The free culture movement is a social movement that promotes the freedom to distribute and modify creative works in the form of free content by using the Internet and other forms of media.
The movement objects to overly-restrictive copyright laws. Many members of the movement argue that such laws hinder creativity. They call this system "permission culture".
Creative Commons is a well-known website which was started by Lawrence Lessig. It lists licenses that permit sharing under various conditions, and also offers an online search of various creative-commons-licensed productions.
The free culture movement, with its ethos of free exchange of ideas, is of a whole with the free software movement. Richard Stallman, the founder of the GNU project, and free software activist, advocates free sharing of information. He famously stated that free software means free as in “free speech,” not “free beer.”
Today, the term stands for many other movements, including hacker computing, the access to knowledge movement and the copyleft movement.
The term “free culture” was originally the title of a 2004 book by Lawrence Lessig, a founding father of the free culture movement.
Read more about Free Culture Movement: Background, Organizations, Defining Freedom, Criticisms
Famous quotes containing the words free, culture and/or movement:
“African rights and liberty is a subject that ought to fire the breast of every free man of color in these United States, and excite in his bosom a lively, deep, decided and heart-felt interest.”
—Maria Stewart (1803–1879)
“As the twentieth century ends, commerce and culture are coming closer together. The distinction between life and art has been eroded by fifty years of enhanced communications, ever-improving reproduction technologies and increasing wealth.”
—Stephen Bayley (b. 1951)
“The political core of any movement for freedom in the society has to have the political imperative to protect free speech.”
—bell hooks (b. 1955)