Cultural Creators vs. Cultural Consumers

I just saw Lawrence Lessig on Charlie Rose. He’s a law professor and author with close connections to Obama. And he’s a lot smarter than me.

His new book is called Remix (available soon under a Creative Commons license). He proposes a dramatic revision of copyright law worldwide to fit how information is used in the internet age. Fascinating stuff.

One idea that I found amazing is Lessig’s assertion that the internet is bringing us back into a world where people are creators of culture and not just passive cultural consumers. Lessig advocates a world where people can create and recreate the most important cultural elements around them — where amateur creativity is important, rather than a world where we’re merely passive consumers of culture.

So, congrats, folks: if you’re blogging, you get a culture-creator medal. Thumbs up!

I highly recommend the Charlie Rose interview, by the way.

Tags: Charlie Rose, Copyright Law, Creative Commons, Lawrence Lessig, Remix

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