The JibJab video is making the current owners of Woody Guthrie’s song very very angry. Some excellent points have been made on the side of parody, in blogs at Blogspot, Corante, and Lessig. Of particular note is the comment by “bilge:”
A pity that the “framer’s intent” crowd are mute about copyright. Because originally, copyright was only for 14 years. Now, no work ever produced in my lifetime will enter the public domain before I die.
How much better would the world be if the public domain was actually allowed to take ownership of works that the public has already paid for? We’d have a culture that was actually ours, instead of locked up in perpetuity by corporate monoliths. We’d have more The Wind Done Gone and less Family Circus.
Now all we need is for someone to make a satire of the parody (or is it a parody of the satire?) where TRO and Jibjab sing these lyrics.
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