Commissioned and published by Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN), a special operating agency of the Department of Canadian Heritage, this paper examines the intersection between intellectual property and digital art. Written from a cultural heritage perspective, it also attempts to provide information to cultural professionals who deal with IP. And, according to author Richard Rinehart, it broadens the conversation to include the larger community, with the thought that intellectual property could well be the next battleground in the "culture wars."

Digital art is defined here as any art that is produced and experienced using digital media. And the author provides an overview of how the cultural heritage community responds to intellectual property law and practice regarding (digital) art. Featuring real-world case studies, the paper covers the whole spectrum of this issue, focusing on copyrights, moral rights, responses from the legal community, the economic models of digital art (and the copyright models that serve them), and the various elements that distinguish digital art from other forms of art and result in special intellectual property considerations.

Nailing Down Bits: Digital Art and Intellectual Property is a timely and informative report on an area in which IP practice is still a work in progress. To read the entire report, click here.

About the author:

Richard Rinehart, a digital media artist and Director of Digital Media at the UC Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive, has taught digital media studio and theory in UC Berkeley. He also served as visiting faculty at the San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco State University, and other institutions. A member of the Executive Committee of the UC Berkeley Center for New Media and a Net.art Curator for New Langton Arts in San Francisco, Mr. Rinehart manages research projects in the area of digital culture, including the NEA-funded project, Archiving the Avant Garde.