Paranoid Twitch-Bags (Legal Term)

A common argument for giving away some rights surrounding your intellectual property is that you're not really giving up much of anything. You get back more than you give. You shouldn't fear having non-purchased copies of your (usually digital) books/songs/software/movies out there, because you're exposing your work to a huge audience. You're getting free marketing. You're building your brand. You're getting people to care, to cultivate an opinion about something that otherwise might not be on their radar. You're building a reputation. You are one step closer to your big break, because next time, they'll already know who you are. You've already had your big break, and there's no barrier to access to your work.

But documentary filmmaker Jason Scott has other reasons for Creative Commons licensing his work.

... under copyright law in the United States, I have, as a content creator, an amazing arsenal of statutes and legal decisions at my disposal to make your life, assuming you are playing the part of someone copying my films without my permission, into a bitter fucking hell. I mean, a seriously bad, stinky, horrifying pit of suck. I can threaten you with years of jail. I can sue you in civil court while pursuing a criminal case against you on a state and federal level. If I am feeling somewhat kinky I can try and drag Interpol into the whole mess. And the laws out there, approved, let me attempt to have you put away for YEARS. Absolutely YEARS of your life for videotaping a copy of my film
...
But that's not what I did. Instead, I ...licensed it under Creative Commons, giving away a lot of the tools that US copyright law grants me, because they're are By the Jerks, for the Jerks, and should perish from this Earth.

It was in some ways a tough decision, because you want to "protect" yourself, but then you realize you're not really "protecting" anything; all you're doing is being a paranoid twitch-bag.

He's not invoking the awesome exposure of p2p, Creative Commons search engines, etc. He specifically says he wants you to pay for his documentary. He's just not willing to be a part of a system that doesn't serve people's best interest.

Even if you are honest, open, friendly, making a kick-ass product and totally changing the world with your little whooziz, some people, on principle, do not pay for media. This is what they do and they have tools to get media for free, tools that are better than your tools are and which are much more ubiquitous and better updated. In realizing this, perhaps you will stop treating every single person who purchases your product like a scumbag, guilty until proven innocent, beneath and below you. A number of people do not pay. This happens at the circus, the rock concert, your local supermarket and at your job. To turn your customer base into a constantly-on-alert totalitarian wasteland is not the effective solution. Instead, assume that if you've actually made a unique, interesting product and put your heart into it and made something that can't truly be duplicated, people will pay. And if you treat them like they're human beings, they'll ask other people to pay too.

Result: You save a lot of lawyers fees, and people feel like customers and not shotgun targets. Also, your breath will smell better.

His full post here: http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/000123.html.

BTW. His geeky movie looks pretty great.