Uncopyright

This entire blog, and all my articles, are uncopyrighted.

I freely put them in the public domain, and release my copyright on all these works.

There is no need to email me for permission — use my content however you want! Email it, share it, reprint it with or without credit. Change it, put in a bunch of swears and attribute them to me. It’s OK.

Attribution is appreciated but not required.

Why I’m releasing copyright

I’m not a big fan of copyright laws.

The lack of copyright, and blatant copying by other artists and even businesses, never hurt Leonardo da Vinci when it comes to works such as the Mona Lisa, the Last Supper, or the Vitruvian Man. It’s never hurt Shakespeare. I sincerely doubt it will hurt me.

If someone feels like sharing my content in any form, that’s a good thing. My work will spread to more people than I could make possible on my own. That’s something to celebrate.

And if someone wants to take my work and improve upon it, as artists have been doing for centuries, I think that’s wonderful. If they can take my favorite posts and make something inspiring or thought-provoking or even sad, I say more power to them. The creative community only benefits from derivations and inspirations.

This isn’t a new concept, of course. I’m freely ripping ideas off here. Which is kinda the point.

Counter arguments

1. Your Google rank will go down. Google penalizes pages that have exact duplicates on other sites, when it comes to PageRank. SEO isn’t important to me. Even if it were, sharing and page views will increase, bolstering PageRank.

2. Who knows what people will do with your work? Someone could take my work, turn it into a piece of crap, and put my name on it. They could translate it with all kinds of errors or typos. They could do just about anything. But that kind of thinking stems from a mind that wants to control content. I don’t want to control it, and even if I could, it’s not a good thing. What if someone extends the concepts and make it more useful, to more people? Release control, and see what happens. People are super smart, creative creatures. I’d be happy to see what they can do.

4. What if someone publishes a book with all your content and makes a million dollars? I hope they at least give me credit. And my desire is that they give some of that money to a worthy cause.

5. But, they’re stealing from you! You can’t steal what is given freely. I call this sharing, not piracy.