doctrine

Some Personal Observations Regarding the CopySouth Workshop: Trivandrum, Kerala, December 2008
(first draft)

An Important Note for the Reader:

Please note: This is not an objective report of the presentations within the workshop. It is a highly subjective collection of notes and thoughts based on the issues raised by various speakers. My personal notes have been edited and restructured (even extended with my own viewpoints) afterwards. This text is therefore purely a reflection of my own interests and obsessions as manifest through, and by, the CopySouth workshop. However, hopefully, it may also be of interest and use to others.

This presentation is a critique of the concept of "free society" and its technology of propaganda. This presentation is therefore also a critique of ICT, information and communications technology, the technology underlying the free and open-source movement.

This text is an edited and more organized version of the brief 5-minute "kick-off" presentation that I made for the session on "Cultural Industries" at the CopySouth Workshop in Kerala, India. As a kick-off presentation, this text was intended to launch debates and discussion around the topic of copyright and creativity. Two other presenters were Shishir J. Kha (India) and Tatiana Carsen (Argentina).

Thanks to all the CopySouth members for the dialogues and the opportunity to sharpen the arguments set forth in this text, especially to Rustom Bharucha, Lawrence Liang, Carolina Botero, and CopySouth observers Trevor Batten and Gargi Sen. I look forward to continuing the dialogues.