Intellectual Commons: A Common Theme

The idea of the intellectual commons is that there is some knowledge that belongs to everyone, that everyone has the rights and access to use freely for their own creative work. This concept has been shown in a positive light in almost all of the readings we have done in Shirky, Lessig, Barlow, and Jenkins. In chapters 1 and 4 of Lessig's Free Culture, he points out the fact that some of the greatest creative works in the past 100 years have com from the borrowing and remixing of prior work. He uses Walt Disney as a prime example, listing off numerous movies that were inspired by the Brothers Grimm and made into softer, humorous works. He also discusses how the creation of almost every art form we know, film, music, radio, and cable TV, stemmed from what would now be classified as "piracy." He seems to see nothing wrong with the idea of inspiration from the work of others and it had never been a problem, until today's bureaucratic, capitalist society came to be.

Jenkins also was an advocate of the old school habit of active amateur productions being the main source of entertainment from town to town. No one had a problem with the remake of plays because everyone got to enjoy the art form this way. This coincides with the message of Shirky, who agrees that sharing is the basis of community and cooperation by people seeking to achieve similar goals. Shirky goes farther than Jenkins and says that the anarchy, or the organization without a head, is the only way to allow everyone to be involved in what they want, form a common culture and plans for this culture without submitting to the authority of another. It is in this way that the intellectual commons becomes larger, allowing ore people access to concepts and ideas that they can then unite and form bonds over. It is through internet networking that the privatization of knowledge can be lowered and people can start learning from the work, opinions, and ideas of others again.

In A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace, Barlow stresses the importance of the internet being the "home of the mind," a safe place where the idea of hierarchal organizational and profit is not welcome. This freedom of the mind, or intellectual commons, allows all people to express any idea or belief without fear and gets away from the idea of conformity that people have come to accept. All in all, these author's all believe in the ideas of the mind being openly displayed for all people to discuss, agree upon, or utilize for their own creative works. Having this open network of thoughts allows more people to be involved and assures that people are forced to think for themselves rather than accept the opinions of some overhead managerial force.