CopyCamp 2018 – checking we’re speaking the same language.

Jane and I were very pleased to see that videos from CopyCamp 2018 in Warsaw are now available on the conference website. If you want to catch our joint session it’s at 4:22:30 during the first day stream, and the opening panel discussion in which Jane featured starts at 00:8:30.

Looking at the video and rereading Jane’s previous blog post got me thinking about the topic of language and copyright. Firstly, the conference was in a mixture of English and Polish, and this was the first multilingual event I’d been to where earpieces were available providing instantaneous translation. Although it took a bit of getting used to, I got into it eventually and soon enough felt like I was taking part in an important international summit where nothing less than the continued existence of human civilisation was at stake. I was also extremely impressed with the interpreters’ ability to keep up with the presentations and make them comprehensible in English, and it was very heartening to hear the well deserved and thunderous applause they got at the end of the final day.

The other thing that occurred to me was that the conference couldn’t help but reflect the divergent opinions over the the EU Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive. It wasn’t quite an elephant in the room, but I got the sense that people were on their best behaviour given that the event was intended as a neutral space to discuss copyright issues. The EU is of course a multi-lingual institution, and part of the challenge of creating European law is that everything needs to be translated into multiple languages without losing its meaning and intent. And on top of that, it is also a highly technical area of law as we discussed with Eleonora Rosati in our first guest Copyright Waffle podcast, so there’s always a tendency to use emotive language that isn’t actually helpful in understanding complex systems.

I was very interested to hear Will Slauter comparing the current rhetoric around the proposed press publishers’ right and the language used in the debates around copying within the 19th century print news industry (first day stream at 2:09:00). Will pointed out that the same tropes appear over and over again, and that some element of copying is always tolerated within the system. However, it depends on which side of the ‘us’ and ‘them’ dichotomy a person or organisation sits as to whether it is seen by the press industry as ‘piracy’ or just business. But the purpose of mentioning this is not necessarily to talk about the content of the proposed DSM. I have my views on this, but I also welcomed the opportunity to hear carefully worded and well argued presentations from others with different views. For example Burak Özgen from GESAC who wanted to distance himself from the loaded term “value gap”, instead talking about “transfer of value” in their efforts to license use of copyright works on online music platforms (second day stream at 3:38:30).

So the issue with language is not just whether it allows you to understand and be understood, it also has huge ideological power. Copyright may be a complex area of law, but it’s also one that encapsulates big ideas around access to art, culture and science which people feel passionate about. And whilst passion can be a good thing, we’ve all seen the effect of emotive language on the political stage in recent years and the descent into tribalism. I’ve recently been reading The People vs Tech by Jamie Bartlett, in which the author (who has for many years been a cheerleader for digital technology) argues that the internet is now undermining democracy. He notes that democracy is about consensus, about give and take, and therefore not about getting everything you want. However, much of the the language of online discussion falls into the trap of following a winner takes all mindset.

—————————————