Our
Belief in Sharing
After
releasing our
stock photos for public sharing for more than 1 year, we consolidate
our belief in our move to embrace free licence. Last year we released
our calendar under creative common licence but we decided to releasae
our works under our own free licence for some considerations. Now it's
time
for us to tell the public our thinking.
Someone
claim that the
majority of people may enjoy wealth generated from their
creative
work. So our legislators have drafted and passed a series of
law
for the protection of intellectual property. However, under the
copyright ordinance, we cannot be sure if a piece of work is allowed to
be copied, shared, distributed, reproduced or modified without a
complete knowledge about the details of license even though we are
willing to pay for the use of it. For the peace of mind,
we must create
everything from the very beginning together with a
thorough prior art search confirming that there is no similar work in
the world.
However, the
new ordinances have not helped too much in protecting our creative
works. Customers, including government departments, are expecting "free
demo design service" early in the stage of
tendering quotation for
jobs involving the elements of creation.
The
problem is not limited to this. Nobody is able to tell if his
idea
would coinside with someone living and working in elsewhere of the
world. This intrinsic defect of the so-called intellectual property
have given rise to the overwhelming rent seeking activities of a group
of professional litigators who take advantages from champerty and
maintenance. These brave new ordinances, to some extent, have legalized
their legal extortion from innocent people. In Hong Kong, their victims
are mainly SMEs, especially small retailers or service providers.
Outsiders can hardly imagine how and why a lawful and
disciplined retailer keeps receiveing legal letters from prominent law
firms representing prominent copyright owners like content providers or
trademark owners
claiming hundred thousands dollars for the infringement of copyright
just for selling stationery of dollars and cents which is
deemed by these smart heads to be "too similar" to what they
possess. In Western countries, even the wealthy gigantic
corporations are
their targets.
Then
some people stood up and
vowed
that this "permission
culture"
was not the thing they want but that they valued the joy of sharing and
recognition of their idea more than money.
They realize that whether or not a piece of work can generate
profit
relies on the popularity but not the promise of law. In software
industry, some vendors introduce the idea of "SAAS" (software as a
service) and support the open source movement. In creative industry,
some artists start to release their work free of charge to the public
for gaining the popularity and make their money from the
provision of
direct service. Thus a number of
free
license like "creative
common", "copyleft",
"wiki-common"
or "GPL"
were created
to get around the restriction of copyright which is granted to the
creator automatically as a natural right even he does not demand for it
by most of the prevailing legal
systems in our world. To the astonishment of a lot of ordinary people,
in just a few years, more and more authors have joined the camp of "free
culture"
and released their work to the public under various kinds of free
license.
They
contribute their effort in building a more beautiful world.
However,
do not confuss "piracy" with "free culture". Advocates
of free culture only share with others their own creation but not
pirated property from others. Actually, they respect the right of the
author of all intellectual property. Whether or not to release
their work under free license remain their own choice.
This
point is important when using our hyper-links to these 3rd party web
sites providing free resources to artists all over the world.
We
respect the will and the right of the author of all intellectual
properties. When we provide the information and hyper-link of these
web-sites, we believe that their activities and content are lawful and
ethical. Hence, before you visit those webs, please read our disclaimer
once again. If you find any abuse or obsession, please email to "abuse@um-gallery.net".
Taking
the most pragmatic
point of view, the action of releasing free works to the public may be
regarded as a "free demo service"
like what a contractor provides in tendering a quotation for
a
project. Nevertheless, as a humble person, we should believe in the
pure intention of some people who only demand for the echo from their
audience in return
for
what they have shared with the world.
-
11/12/2008
