Machinima goes to Harvard

Yesterday, I participated in Harvard Law's Signal or Noise 2k5 Conference, a full day dedicated to the ever-expanding world of derivative creative and associated rights. It was a great conference, which included such heavy-hitters as John Perry Barlow, Charles Nesson, Yochai Benkler, and Mike Doughty (former frontman of Soul Coughing). Hell, even the Beatallica guys were there! (great stuff to check out once the site is back up). The event explored IP issues around the world of mixed-up media - where does a work orginate? who gets to claim its authorship if it contains works/influences of others? - thought-provoking to say the least. Kudos to the Berkman Center at Harvard for their second successful event. I hear they may post streaming versions of the presentations, so stay tuned to their site.

My Machinima presentation was a mix of one-part "What is?" and one-part "This is," which provides a nice balance for those just learning of the medium. I showed some examples of Machinima, but the presentation was cut short so I was unable to show the Breen vid. Given the audience, some slides focused on the licensing aspects of Machinima. This is often a hot-topic item for the Machinima artists that have commercial aspirations for their work.

In my presentation, I spoke of several licensing models that could be brokered between the game developers and Machinima filmmakers. These fall under the following:

• Per-project license: The game developer provides licensing for the Machinima project on a one-time use basis only. While this will make the project commercially viable, it can fall short in the long run as a new license needs to be negotiated for any future works in the same game tech. To my knowledge, most commercial Machinima works have had their licensing structured in this fashion.
  
  
• Per-site/seat license: The game developer provides a site/seat license for the Machinima studio, allowing the studio to produce any and all (but also limited to) commercial Machinima projects. This is a model that most software applications follow. While the end user doesn't own the software outright, they are licensed to use it for commercial purposes. This presents one of the better licensing opportunities for the Machinima filmmaker - however, it is subjected to a pricing structure that only the most well-funded of Machinima teams/studios could handle.
  
  
• Percentage-based licensing: The game developer takes a percentage of the profits that the Machinima project receives. While this could be considered a best-case scenario, it also involves a large amount of bookkeeping. A point system such as this has worked in the past (in other related industries), but it ulitimately represents an investment on the game developer's part - something most developers have neither the bandwidth nor the budget for.
  

There are other licensing possiblities within the Machinima production world - open-source development (which will be a great boon), permit-based licensing (akin to film/location permits, only for MMOs), etc. Linden Lab's Second Life also presents a great platform for Machinima production (all IP rights are retained by the user - though it gets a bit sticky within the "likeness" area - possible releases need to be struck).

As part of my own education (and somewhat a primer to the Harvard event), I sat in on Prof. Beth Noveck's wonderful Copyright, Innovation and the Net class at NYLS this past February, where we discussed the possible rights issues that come up with Machinima development. The class identified all the different rights aspects - tech, artistic assets, performance - items that sometime fall under the radar in the virtual space. The class confirmed my previous belief: as more Machinima works are made, the business and legal support will follow (particularly if there's $ involved).

Until that happens however, I will continue to speak with the game developers in getting them to consider Machinima licensing and work with them on how that's structured - giving the game developers their fair share and keeping in focus the independent Machinima filmmaker.

I have additional thoughts about how the 3D animation software developers will eventually find their way here - but more on that in a future posting.