I went to flickr today to browse photos and came upon this remarkable image of a whale breaching while a man on a surfboard looks on.
It's a great moment, and I appreciate the photographer's willingness to share it. Unfortunately, the photographer's fear that someone would use the image without his permission has driven him to post it with a hideous "C for Copyright" obliterating the focal point of the photo.
As a result, we can't respond to the actual photograph; instead, we're limited to responding to an imaginary version of the photograph — a version without a watermark, that, for us, for now, exists only our heads. It's a bit like going to the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa … and being asked to imagine how great she must have been before the museum painted a big, white "C" over the face of the portrait.
In his blog post on his new Kindle DX, musician David Byrne notes:
As with music, sharing things is a way of getting to know one another and a form of reciprocal debt — if I “lend” you my book, you sort of owe me… a book, or something. We’re linked now, which is how we use these things that represent our inner selves — as social connectors. Take that ability away, the ability to exchange stuff that represents us, and I’ll bet some of the “value” of these kinds of e-books goes too… the social interconnectedness value, not the dollar value.
And he's right: one way we appreciate the things we love — one way we use them to define ourselves — is by sharing them. This has always been true.
When I've loved good books, I've passed them around. When I find a photograph or an article I love, I want to share it with you. In the digital age, efforts to prevent this kind of sharing — whether by actually defacing the artwork (as Mr. Politz, the photographer, has done) or by gumming it up with silly Digital Rights Management schemes (as the Kindle does) — do little more than keep your most enthusiastic fans from becoming evangelists for your work.
Add comment