Creativity of the Internet

The Internet is probably the greatest tool that the world has ever seen. The things that people have created on the Internet are amazing yet not many are legal. Using the past, what we know people loved to hear or see, has always been a way for people to create new things, videos, music, art of any kind. In the twentieth century though, this concept has become illegal, breaking many copyright laws. People want to remix, or create something new using parts of something old that people have always loved and cherished. The most convenient and accessible way to copy someone else’s work is the Internet. Which creates our issue at hand; the Internet is causing a huge impact on creative works in a positive but illegal way.    

Being an artist I understand the need or want for others to enjoy my work. Yet, there are so many copyright laws now that restrict you from ever even considering making something close to someone else’s work. Girl Talk, a remix artist, commits this crime everyday. Girl Talk, or Gregg Gillis, uses the popular hits from all eras to remix them with popular current hit songs. The problem he faces with remixing is that paying the rights to every song he uses would become outrageously expensive and frankly, not worth it. For each sample of another song Girl Talk uses in one of his remixes, he has to pay on average $2500 to each of the corporations that owns each title song. So for a typical Girl Talk song, for it to be legal, he should pay $262,500, and for a typical album he should pay, on average, $4,200,000. (Gaylor) How could corporations expect someone to pay over four million dollars to create something completely new with the help of musical geniuses from the past?

“Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that enables the sharing and use of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools”  (Creative Commons). For all artists there is an Internet source that is in the process of taking down the corporations that are limiting our use of other peoples’ work. Through this source, you are able to select the specific licenses, or who is able to use your work. Their mission is to make people more creative and widen their knowledge of other cultures, eras, the past and make something new out of it. So there are ways to get around the problems of illegal usage of other peoples’ work, so why is this still an issue today?

Everyone wants credit for the work that they have done, there is never a question about this. However, production companies and other corporations have taken extreme measures. People are going to jail, being fined thousands of dollars simply because they downloaded a song from the Internet and made it into their own new creation. Internet sources like Creative Commons need to be used more often and more efficiently, especially by famous artists to allow the use of creative works to anyone they choose. Creative Commons has opened the door for something amazing in the Internet world, giving people the chance to share their creations in the exact way they choose. It is not fair to limit people on their creativity; using works of the past is not stealing, it is recognizing and rewarding these amazing artists for the culture they have given the world. “Our vision is nothing less than realizing the full potential of the Internet to drive a new era of development, growth, and productivity.” Their vision statement should be an overall goal for all Internet users; cites like Creative Commons need to set the new standard for creative users of the Internet. “Creativity has never had it so good”, so lets keep it this way and allow the Internet to take your creativity anywhere and everywhere. 

Works Cited

Creative Commons. (2001). What is Creative Commons? About. www.creativecommons.org

Gaylor, B. (2009). RiP!: A Remix Manifesto.

Holloway-Smith, B. (2012). Illegal Art: Considering Our Culture Of Copying. Junctures: The Journal For Thematic Dialogue, (15), 19-26.

Let the creative juices flow. (2012). New Scientist, (2866), 3.

Turner, M. (2010). Monk Turner. Case Studies. http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Monk_Turner