John Miedema

Birth of the Reader-Hacker, Pt 5.

Every extension of self crosses a boundary, changing our relationship with others, and re-defining our identity. The extension of digital technology changes many things for readers. Readers are concerned with issues such as access to content and copyright, concepts under contention these days. You will find that many reader-hackers are digital media activists, people who have taken the time to learn the rules, and insightful enough to know when to bend and break them.

Here are some ways that reader-hackers are creatively contributing to new thinking about content and copyright:

1. P2P Sharing. Peer-to-Peer content sharing is often wrongly characterized as being only about theft of copyrighted content. In fact, P2P downloaders spend more on music. But P2P is a much bigger subject. People use P2P to get known as artists. The days of mega-rock stars are gone. Many more small artists — musicians and writers — can be discovered through the new digital media.

2. Copyright. Traditional copyright is a tough battle on the internet because the internet is essentially a giant copy machine. I respect an artist’s rights to their work, but I encourage artists to consider that copying is the sincerest form of flattery and is a powerful strategy in getting known. Creative Commons licensing is a good strategy for balancing the rights of artists and the potential of the web for remixing content.

3. Net neutrality. Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the web, has expressed serious concern regarding trends toward a two-tier web, one for those who can pay, and another for the rest of us. He advocates for net neutrality, a level playing field for access to information and all the good things that stream from it, things like innovation and democracy.

4. Censorship. You’ve heard of the great firewall of China, but many people in the free world have limits placed on their access to information. Many workplaces limit access to the internet in the name of network safety and efficiency. Hackers are interested in the free flow of information. Circumvention technologies exist. See, for example, the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Also see Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering.