The Granick Slate
Jennifer Granick's slate card for today's election is out. Granick's judgment about things political is a standard for all right (as in correct) thinking people out here. To the surprise of some, she has endorsed Senator Edwards:
"Kerry's probably going to be the nominee, and hopefully our next president, and I'm feeling pretty good about that. But he's got to learn the lesson that Howard Dean taught the Democrats, which is that you can't win by playing it safe and hoping to get the "Anyone But Bush" vote. You have to take a stance. Edwards' "Two Americas" platform is great. He's talking about class and race and a vision of how government can help regular people. I think that the Democrats need to heed this message, and a vote for Edwards will help."
Comments (5)
this is a general question and doesn't really relate to the blog entry but i hope it's okay to ask anyways...:
i'm part of the on-line librarians book club and this month we're reading 'Copyright's Highway: From Gutenberg to the Celestial Jukebox' by Paul Goldstein.
Anyways, Goldstein recounts the case of 2 Live Crew supposedly infringing on Roy Orbison's rights by parodying his song 'Pretty Women'. Goldstein writes, "the lawyers for 2 Live Crew understood that traditional copyright doctrine would judge their clients not by how much they had added to the Orbison-Dees ['Pretty Woman'] original but by how much they had taken from it."
i wonder if sales of the song 'Pretty Woman' as sung by Roy Orbison increased after the 2 Live Crew song parodying it was released? if so, then maybe one could argue that 2 Live Crew *made* money for Orbison, and isn't that what copyright is all about? it would be interesting to see if anyone has studied that effects on the sales of the supposed-infringed work?
for example, i'm sure many on this list were aware of the recent on-line mp3 activism called 'grey tuesday'?
more info, and better written, is on http://greytuesday.org but basically DJ Danger Mouse created a remix of Jay-Z's 'the Black Album' and the Beatles 'White Album', and called it the 'Grey Album'. (by the way, according to greytuesday.org, "Jay-Z's record label released an a capella version of his Black Album specifically to encourage remixes like this one.") of course, EMI, who (or is it which? :P) owns the rights to the Beatles' 'White Album', flipped out and made all kinds of threatening acts. in response, lots and lots of online folks all on one day (feb 24th i think) in protest made their individual sites all grey *and* posted the 'grey album' on their sites as mp3s for folks to download.
anyway, my point in this example is to say that as soon as i downloaded and listened to the 'Grey Album', i went and played (and re-played) the 'White Album' just so i could hear the similarities and dissimilarities. i wonder how many others did the same thing?
so basically i'm wondering why this emphasis on what is being taken *away* instead of what is being *added* on? it seems like copyright could just be looked at the other way around, in that one person's use of someone else's just adds attention (and money perhaps) to that someone else.
ergh. hope this makes sense, it's a bit hard to articulate but it makes sense to me right now :P ...
- andrea
Now how on earth does it make sense to vote for Edwards because you like Dean?
Edwards is not the one that got ordinary people involved in politics again. Edwards is not the one that broke fundraising records through small individual contributions. Edwards is not the one that restored the backbone of the party.
To tell the Democrats to pay attention to Dean's lesson, vote for Dean.
Arg. That last comment was me; the comment form dropped my name for some reason.
andrea: You might want to post your comment under the "Grey Tuesday" blog entry.
Anyway, I think you miss the main point; which in my oft-stated opinion is that the music industry is not interested in debating ephemeral things like "what is being taken *away* instead of what is being *added* on". If they think it will reduce their ability to extract profits from their properties, they will vigorously litigate.
Kerry's blog is now arguing who should be Veep - Edwards has his constituency. If you want to be part of it, go over there and troll Kerry's blog.
It's all up to him now. Take it over there, boys. In the hundreds!