Seizing the Means of Distribution

I wonder. Specifically, I wonder about the distribution of entertainment media.

Joss Whedon, master that he is, showed us via Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog that a creative work can be distributed via the Internet, free, and yet still break even (if not profit) from sales of that creative work in other media. Warren "Hyperlink Terrorist" Ellis is doing something similar with Freakangels, distributing the comic for free online but garnering revenue via trade paperbacks. And then of course there are the multitude of webcomics and entertainment sites--Penny Arcade, Questionable Content, Homestar Runner--that manage to provide for their creators purely through merchandise and advertising. All this gives me some hope that self-published, creator-owned content really is viable now; that an artist or a writer could make some, if not all, of their income via this sort of model.

So really, I guess this is less about self-publication as that term is usually used, and more about the use of the Web as an alternate means of distributing media that has been controlled by the facilitators and distributors (publishing houses, record labels, what-have-you). It seems like it is getting to a place where this is really viable, and where companies are beginning to look long and hard at the issue.

A part of me wants to try it. And a part of me doesn't.

Don't get me wrong: succeeding in this way would be welcome relief. It sounds so nice after the rejections, the editors, the hoop-jumping, the little song and dance that is any creator's effort to get themselves noticed and funded and God help us actually able to spend their time and energy wholly on the business of creating. But then there's the stubbornness, and doubtfulness, and fear.

Ellis and Whedon have advantages I don't: they're famous. Joss Whedon's creations have fanboys before they're anything but a rumor on SciFi Wire; Ellis could scrawl outlines on napkins and make a profit. And Penny Arcade is a media juggernaut—they are a part of the nerd zeitgeist in a way that I could only pray for. They have built-in P.R. machines, Internet enclaves that will rush to digest whatever they put out if for no other reason than to say they were there first. I'm lucky when one of my blog posts generates a comment.

Then there is the stigma of self-publication, not unique to novels, but certainly endemic. The combination of Internet self-publishing scams and abysmal fan-fiction communities means that anyone who isn't going through the "accepted" channel of a magazine publishing house, and thus through a gauntlet of slush piles and editors and other systems for filtering out bad taste, is almost inevitably going to be judged more harshly, if not dismissed outright; and the usual methods of getting attention to a web original like this (banner ads and the like) are just going to drag them down further.

And finally, there is the dogged desire to stay the course; the feeling that being published via the "usual" route will be in some way a victory, a validation of my capacity to produce "real art"; and there is the simple love of the symbolic content of seeing my work in print, of having real paper in my hands with real ink shaped into my words, an artifact I can touch and hold up and smell and, maybe if I'm lucky, put my signature on. This is partially about a need to be vindicated in my struggle and partially about a fear of the roulette wheel that is trying to succeed on the Internet, and it is born of very little reality, given my constant complaints about the low quality of some of the books being produced.

But then there's John Dies at the End, linked in the sidebar; David Wong is best known purely on the Internet (as the progenitor of this and the term "monkey sphere", and of course his editing work on cracked.com), but this book appears to have been a cult success. So it is doable; there are companies that will publish you after a web publication (though a cursory search suggests J.D.A.T.E. is not still up for free on his site, which may be contractual); and people will take Web writing seriously. So it comes back to stubbornness, and the fear of taking that big, bold step straight into a thirty-foot drop.

All this is to say that I am considering the idea, and researching it, and wondering how best to get my name out there (on top of the now-mandatory monthly submissions). All this is also to say that I may have a new project brewing, with multiple levels of utility and at least one level of entertainment. In short: stay tuned.

No. Or, Why I Don't Love Copyright.

This is being reported everywhere, but I cling to the idea that to someone, I am the entire Internet. It's not writing-related, but it is IP related, which means I feel obliged to report on it:

Worlds.com sues NCSoft for patent infringement. The description of the patent? The foundational architecture of MMORPGs.

I'm not kidding. Really. Take a minute to read that link.

I don't have the time or resources to research how spurious Worlds.com's claim might be; based on the information I've seen, which given my sources could be a little under-researched, leads me to three basic conclusions:

#1: It could be economically and stylistically devastating for Worlds.com to win this suit;

#2: Whoever gave Worlds.com this patent is either outmoded or an idiot; and

#3: This is one of the best cases I have recently seen for a reform of IP law.

The reasons for #1 have been explored in every article I've linked, so I'll just summarize: If their patent is deemed legitimate, they have the capacity to sue the pants off of every gaming company that has ever helmed a standard-variety MMORPG. The damages those companies would have to pay could be apocalyptically high--and gaming is one of a handful of industries whose profits swell during economic troubles, from my understanding, so this is a blow I do not want to see dealt. I realize that it is unlikely the suit will drive anyone out of business if it passes, but I think that the economic situation in the world is fragile enough without payouts for this lawsuit being added to the heap of losses companies are incurring.

I do not recall seeing a date on the patent they are referencing--there is a chance it is old enough that it is legitimate, that someone working under their auspices was the first to develop the technology that is now the central system by which the bulk of MMORPGs operate. If not, then Worlds.com are weasels for having staged this farce; if so, then they are weasels for having, rather blatantly, bided their time to sue. MMORPGs have been running on the supposedly-patented architecture they describe since, to the best of my knowledge, 1997, if not earlier, which means that either Worlds.com did not keep track of a patent that someone there had to have known described an industry- and world-changing technology, or they waited until a company had enough money that they considered a suit worthwhile.

If this is not a result of corporate greed, than it is a result of a system for civil suits that rewards this sort of behavior, and of a patenting system that allows for these kinds of corporate-friendly predations. A single person holding that patent could not, under most circumstances, hope to win a suit against a company like NCSoft; Worlds.com, though, stands what I would consider a fighting chance. And if they do win, as stated, it stands to put at risk the livelihoods of a community of creators that I hold in rather great respect.

If this whole thing doesn't seem insane enough to you, please consider what Massively has to say on the subject of software design and patents: that under the current system, proof of prior art does nothing to defend a person against claims of infringement (translation: it barely matters when Worlds.com's patent was registered); and that software companies often "discourage their employees from consulting the patent system. If they infringe accidentally, the financial risks are far lower -- and it is pretty much impossible to write any software without infringing on multiple patents." [link] Does that sound like a functioning and healthy patent system to you?

I could rant on this subject for a long time, and in the process expose my ignorance; the truth is that I have no good answer, that I am simply angry and want to see a system that protects the creator without all the strange hoop-jumping the current system requires. This is just the latest, most farcical, example.

It's possible that this is me blowing all this out of proportion; that I'm overreacting to a corporation trying to stake a wholly veracious claim. But given that they filed this suit at Christmas, which I find hard to interpret as a desperate defense of an infringed patent, I am inclined to be less than charitable. As it stands, I await the possibility that further data will exonerate Worlds.com, and that this lawsuit will disappear in a puff of air; but for the moment, I maintain that Worlds.com's higher-ups should really just be ashamed of themselves.

I am your meta-MetaFilter. Call me "Filter Omega".

As usual, life and circumstance puts the lie to my posting claims. The post about obsession and Oliver Postgate (well, his work, that is) is to come later today; for now, you receive more link salad.

• Music industry shifting its anti-piracy tactics. Provided they hold true to this, it looks the RIAA is finally focusing its money and time on targeting music uploaders rather than music downloaders, and is starting to do some work on respecting the privacy of the individual. Unfortunately, they aren't abandoning their current (asinine) crop of lawsuits, so I can only gain so much respect...


• A Mr. Wendell Jamieson gives us a very different take on It's A Wonderful Life. What's better than lit crit? Cynical lit crit!


• POSTNotes. These are briefings and longer works from the UK's Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology. I have not gotten a chance to read them yet; I'll edit with a review when I get a chance (and encourage you readers to let me know if this is just terrible stuff). In the meantime, I just dig this idea; it's both a quick way to get an update on current science, and a nice little way for government to make itself a bit less opaque.


• And finally, your dose of schadenfreude: Anti-kidnapping expert kidnapped. This is terrible and I hope Mr. Batista gets out of it safely, and yet at the same time there is a dark part of me that cannot help but laugh. Welcome to the downfall of my generation.