a constellation of interests is now seeking to increase its ownership and control of creativity. we are told that these interests require new laws and rights that will allow them to control concepts and ideas and protect them from exploitation. they say that this will enrich our lives, create new products and safeguard the possibility of future prosperity. but this is a disaster for creativity, whose health depends on an ongoing, free and open conversation
between ideas from the past and the present.

in response, we wish to defend the idea of a creative field of concepts and ideas that are free from ownership.

1. Profit has a new object of affection. Indeed, Profiteers now shamelessly proclaim to be the true friend of creativity and the creative. Everywhere, they declare, “we support and protect concepts and ideas. creativity is our business and it is safe in our hands. we are the true friends of creativity!”

2. Not content with declarations of friendship, profiteers are eager to put into practice their fondness for creativity as well. Action speaks louder than words in capitalist culture. To display their affection, profiteers use legal mechanisms, namely intellectual property law, to watch over concepts and ideas and to protect them from those who seek to misuse them. While we are dead to the world at night, they are busily stockpiling intellectual property at an astonishing rate. More and more, the creative sphere is being brought under
their exclusive control.

3. The fact that the profiteers are now so protective of creativity, jealously seeking to control concepts and ideas, ought to rouse suspicion. While they may claim to be the true friends of creativity, we know that friendship is not the same as dependency. It is very different to say, “I am your true friend because I need you”, than to say, “I need you because I am your true friend”. But how are we to settle this issue? How do we distinguish the true friend from the false? In any relationship between friends we should ask, “Are both
partners mutually benefiting?”

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