Copyright or Copy, All Right?...

I know I haven't been around much, not even doing a lot of scrapping, so I apologyse, but my health has not been the best this past week and I have been wrestling with new kind of pain (or extreme discomfort, as the UK's welfare reviewists like to call it), which makes it impossible to do any kind of anything.

This post today was inspired by a wonderful lady I came across whilst browsing someone else's Scrapblogs and the decided to follow her WordPress blog.
Her name is Leslie Sigal Javorek, but some of you may have come across her as IconDoIt, as she gives out freebies which make beautiful embellishments for scrapping.
This morning one of the first things I got in my inbox was her post about the Copyright thing and this is an issue which has been in my mind a lot lately.
I suggest you read her post, to understand better what I'm talking about (she is a delight to read too).
In there she talks about how Copyrights can be restricting creativity, how many wonderful pieces have spanned of other authors,and particularly of Don Quixote de la Mancha, Miguel d Cervantes' great work.
This touched me especially because my father would quote Cervantes a lot in educating us. She also posted this video by Nina Paley, one of the artist at the Question Copyright.org , the site yo go to get more knowledgeable about the subject.


I have mixed feelings on this copyright thing, having been victim of stolen ID which I may have never know if it wasn't for a few friends of mine up north (in the UK) who talked to someone online who was using my photos as herself....poor girl did not know how much I traveled around...but there is also the thing I'm most passionate about, regarding music.
I was a performer for 33 years and have seen so much of it, is scary.
Not even going into the depths of piracy or plagiarism, I m constantly having to show my daughter original versions of songs by Stevie Wonder, Chaka Kan or other less acknowledge (and sometimes less talented) are putting out there without not even a simple mention of the artist...
In the Uk we had a few years ago a bunch of kids going around with Eternal Flame *by Atomic Kitten* did these kids ever knew about Siouxie and the Bangles? me thinks not,unfortunately.
I went to my daughter;s school to teach the kids how "As" was written by Stevie Wonder and NOT by Mary J.Blige, and so on.

And then we come to the part that maybe more familiar to the scrapping community, and this is why this subject is such a difficult one for me
I love digital scrapbooking.it has become a pain relief therapy and a creative outlet .
I don't get much around the net, but enough to be able to say that very, very few people read the TOU, and of those who do, very few really acknowledge the artist... even the designers themselves: I am amazed as how many times I got the same cluster frame in different designers kits, which I thought was the marvelous creation of one person but it isn't. And try figure out who first created it?
Well, their designers themselves only acknowledge the name of the people they bought things from in a very, very small print, and don't really say who made what.....
I know some people may think scrapbooking a minor art....if an art at all, but this is what I know about these days,and what makes me reluctant to have an opinion in which I can passionate about in the Copyright thing...

I'm going to leave this in here, as my mind doesn't go very far in the mornings, but there is something I have been thinking a lot about and is related to this issue too, which is the attitude of the designers and how much can this influence the way you (one) respects their work, and I really, really want to elaborate about it.

And as I cannot finish this post without a LO, here is something I made with one of my most loved freebie girl: Rosemarie Pixel, of Pixel Scrapbooking. This template plus kit was given as a freebie by Rosemarie a couple of weeks ago, as she is following the 365 Project. I only changed color I think, in a couple of elements and added something *derivating* of her elements :)
This was our last outing, to a dear Brazilian friend of mine's house. She is married to a marvelous Finnish International (like he likes to describe himself) and that day made a Feijoada, our typical Brazilian dish of rice and stewed black beans.
Have a great day!


For the next one I used a kit from one of my newest finds, Julie Marie Designs, a kit she started as a freebie, then made a full kit which I HAD to go back to buy,luckily it was on one of those sale days, plus a coupon she wonderfully sent me for 30% discount after I bought from her on a U$1 dollar sale at GottaPixel.

Down memory lane.....

... with the music of today.

So now we have the iMac, iTunes at hand, but LimeWire is the blessing for the less fortunate on the financial side (that would be us), so, not having gotten around to get the PC, our dear dinossaur, going to retrieve my old collection, I set out to get some new (old) songs.
But when I got into our LimeWire library I saw that Sarita downloaded a few songs, I decided to give a bit of attention.

She still makes a point to be home in time to watch the Cheetah Girls movie and new episodes of the Sweet Life of Zack and Cody, but I can see her wondering into a different period of her life.... and, providing it is not Britney, I try to learn as much as what she likes to be able to share and encourage her to sing and keep performance a part of her days, though we, not surprisingly, have no more money to pay for the classes.
( I've just got my energy bills for the quarter, which total the amount of £297 Sterling Pounds... there goes Sarita's birthday's sushi dinner, I'm afraid)

And I found a couple of jewels.
One was Beyonce (why the Brit presentors call her BeyonceYYY, is beyond my comprehension of the eastendernest of the Shakespearean language, and makes me puke, but that is a minor detail) , which did not surprise me as I had watched (to Sarita's insistence, the E channel's life of the girl, and hey, a girl with determination, with intelligence, supportive parents and a drop of luck that came in the right time, a voice to kill for and.... well.... have you seen her and Shakira performing together?
my idea of heaven.
(well, one can't help but lust...)
So Beyonce singing *If I was a boy*
[I almost got all happy thinking she was changing teams, but hey, chances of her ever noticing us are slim, so, never mind...;)]
The other one was Jennifer Hudson singing Spotlight.
So I go into YouTube....
this was at, what...18:30h?
I'm still here, with Sarita coming and sitting in my bed to share a kebab and what she called *quality time with my mummy*, as she has been spending time with Syan because if this party on monday... (that will be something to talk about on tuesday...right now, I wish I had a double barrel shotgun to keep all the boys and whatever influences she can find when she goes out with her friends..., but as that is not very civilized or makes any sense, and your children are not your children and all that.... lets leave it as that and go back to YouTube, safer subject)

Not only is Beyonce amazing on all aspects of If I was a boy, but I found this video of her paying tribute to Tina Turner and singing dancing and fiercing Proud Mary... hwich by the way I have been trying to embed here for the past 20 minutes and, no matter what I do, this thing here wont paste the code I copied from YouTube, but, make an effort go watch it, it's well worth it, the user is Karavias, because you'll find a number of videos of Beyonce WITH Tina, that's not what I'm talking about... also, if you are familiar with my Vox, is there.

So,as much as I'm always complaining about the young *artists* performing (and recording) old stuff without notifying the younger ones as to who authors the songs, I'm amazed when things are done properly, and, to crown it all, I kept going back and back in time with the click of the mouse and I was not lying in my bed with the computer no more, but tripping my head of and listening to a mixture of Pink Floyd, Tangerine Dream and Air Supply (yeah, don't ask) in a big cassette player and eating grapes half by half at my parents place...
You gotta love YouTube.

There is also the video of Jennifer Hudson doing Spotlight, look for the official one, another jewel, certainly (another code which wont paste here!)

it makes me feel like standing up and dancing a bit too...
(which I actually can't as Sarita has fallen asleep fully clothed in my bed .... three more days of her 12 years of life...
I'm enjoying all the attention and at the same time praying to keep it in the best way....)

And, to go, I just thought I share with you something which came into my mailbox tonight and made me laugh, though I presume you computer-wise people have seen it in every other language...this came to me in Portuguese, from a Brazilian, so I'll try to translate it without loosing the humor.....

A Jew is walking in the desert and finds a Coca Cola bottle... picks it up and.. surprise...a genie comes out of it!

-"Hello, I'm the 1 wish Genie, at your service. I can grant you a wish, an only wish, what would you like?"-

"Oh, I want peace in the MIddle East... look at this map, I want all these countries to live in peace, in harmony. Yes, that's my wish"

"But, my friend, come down to reality, get your feet on the ground.... I'm a genie, and a good one as it goes but.....man, these countries have been at war for the past 5000 years!!!!!!! nah, I'm not all that good, ask for something else, man"

"OK, I have never found and ideal woman...so I would like one that has a sense of humor, likes to have sex a lot, likes cooking, cleaning the house,is not jealous, is loyal and wont cheat,likes football, enjoys a beer or three,is gorgeous, hot, young, affectionate and it's not addicted to credit cards."

The Genie takes a deep, deep breath and says:

-"Give us that shit of that map again!"-

and this is the last of my photo scraps I m making to print....




and now I really need to go (to listen to Air Supply and Peter Cetera...yeah, I know, but hey, I'm 50 now, I can do as I please, I'm officially old!)