MEDIA PIRACY &
Explain? This website contains the intercepted design of 5 media websites — applying them to each chapter individually.

The 2000s. «You wouldn't steal a car», it quivers in rubber-pressed letters across the opening screen of the newly purchased DVD.

Even before you enter the main menu, mixed in with film previews, the unskippable service announcement invokes, with its sinister backstreets, leather jackets and crowbars, a dire scenery of crime and Internet-mischief. «You wouldn't steal a car, a handbag, a television», it argues; likewise, you should keep your hands away from crooked download buttons looming on the Internet.

The video, charmingly over the top as it may be, remains to catch plenty of slack and harvests much amusement for its wild analogies—rightly so, perhaps. The leap between a particularly serious case of theft and a comparatively milder copyright infringement likely came off a bit too ambitious for most a DVD watcher.

So be it. Did the broadcasting creatives of the time produce the most compelling anti-piracy campaign possible?

Probably not.

Did the sequence nevertheless succeed in limiting piracy and taking a step towards safeguarding the content of media culture?
Again, not at all.

On the contrary, there's even indication that the clip encouraged online piracy rather than helping in repressing it. ¹

!Introduction: The Culture-Digital

At the advert's time, the triumph of the computer had plunged our cultural world into full tour-de-force digitization. The complete makeover of our everyday life meant unprecedented developments in saving, multiplying, and disseminating media assets of all kinds, virtually reduced down to the stroke of three keyboard-shortcuts. No matter whether photo, video, or audio—the Culture-Digital is multimedia, encoded and compressed into the .jpg's, .mp4's or .wav's of our times. Obtaining and copying online material of any medium has been dramatically simplified and what was once laborious and involved great production effort is now swiftly manageable by the amateur, everyday computer user. ^{More Info 2}

In the midst of this technical reproduction spree, the question of implementing digital copyright law becomes particularly enticing.

The publication of the You Wouldn't Steal a Car ad marked humble beginnings of attempted copyright implementation on the web, and, in its ridiculed reception, fittingly typifies the difficulties in establishing stately law in a space inherently unstately.

It precisely marks the halfway point between today and the very beginnings of the Internet itself; then, simply an unorganized network of a handful of early computers, to be developed and structured upon principles formulated by those specifically concerned with computer networking: programmers, computer scientists, hackers, geeks, and nerds. ³

Since its inception, precisely this group made sure the roots of the Inter-network would lay in ideas of an unrestricted, anarchic space of concentrated availability and freedom—by building these ideas into the design of the system itself. The Intergalactic Computer Network ⁴ should be space for unrestricted openness and collaboration. These core values were notably voiced in a pathbreaking collection of quotes and beliefs, such as «Architecture is Politics» ⁵, «Code is law» ⁶ and «The net interprets censorship as damage and routs around it.» ⁷ The very architecture on which the World Wide Web was to be built was in itself designed to allow for the free and unrestricted flow of information. There was sharing, copying, and no one thinking about copyright regulations. Much rather, computers were continuously developed onward in an underlying open-source ⁸ approach based on the sharing and reusing of established discoveries—early examples are the sharing of the source code that made the Internet itself: It was simply convenient to allow for peer review and bug fixing, seeking collaboration in times of limited resources.

With the onset of the commercialization of the World Wide Web in 1995, these notions were challenged—and defended within a multitude of appearing Manifestos, most notably John Perry Barlow's Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace and Eric Hughes’s Cypherpunk Manifesto, calling for independency, anti-governance ⁹, and anonymity ¹⁰—And though each of the three have been meddled with and pushed around throughout the last decade, independence, anti-governance and anonymity ultimately remain. Up until today, «a particular problem in the relationship between the state and digital networks is the ability of the average citizen, business, or organization operating on the Internet to evade or override most conventional jurisdictions. Some of this is still rooted in the earlier emphasis on the Internet as a decentralized space where authority structures cannot be established.» ¹¹

It seems these roots of unregulated freedom resonate especially within the generations that don't know any handling of cultural property outside of the existence of the Internet to begin with. The underlying phenomena of the Internet are rubbing off on an increasingly digital culture—the Culture-Digital.

The Internet, with its large-scale networking possibilities and interconnected reference systems of hyperlinks and cross-referencing brings with it a redistribution culture of sharing, retweeting, and reblogging. Social media platforms (such as Twitter, and the image/video-based Tik-Tok in particular) make the reposting and reediting of existing material a core mechanism deeply anchored in the very framework of the platform. Through the reinterpretation of a previous post, trends are created, images multiply and develop new niches. ^{More Info} The Culture-Digital is one of Remixing—Oftentimes, one of remixing in complete disregard for what may be copyrighted and what may be not. In consequence, «a large part of everyday remix practices is moving in direct contradiction to existing legal frameworks.» Images and videos on film and culture practically become Public Domain, are edited, adapted, and forwarded.

The origin of the post, and so the question of the author, recedes into the background here; Resulting in «most users themselves having no interest in being considered as authors for their own works». ¹²

Hence, new attempts to restriction are often rigorously dismissed and, if at all, only bumpily established. In the recent past, copyright regulations on the Internet have, in the first place, been met with great headaches. ^{More Info}

!Copyright Legalities

Overview

It is important to note here that each country establishes its own copyright regulations - both within national borders as well as within the Internet as well.

This text will refer to German law, unless stated otherwise.

Jurists commonly distinguish between three offences in matters of copyright infringement. These include the commonly known acts of counterfeiting, plagiarizing, and bootlegging. Product piracy is a collective term that may refer to any of these offences.

Differentiating between these three terminologies can be delicate, though generally agreed upon definitions go as follows: While counterfeits are deceptive forgeries, often of inferior quality, and plagiarisms refer to copies passed off as one's own creation, bootlegs are rather an unlawfully made or distributed copy of copyrighted material. Whereas an art forger copies a painting and makes it appear to be created by the original artist, the plagiarist passes off the copy as his own work. ¹³

The bootlegger here takes a more distanced position to the work. They rarely republish an item for personal acknowledgement and rather set themselves the goal of redistributing the work to a (local) community.

Notably though, German copyright law does not include a so-called 'legal definition' for these terms. They are rather colloquial, popular-juristic umbrella terms for verbs brought into association by the German dictionary such as '(to) forge, imitate, copy, borrow, adopt, fake and mimic'. ¹⁴ There are no divisive lines between the acts and rather serve as self-made categorizations to help navigating scenarios.

When examining concrete legal guidelines for determining acts of 'copyright infringement', things get cloudier. Per definition, a work is uncopyrightable (and therefore always free to copy) if it is not qualifiable as an 'intellectual creation', therefore being banal and lacking the individuality required for copyright protection (§ 2 II UrhG) ¹⁵.

This means, concretely, that a subsequent author may not be prohibited from using commonplace words 'and', 'the', 'a', or even the letter 'm' or 'n'. What is essential is that the reference in question possesses enough 'distinctiveness' to be considered creative. Though—how many letters does it take to formulate something original? ^{More Info}

A concrete formulation for the line between a banal creation and a work possessive of 'intellectual creation' does not exist; Ergo, copyright infringement, in its various forms of severity, does not necessarily violate applicable law and is much rather considered a grey area. Black and white 'yesses' and 'noes' are simply nonexistent here. The definitions for the terms, as well as judging the severity of infringement, will always be down to the evaluation of a judge and their interpretation in deciding the fate of a design piece. ¹⁶

Exceptions in Internet «New Land»

Evidently, even outside the Internet, copyright regulations, maintained for centuries, carefully ordered, and extensively formulated, continue to spark debate. These already shaky copyright laws of the offline world seep into the Internet and flow from the interpretable to the porous—As of yet, the Culture-Digital is being paired up and thrown together with copyright legislature dating back to times of Goethe and Beethoven. ¹⁷

The German law has sought to create clarity in dealing with fair use in the so-called «new land» ^{More Info 18} that is the Internet in the same way it hopes to create clarity elsewhere, too: with a bounty of more and again more paragraphs and reformulations and legislations and a mass of bureaucratic acts.

The recent Act to adapt copyright law to the requirements of the digital single market outlines new dos and don'ts in 171 pages of finest legal prose: 15 seconds are allowed, 160 characters and 125 kilobytes—except this, and only if that. ¹⁹ Oh, Germany, you bulging bulwark of exceptions and small print, neatly sorted and aligned—A shame, though, that hardly any of the users on the web seem to be taking any of it seriously - let alone seriously violating anything at all?

In the first place, national copyright laws in the 'real world' have little effect in the borderless Internet and often slip off of a lack of international consensus. «A big question is always how the various national laws [on the Internet] are compatible with each other. What rights apply if the server is in country A, the user is in country B and the programmer is in country C? There are no rules there.» ²⁰

This bundled unclarity, in harmony with an unprecedented ease of (re)production, likewise has an effect on the investigations, or rather the non-investigations, of rule-breakers. «Technological development has removed many barriers to the dissemination of cultural goods, so that any computer owner can now easily create things that, in the past, would have been possible only with significant investment. This impacts enforcement of law, as prohibition online is handled completely differently from that of traditional private use in the offline world.» ²¹

For even when there is a clear rule-breaking, prosecution is often too cumbersome and abundantly inefficient for prosecutors; rules and laws are only as good as their implementation, and it seems no one really enjoys indulging in the nitty-gritty of tedious prosecution processes ²²—for acts that are committed millions of times a day anyhow. ^{More Info}

An egalization of copyright values has taken on a life of its own on the Internet, allowed to roam free.

Internet users form resistance to restrictions within the virtual space by exerting a form of collective casualness in breaking copyright rules, as if they were not there in the first place. «Classic copyright law and its comprehensive protective rights are based on the fiction of an originless creation. Creators have always stood on the shoulders of giants. But as long as borrowed ideas were only implied, ambiguous, and reformed in works, this fiction of an originless creation could be maintained.» ²³

Not so with the wave of remixing and reappropriating the Internet is confronting us with—the illusion has broken.

«The definition of the computer was that of a machine, which can imitate all other machines. That definition should remove all definitions of copyright and intellectual property». ²⁴ Or, more bluntly: «You'd have to live behind the moon to avoid any inspiration by others.» ²⁵

And so, an enormous breadth of anti-copyrighters, willful or unwilful, persists firmly in place; The Internet archives, public domain distributors and obscure torrenting platforms in fully stacked online piracy portals, representatives of anticapitalistic access to the content of the Internet, appearing in all possible legal and not-so-legal shades of gray. They remain intact as remnants of the Internet’s early days, embraced by its presentday community with open arms. The online pirate's role does not correspond to the dirty reputation of a rogue that once preceded them anymore. Rather, they are the everyday consumer. ²⁶

!Artistic Thoughts on Plagiarism and Reproduction

The Bootleg

Enough already, with legalities.

Judging the blurriness of legal terminology, this chapter will rather focus on users who have made themselves comfortable within the very grey area of copyright legislation itself—The Culture-Digital, the remixers, the Crackers, Rippers, Hackers, counterfeiters, Yankee Thrifters, bootleggers, Modders, pirates and copy-artists of the times. Truly, when maneuvering the nitty grittys of law, action is often more determinative that fine print.

Once a product is made public, its original, carefully curated design is at the mercy of whomever may get their hands on it.

An original copy is not perfectly formed for everyone—in fact, it is perfectly formed for a vast minority of the consumer market, and the fact it is perfectly formed for that vast minority is because that vast minority does not consider the design of the non-perfectly formed object—if even anyone. It is supposedly perfectly formed for those deemed a 'target audience': With this notion comes bias. Perhaps mechanically perfectly produced, it is not functionally perfect for the consumer.

When the original good, in its needed shape, size and functionality, does not exist, own technical ability is required to shape what does exist into something fitting your needs. ²⁷

What the Hacker aims to achieve is to adapt the premade item, available in countless iterations, identically perfect, to his own needs and likings. They do not abide to sheepish acceptance. Though the prevalent motif of the hacker has come to be associated with green text and monospace, it rather stems from the hijacking of everyday objects, hardware; most prevalently introduced by Nicolas Collins' The Art of Hardware Hacking ²⁸. Items are taken out of their current functionality, broken open and analyzed for possible synthesis with work of their own. Thus, the hacker aims to introduce his own character and thinking into an innate object and adapt it to serve his own purposes.

Through bootlegging, the consumer outside of the target audience does not settle for the initially given and mass-produced shape of the item but cuts away what they do not need and add on top what is necessary to get their job done. Quick and dirty solutions do the trick to reappropriate an object to serve its new purpose. The bootleg is a hack, a quick solution to a complex problem. The hacker takes building block that already exist and plugs them into each other. ²⁹ The result is an item akin to Bricolage, not quite the original, not quite something new—a hybrid.

This individualized level of functionality does not exist in a world of copyrighting and nitpicking over when an item is distinct enough from a counterpart: Breathing space for adaptation goes out the window.

What is perfect for some can hardly be perfect for millions of others also. Sometimes, what is perfect is a copy with a single modification. Sometimes, a handful of modifications, and sometimes, half of the original is ripped away and screwed on top of something else.

Sometimes, this modification occurs in magnificent technical prowess and attention to detail, most of the times in a makeshift, DIY fashion, starkly contrasting the original design. Gaps in initial conceptualization are plugged with tape and plywood.

These processes leave traces on the original objects, so called 'scars of labor' ³⁰, evidence of consumption and interference. They are craft fixes, «the glue drips, screw holes, cum stains and fingerprints» ³¹ left on an immaculate original; Proof that the original object has been taken and used. Like a messily written name labelling a mass-produced item as one’s own, a sense of identity and individuality is added to the object.

What is now present is a scratched-up version of a high-definition first, an «illicit fifth-generation bastard of an original» ³². Thus, the aesthetic reappropriation of the asset directly mimics the inherently counter-capitalist act of stealing it in the first place. ^{More Info}

The bootlegger hacks into an object which is not meant to be opened. It's an answer to throw away culture. Lack of repairability, planned obsolescence. The bootleg does not try to hide what it is.

The Original

Created around an original during production and retail is a mystical aura, proving the items legitimacy: It relies on the idea of a perfect, intentional, and curated state. The item carries an identity with it, thought out by the brand that published it, carefully constructed and maintained, apparent in its cleanest, purest form in the shelved item. Brands rely on this idea of the original massively. It is what justifies the power and authority over the counterfeit or any successors and gives legitimacy to the idea of copyright in the first place. ³³

It is this aura ³⁴, broken apart and overwritten, that gives the bootleg, the altered version, its power. In the collection of one-and-only originals, the slightest inconsistency stands out. ³⁵ The result is a molded-out canvas of mechanical ex-perfection, taped over, scribbled onto, cut apart and reglued together. It adheres precisely to the needs of a one and functions to their needs.

Digital Bootlegging

Bootlegging quickly grew beyond the act of a single individual, tinkering away, to a widespread network of the digital world. In the digital space, the bootleg is socialized. It no longer functions specifically for one or the other: Instead, it passes through networks and groups as filetypes, iterating in different versions, cached by one and processed by another. What establishes itself online is a sort of non-space underground distribution network of those to whom the circumstances of the original do not abide. They link together, edit to their needs and likings, sharing among others in similar situations.

The functionality of torrenting methods used on virtually all pirating networks—the libgens, z-libraries, thepiratebays and ubuwebs—visualise this. Rather than downloading files from a central server, users link together: When one downloads a file, they get connected to many others who have done so before them, each providing a small piece of the requested file. Once all parts are collected, the data is pieced together on the obtainer's computer—and the downloader ideally becomes a distributor themselves. ^{More Info 36 More Info 37}

Though inherently physical, the scars of labor reappear here again—In the form of smearing data compression in the digital.

With each new copy, and redownload, and passing on, there is the potential for a small change to be saved into the file: Be it the reduction of video quality, as it becomes compressed and recompressed in many up-and re-downloads, or a streaming-host who cuts their username in front of an intercepted movie.

These little quirks are glitches, uncharacteristic of the mechanical perfection are maintained in ever new split-offs of the original file.

Similar to its physical counterpart, the digital bootleg becomes independent from its high-quality counterpiece. It is adapted and, as it is hacked, is torn apart and arranged back together elsewhere, by a different user, all leaving their marks of use behind as the original becomes overwritten (and overwritten and overwritten).

!Internet Non-Law

Paradoxically, those underground networks and string-pullers of the piracy portals are equally helping their opponents, the copyright representatives, with every act of disobedience. With their creative new solutions to find loopholes and undermine the system to keep theirs running, they simultaneously reveal the weak spots of legislature. The pirate exposes ways to circumvent the current regulations, allowing them to be identified and closed by the regulators—only for a new loophole to be found.

The pirate's activities thus have a direct impact on making the copyright legislation more compact and more robust against future attacks of their own: «The hacker becomes a helper of that knowledge regime whose challenger they saw themself as. They oscillate between subversion and stabilization.» ³⁸

But the resulting endless loop of judicial executions is tedious and sluggish, and so it remains a game of cat and mouse in which slow government processes are always two steps too late against the rapid technical adaptations of their opponents. ^{More Info} It is for this reason that many believe copyright laws are simply not equipped to get a lock on the digital space and «Internet pirates will always win.» ³⁹

With the legal body of legislation failing to get a clear grip on fair use online, the responsibility of a verdict becomes much more dependent upon on which platform the infringement takes place and who is affected ^{More Info}. Oftentimes, especially in artistic cases, the users themselves become the judges of a self-governing body. ^{More Info} They call out blatant stealing and confront plagiarists ^{More Info}, but celebrate acts of taking what should be theirs.

!Break: Thoughts on Labelling your Belongings

In the context of what has been stated before.
Reappropriation begins with the first step of customization: Labelling. There is beauty in the object with a handwritten name.
A handwritten name is a successful first step in customizing an item.
There is equal beauty in the date of acquisition.
Permanency is encouraged.


!Hacking, Fixing and Maintaining a 70’s Fisher Price Toy: A Detour

Thoughts on Fixing and Re-fixing

What comes with fixing is care. Rather than throwing away an item that has served its purpose, one figures out its exact functionality, figures out the system it is built on, its uses, its components, and begins curating materials to compile and merge with the original.

Within this mentality, things can further be adapted to one’s liking and specific needs, filled with personality. Its functionality is understood and can be further maintained.

Hacking Everyday Life

A particular item that I have come across, with which I am attempting to exemplify this process, is the Movie Viewer produced by Fisher Price first in the 1970's and up until today. It is a radar-gun like object, loaded with visuals in the form of super 8 film. The user peeks into the hollow body of the toy through a viewfinder, right onto a strip of super 8 film, advanced by rotating a wheel on the viewer’s side. Frame by frame, a 40 second loop of Disney footage is played analogly right in your hands.

At some point, intrigued engineers figured out how to pry the toy open carefully, replacing the default film with their own super 8 strips, then putting it back together again. Individuals could now flip through their personally recorded footage, having individualized the toy ⁴⁰.

A sweet activity before Fisher Price discontinued the original and reissued an updated version years later, switching from accessible super 8 film to a custom format. With this switch the gear advancing the film inside the toy did not match up with the holes in publicly available film anymore, rendering the movie viewer worthless for customization.

Nevertheless, within this working methodology, I see a thorough connection to valuable approaches of customizing present today. What had started as an activity of taking advantage of the functionalities of a preexisting item, now developed further into the space of coding. Reusing previously established, functional code as a vessel for personal projects is common practice; Almost all computer programs contain many ideas borrowed from elsewhere. Many also contain short sections of actual code copied and pasted—but for anyone to file a claim of plagiarism for reuse of code is practically unthinkable.

I believe this approach can likewise be useful in determining an act of unethical copyright infringement outside of the digital. Basis for this lies on the fundamental practice of integrating the code into a system of one's own. Value stems from adapting the underlying system to one’s own needs and personal liking, changing what is necessary.

Within coding and especially the open-source movement, there is a group of fixers, maintainers, and hackers that share the same values of adaptation and customization to established systems, stripped of all of their analogue qualities and passed on to the digital space.

In open-source culture, these readaptations, overwritings and edits are in itself engrained in the functionality of the object, or much rather, the creation of it: the tool, the software. There is no original copy. Even if there were, no one would care. Programs are fully intended to be broken open, picked apart and edited to the liking of the individual that downloaded it to their computer. In total, an amass of slightly different copies of a program, perfectly in sync to the needs of each a one. What becomes much more decisive for differentiating between blatant plagiarism and functional copying is not the visual output, but the introduction and compilation of personal character.

Reenter the movie viewer. Up until today, few people remain that scour the Internet for 1973 originals—they are sparse, crumbly and jam easily. In a quest this thesis has brought me upon, I aim fix the second version movie viewer and supply to necessary parts to my and the other movie viewer comrades' needs. ^{More Info}

It seems incredibly fitting that the answer to the problem of the unfitting gear itself may come from the open-source community. The idea is to digitally recreate and mechanically reproduce the first-generation gear through a 3D printer, bringing it back to life. In doing so, the non-fitting gear of the second edition can be replaced, and the customized movie viewer lives on.

!Reframing Internet Copyright

It has been established that, no matter if functional execution or artistic practice, ideas live on in further works, sometimes visible, sometimes hidden behind reappropriation and a fresh coat of paint, sometimes as a mere inspiration. The lines between copy and original are not black and white, but blurry greys, differing in intensities of modification and originality. In an increasingly digital world, remixing and readaptation has become a social phenomenon, causing existing regulations to crumble and be naturally disregarded: especially among younger generations.

In a Plea for a New Term of the Original, Dirk von Gehlen proposes a solution to the situation—Instead of maintaining the current pseudo-black-and-white legislature, he suggests creating a scale that allows for more gradual attribution of originality: distinguishing between 'highly original' and 'lesser original' works. Here, clear distinctions would not be needed anymore. A space for leeway, a transparent communication of influence and homage could be laid out, evading the constant question of rule breaking—kissing the idea of 'Yes!' and 'No!' and the 'masterful artistic creation' and the idea of originality entirely goodbye. ⁴¹

«The idea of originality only exists because people [in law] decide whom possesses it. Originality is only created in the eye of the beholder. This legitimization is just as arbitrary as the rulings of copyright infringement themselves.» ⁴²

The question of originality, here, would rather become one of flowing transition, transparently communicating the level of influence.

Especially in dealing with generations that have been socialized on the Internet and have built their network culture on the basic methods of sharing and remixing, there must be adjustments. «A free society must provide its members with opportunities for sharing and participation—and that includes copying (and not only in the digital space). We would do better if we were to establish a system in which one would openly draw from the ideas of others, creating and copying references ⁴³» instead of tiptoeing around legal sponginess. «Maybe that's where originality emerges; within the variation of one's own copy» ⁴⁴.

Instead of clear distinctions, Gehlen borrows and idea from Anaïs Hostettler, supposing a line of thinking closer to the idea of 'Versions', akin to those derived out of software development in the digital space und reminiscent of approaches in open-source culture. The act of copying, rather than being an inspiring act of reproduction, is pushed into an in itself inherently creative act of questioning existing material and refunctioning it. With proper copying comes critical reflection, questions of self-reliance and functionality, durability, communication, and expression of thought.

Whether the exact moment of when a copy becomes independent can be found, who knows. Whether it matters, who cares. It seems many a problem of splitting hairs between blacks and whites could be evaded in a full embrace of grey.

References

Footnotes

Definitions