographers and dancers is to protect their work from a legal standpoint, or, at least, ensure that choreography is not replicated without the express written consent of the artist or dance company.
But why don't we just turn these standard rules upside down and see what happens?
Why not host a dance festival in your town or city where all the dance performances are licensed under Creative Commons so that anybody can create and distribute derivative versions of the works in digital and/or live formats? And one of the stipulations would be that derivative works would properly recognize the original creator. It would be up to the festival organizer and dance companies whether derivative works could be created just for non-commercial purposes or also for commercial purposes. (Here's a link to the different types of CC licenses).
From a Practical Standpoint, What Does this CC-Licensed Event Mean?
Here's a rundown:
- All dance performances at the festival are recorded and the video is uploaded to a video sharing site. If there's a two camera shoot, the raw footage from each camera might be uploaded. The music tracks can be uploaded as well as separate audio files. Obviously a deal has to be arranged with the owners of the music - maybe under a CC license as well.
- Internet users are now free to do what they want with the video and audio files. They can edit the videos, insert their own dance footage and make any other creative changes and additions that they want. Then they can upload and share their finished works. (There happens to be an excellent overview in yesterday's TechCrunch of online video editing applications. So it's easier than ever for dance fans to edit video footage.)
- Derivative works can be created in the offline world as well. A dance teacher might incorporate part of a performance in whole or part into a dance routine that is taught during a class. Or a dance company might use one of the festival dance works as the basis for one of their new pieces. In either the class or performance setting, the original artist would have to be recognized under the terms of the CC license.
What Are the Advantages of this Licensing Approach?
- Dancers and dance fans will be able to use your work as the basis for further exploration and creativity. They are no longer just passive observers of your work (I think this is my mantra after saying this a hundred times in previous posts). They can create their own dance videos and/or work in a very direct, physical manner with your choreography.
- All participants in the dance festival will get a lot of exposure and recognition at a very low cost. This CC licensing approach is very viral in nature. In other words, since users - dancers and non-dancers - can experiment with your creations and create new works, they will be highly inclined to share what they've done with others. They might embed their new video on their blog or social networking profile, or they might upload their video to a video sharing site.
- The likely result is that you will get more exposure for your dance company and increase the likelihood that you will get more bookings in the future and larger audiences as well. Plus, since the Internet is an important part of this proposed CC licensing approach, there is also the possibility that you can sell or monetize your work through online channels.
Posted by Doug Fox on February 22, 2007 7:02 AM
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I think you need to explore the downsides of this type of technology.
Here at Article19 we are becoming increasingly skeptical (and quite a bit irritated) of these online video systems for the simple reason that the video material, when rendered by computer servers, is of such low quality that it diminishes the work it is attempting to show to the users.
I would point to the videos of Paris Opera Ballet on YouTube (if they are still there) as an example.
Such applications are built by engineers and venture capitalists that are more concerned with volume than with creative quality (YouTube is a classic example of this).
As the offline world moves toward ever higher levels of quality in video production and delivery (High Definition Video, HD-DVD, Blue Ray, etc) the online world is tearing it to pieces with sub standard products (whether or not they are free is irrelevant) that deliver a poor user experience.
The internets infrastructure cannot cope with HD Video (or even heavily compressed SD video) so the quality of the video material is never going to get any better, not for many years, the cost to the provider is too high, and what they care about is money, the aesthetics are of secondary importance.