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JAN GLIDEWELLI used to know a potter who would slave for hours over his wheel.
He would work a piece of clay to exactly the right consistency, "wedge" it, meaning he kneaded as many air-bubbles as possible out of it, centered it on the spinning wheel and then gently massaged it into intricate shapes. He would create the entire pot from top to bottom, up to the point where most potters would remove it to dry and be fired.
But my friend would, instead, take a piece of monofilament fishing line with two wooden handles on each end, ominously called a garrote in the trade. Stretching the line taut, he would use it to slice through the wet clay of the pot and reduce it to a shapeless mass from which he would then create another pot before repeating the destruction process.
For some people, such as my friend, the act of creation is more important than what they might expect to gain from it.
My point is that different people create things for different reasons, and that those who create for money have a right to have their products protected.
I say this in response to a lawsuit filed last week by the Recording Industry Association of America against four college students the association says are offering copyrighted music for free through file-sharing systems.
The systems, similar to those operated by Napster before it was shut down, are alleged to be violations of the copyright provisions that allows artists, writers, musicians and even newspapers to protect the right to be paid for their creations. Copyrights are sort of the artistic first cousins of patents.
You can get away with copying some things, but not many. At least not if you stick to the law, and if you start making money off anything someone else has copyrighted, it gets real sticky.
An artist I once knew wanted to make high-quality copies of a self-portrait done by artist Frida Kahlo for use in creating another work of art as a tribute to Kahlo. But an alert clerk at Kinko's refused to make the requested copies, noting that the book they were being taken from was copyrighted.
Some of my columns are printed, through a long-ago granted blanket permission, in the newsletter of a nonprofit group that supports folk arts, but when another magazine wanted to reprint one of my columns, they were asked to pay (not me, but the Times, which owns the property and has the copyright). My understanding of the decision is that the magazine that wanted the column was a profit-making enterprise that charges its customers $6 or $7 per copy for the magazine and should have no problem paying for the material it publishes.
The advent of the electronic age made intellectual properties law a rapidly changing field. First it was photocopying machines, used regularly by students, reporters and others to copy reference material. Then it was material on the Internet, now including music.
It's easy to be sympathetic to those who copy the works of multimillionaire artists who sometimes seem to be compensated far beyond their intrinsic worth, but the companies that record and manufacture and retail CDs also employ thousands of people whose livelihood is derived from the industry.
I am a longtime fan of the Grateful Dead, an unusual group that not only allowed, but encouraged people to copy their work and even made special areas available at concerts for people to set up their taping equipment. The group made most of its money from touring and sale of memorabilia, and their studio-cut recordings did fine for those not into the bootleg tape-swapping subculture that resulted. (My collection, considered modest, only has 50 or 60 tapes and CDs.)
That was their choice, but others who live through their creativity - or, alas, sometimes lack thereof - have a right to be compensated for their work product.
A friend recently set me up with access to a site where you can get free movies and music, including adult material. I was uneasy about it and finally had the software removed from my computer. Among other things, I learned that the movies were not always as advertised and that some of them fell into a category that you wouldn't want the FBI to find on your hard drive.
The music currently on my computer was recorded from CDs for which I paid, and I'm not even sure that is entirely legal.
But at least I paid for it first.