COPYCENSE

"When Chuck D and the Fine Arts Militia released their latest single, ‘No Meaning No,’ several months ago, they didn’t try to stop people from circulating free copies on the Internet. They encouraged it.

"They posted the entire 3-minute, 12-second song and its various vocal, drum and guitar components online and invited everyone to view, copy, mix, remix, sample, imitate, parody and even criticize it.

"The result has been the creation of a flood of derivative work ranging from classical twists on the hip-hop piece to video interpretations of the song. The musicians reveled in the instant fan base. They were so pleased that they recently decided to publish their next entire album, due later this spring, the same way, becoming the first major artists to do so."

Ariana Eunjung Cha. Creative Commons Is Rewriting Rules of Copyright. WashingtonPost.com. March 15, 2004.

(Editor�s Note: The Post allows free access to their stories on the Web for 14 days before sending the stories to the paper�s fee-based Archives.)

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