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Desai, Deven R. --- "Individual Branding: How the Rise of Individual Creation and Distribution of Cultural Products Confuses the Intellectual Property System" [2011] ELECD 431; in Ghosh, Shubha; Malloy, Paul Robin (eds), "Creativity, Law and Entrepreneurship" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Creativity, Law and Entrepreneurship

Editor(s): Ghosh, Shubha; Malloy, Paul Robin

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781848449879

Section: Chapter 7

Section Title: Individual Branding: How the Rise of Individual Creation and Distribution of Cultural Products Confuses the Intellectual Property System

Author(s): Desai, Deven R.

Number of pages: 22

Extract:

7. Individual branding: how the rise of
individual creation and distribution
of cultural products confuses the
intellectual property system
Deven R. Desai

INTRODUCTION

That we live in an age of information overload is already a cliché.
Nonetheless, it is true;1 because digital creation has changed the way we
generate and distribute information.2 We now live in a world where large,
complex creations such as Wikipedia and open source software emerge
through widespread individual efforts rather than through a single firm
choosing to invest in and create an information product. The production
of music and literature has changed as well. Instead of relying on the copy-
right industry to manage the production, marketing, and distribution of
creative works, artists can take care of these functions by themselves. So
although one could say that any artist is always an entrepreneur in that
she creates a product and tries to sell it, today artists can and often do take
on larger aspects of the business side of their work.3 Because artists are
no longer locked into a gate keeping world, previously hidden or barely
circulated creations are now available. In other words, it appears that the
supply of creative goods (or perhaps more precisely access to the supply)
is less and less of an issue. Generating demand for these goods now takes
center stage. This chapter explores two aspects of this new mode of produc-
tion: how it arose and the problems it generates. It is precisely the factors
that ...