Here’s a puzzle: when is the public domain not in the public domain?
Walled Culture is a big fan of the public domain. The amazing artistic uses that people are able to make of material only once it enters the public…
Copyright has been one of life’s certainties: but will it always be?
Copyright seems to be a fixture of our legal, economic and social systems. For 300 years, it has formed the backbone of the structures used to incentivise and…
How publishers lobbied to “axe the reading tax” on ebooks, won – and then paid it to themselves
One of the (many) villains in Walled Culture the book (free ebook versions) is the publishing industry, specifically in the context of the transition from analogue books to…
In a world where AI art is cheap and easy to generate, do we still need copyright?
To say that AI-generated art is controversial would be something of an understatement. The appearance last year of free tools like Stable Diffusion has not just thrown the…
The copyright world is preparing to hobble yet another innovative technology – generative AI
Last week Walled Culture noted that there already are two lawsuits against generative AI systems that are causing such a buzz at the moment. Both those legal actions…
The first lawsuit against generative AI seems doomed to fail because it misunderstands the technology
Back in October last year, a Walled Culture post noted that generative AI programs were likely to have a massive impact on both copyright and creation. When programs…
Peer review has failed, and that’s great news – for diamond open access, science and society
Over on his Experimental History blog, which he describes as “cognitive sneezing and interior design for your head“, Adam Mastroianni has two great posts about peer review in…
Public domain: a belated step forward, two huge steps back
The first day of the year is a special time in the copyright world. It’s when a flood of works whose copyright has expired finally emerge from behind…
How Minecraft’s “End Poem” ended up in the public domain
Minecraft is the best-selling video game of all time according to Wikipedia, with hundreds of millions of copies sold. The game concludes with the End Poem by the…
A database of public domain works could reduce upload filter overblocking; it’s absurd we need one
One of many problems with the upload filters that Article 17 of the EU Copyright Directive will bring in is that they are likely to overblock. That is,…
A new US law makes it easier for copyright trolls to terrorise people with claims of alleged infringement
The legal landscape is already strongly tilted in favour of copyright holders. But that doesn’t stop the copyright maximalists from demanding more ways to enforce their intellectual monopolies.…
The copyright world is already panicking about music created using generative AI; too late
A couple of weeks ago, Walled Culture wrote about the rapid rise and advance of generative AI in the world of visual arts. One key aspect was its…
A concept that should not exist at all is already implemented: the “paying” public domain
A couple of weeks ago, Walled Culture reported on a terrible idea in France: requiring companies to pay for the use of public domain material. As the post…
Why generative AI will take over the world of art, and will render copyright irrelevant
Observant readers of this blog may have noticed that the images used to illustrate the posts have changed recently. Previously, I have drawn on photos that were either…
Coming soon: the next phase of copyright maximalism – destroying the public domain
The public domain is the natural state of creative material. It’s where creations end up once copyright’s monopoly has expired. Crucially, it is the quid pro quo for…
Walled Culture, the book, now freely available: what that means, and how you can help
Today is an important day for this blog: Walled Culture – the book – has launched. You can download free copies now in a variety of digital formats.…