User production and law reform
A socio-legal critique of user creativity
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11268029 |
|---|---|
| Authors | James Meese (0000-0003-1910-6166, The University of Melbourne, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 37 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 753-767 |
| Publication date | 2015-07-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Media Culture & Society (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0163-4437 • E-ISSN: 1460-3675 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0163443715577246 |
| OpenAlex | W2017344493 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 21 |
This article argues that recent scholarly attempts to prescribe creative agency to a user subject rarely consider how the user functions in a broader legal and cultural context. I suggest that the user is a complex subject defined by various cultural and legal discourses, following a critical body of scholarship that calls for a more nuanced approach to the issue of user production. I show how the user-a term often treated neutrally in the user production literature-is a subject that is already defined by extant legal discourses like copyright. This argument is developed in a detailed analysis of Canadian copyright law and the Copyright Modernization Act, a reform to Canadian copyright law, which attempted to address the phenomenon of user production. These examples show the user is embroiled in a broader set of creative politics where being defined as a user or an author can have commercial implications. I suggest greater specificity and qualification around the role and scope of the user is needed in future scholarship examining the phenomenon of user production
Agency (philosophy · Argument (complex analysis · Context (archaeology · Economics · Epistemology · Law and economics · Phenomenon · Political science · Production (economics · Public relations · Scholarship · Social science · Sociology · Subject (documents · World Wide Web · Computer Science · Copyright and Intellectual Property · Digital Games and Media · Digital Rights Management and Security · History · Law
| Highly cited | No |
|---|