Open Source Cinema - An Open Source Documentary Film about Copyright

Hi,

Brett, great interview on CBC. I'm the guy that started this thread, but I'm not the anonymous person who replied ;)

As an avid open source developer, I'm sometimes puzzled about how the Open Source concept is bantered around, without any real understanding of how it works in the real world. Opens Source software projects are often very restrictive in nature, and have very few people who are actually allowed to contribute to the source tree; this usually happens only after many months or even years of proving that they can cut it as a core developer.

Sadly, we live in a world short on modesty, where millions of talentless people suffer from the delusion that they have something to offer the world. Just watch the American Idol, or worse, go to an independent film festival where 16 mm camera wielding film makers pretentiously snub their noses at digital video, yet have no original ideas and nothing important to say.

So, I imagine that editors actually do a very important job that has nothing to do with profit, but for which ownership is a requirement: Quality Control ! This is perhaps offensive to some, but the fact is, we live in a world where not everyone has equal
talent. Some people just have betters skills, better insight, better tastes, usually as a result of years of hard fought experience and dedication.

Also, when producing anything, it usually helps if someone is ultimately accountable both for the budget, the plan, the message, and the final product. ;) But then again, Wikipedia is a great counter example of how something that anyone can contribute to actually produces pretty decent quality.

So, ownership is not just about profits, just as capitalism is not just about greed and money. As flawed as it is, it is really more of a legal framework where respect for private property and ownership has evolved naturally as the most workable system of co-operation available to human kind at the moment.

Too bad that overconsumption is currently destroying the world. Who needs yet another film, really ;)

pondus