Creators Connecting:

Susan Crean & Russell McOrmond

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd-nc/1.0/
This work is copyright 2004, Russell McOrmond, and licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Last updated April 10, 2004, Russell McOrmond¹

Summary

The following is a series of publicly published letters between writer and cultural critic Susan Crean², and software creator and new media activist Russell McOrmond. It is hoped that in publishing these letters that the journey that Susan and I have been taking will be helpful to others to solidify their own thoughts. Susan has been very influential in my thoughts on creativity and copyright, and convinced me that I too am an activist for creators' rights.

Time sequence and Table of Contents / Correspondences

There is an introduction after this table. This table will continue to be updated as new letters are written.

• April 11, 2002: Susan and I first met at the Ottawa copyright consultation meeting. We exchanged business cards, and heard each other giving our public presentations. She seemed to be in favor of "legal protection for Technological Protection Measures", with opposition of this policy being the main reason our community. It surprised me at that point to hear anyone from the creator community speak in favor of this policy.

• April 30, 2002: We got together informally at a coffee shop in Ottawa to get a better idea of where each other is coming from as creators.

• October 29, 2002: We spoke in a "debate" broadcast live from Ryerson University, this debate was co-sponsored by the CAW-Sam Gindin Chair in Social Justice and Democracy and the Ryerson School of Journalism. It was the first in a series of Gindin Debates. We each wrote articles before the 2 hour broadcast debate.
  
  Rabble Rumble Website: http://www.rabble.ca/rumble/
  Local copy of articles: http://www.flora.ca/creators/crean20021029.html

• April 4, 2003: Susan and I were participants in the Minister's Forum on Copyright hosted as part of the Juno weekend. My involvement was primarily to warn musicians about the harm that the Private Copying regime would cause by legalizing non-commercial private distribution of music, as well as the harm from "legal protection for TPM".
  
  Heritage Website: http://www.pch.gc.ca/progs/ac-ca/progs/pda-cpb/forum/index_e.cfm
  Notes from Russell: http://weblog.flora.ca/article.php3?story_id=382

• May 22, 2003: Susan invited me to the public part of the Creators' Rights Alliance Annual General Meeting.
  
  http://www.digital-copyright.ca/discuss/1888
  http://www.digital-copyright.ca/discuss/1889

• Sept 8, 2003: I was invited as a guest speaker to talk to a special meeting of the Creators' Rights Alliance to discuss TPMs and other issues.
  
  http://www.digital-copyright.ca/discuss/2022
  These notes formed the outline for my later submission to Heritage Committee http://www.flora.ca/copyright2003/

• March 29, 2004: Letter from Russell McOrmond to Susan
  
  http://www.digital-copyright.ca/discuss/2540
  I am reading Susan's book³ and notice some interesting comparisons between what she wrote and what Lawrence Lessig wrote in the introduction to his book.

• March 30, 2004: Letter from Russell McOrmond to Susan

  http://www.flora.ca/creators/crean20040330.html
  In a world where there are people who would consider Emily Carr, Susan Crean and I as "pirates"⁴, we need to talk about a balance of rights between creators. Introduced the Writer's Union support of the heirs of Lucy Maud Montgomery to add copyright to works already released into the public domain.

• March 31, 2004: Letter from Susan Crean to Russell
  
  http://www.flora.ca/creators/crean20040331.html
  Introduction of traditional knowledge discussions in copyright, explaining support of copyright extensions. Introduction of other problems writers face.

• April 20, 2004: Letter from Russell to Susan
  
  http://www.flora.ca/creators/crean20040420.html
  Independent creative environment that Russell grew up in, compatibility and co-existence between different creativity methods, protecting heirs, the Juno scandal, and whether unauthorized P2P is harm.

Introduction

Far too many of us do not write to each other. I do not mean quick letters in electronic mail, but the longer and more well thought out letters sent in the past when it might take weeks or longer for the letter to travel a distance. Quite a bit of thinking that goes into a letter has been lost online. While these letters are communicated electronically and posted on-line, I hope to try to capture some of the added thinking.

While it may not seem like it at first, Susan and I share many values. We are both creators who believe we should be able to make a living at our craft. We each believe in a much larger set of issues beyond our own financial wellbeing, and the importance of creativity and culture to our lives as Canadians and as humans. We seem to not differ on goals and ideals, but when it comes down to implementation details there are many things we disagree on.

It is important for readers to realize as they read these letters that we are both creators speaking as part of our own creator communities. The debate thus far has tries to stick debates very much in a two-sided "for us or against us", often pitting intermediaries like the recording and motion picture industry against so-called "pirates" (citizens, audiences). In all of these debates there are more than two sides, and most often creators are forgotten in the debates entirely.

It is hoped that by publicly discussing these issues we may bring the diverse views of creators back into discussions about creativity and cultural policy. It is also possible that by publicly discussing these issues that Susan and I will grow to share more ideas, and we may be able to convince our diverse communities to come together. We are not there yet, but we are getting closer. Each of us is participating in events from the other community, me participating in the Creators Rights Alliance AGM in 2003 and Susan joining me in an Open Source conference⁵.