Backing Up Our Cultural Heritage Ain't Easy
from the such-is-life dept
Brewster Kahle's Web Archive shouldn't be new to you. The service, which tries to archive as much web content as possible, is only one part of Kahle's desire to archive just about every bit of content we create. Of course, in times of overly broad copyright protection, archiving our culture isn't easy. In order to do so, he says there are three questions that need to be answered: "Can we? May we? Will we?" The answer to the first is obviously yes. The second is where copyright law gets complicated. Kahle is pitching his idea as creating a legal "backup" for all different types of content, but not everyone sees it that way. They still believe that every version of content (even if it's digital and infinitely reproducible) needs to be accounted for and paid for. The final question is still up for debate, but seems somewhat dependent on the second question. Unfortunately, too many copyright owners with too narrow a vision don't quite see that they're doing more harm to themselves by not allowing folks like Kahle the opportunity to back up our cultural heritage.
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