The importance of language

Yesterday I had a Twitter “spat” with the representative (unnamed) of a new company called Kunvay. The interaction on Twitter, and the company’s website, show how language can be used to manipulate very effectively. Under the guise of being “open” and “helping” this company is really just another tool to make it easier for creatives to lose out.

This company spins itself as, and I (sadly) quote, being “on a mission to make the world safe for creativity.” How do they do this? By offering a “service” to make it easier for creatives to sign away their rights, their full copyrights, to client/buyers.

Do they negotiate better deals for creatives?
No.

Do they encourage creatives not to give away their rights?
No.

Do they make it sound like they are empowering creatives?
Yup, and they make it sound like they are doing it to help by making it free for the creative.
Gee, thanks… at least you aren’t making the creatives pay while they lose out by selling off (or giving away) their most important assets!

 
One of the things that came out of our “spat” was that they got legal advice from “Silicon Valley lawyers.” This alone should be a big frickin’ red flag to any creative professional. Another thing that was revealed was that they don’t even know that the plural of “attorney” doesn’t include an apostrophe (brilliant). Another was that they challenged me to prove I was a licensed attorney, even though you can look me up on the California Bar website and my Twitter profile says I’m a member of the CA Bar–and all this while never even giving me a human name (for whoever was writing their tweets). I was challenging their business model but they were attacking my professionalism and credibility.

Possibly the most offensive thing was that they asked why I had such an interest in copyright, saying that I seemed terribly strident and asking “Did you get burned?” This is covert sexism. I’m vehement about my pro-copyright stand and therefore I must be acting out from an emotional hurt? Really? I know they never would have written that if I were a man. No question. But as a woman, in their eyes, I couldn’t possibly just be a professional who cares about artists and their rights because, hey, it’s the right thing to do.

So, again I’ll write here what I tweeted: stay away from Kunvay; keep your copyrights. Creative professionals don’t need help to give away their rights–it happens every day. What creative professionals need are tools to protect their rights, and people to advocate for continuing strong copyright.