ANOTHER THOUGHT

CHEGGERS PLAYS UNPOP

(For UK readers: See what I did there?)

Now I have to say at the outset that I have never ever been a fan of Keith 'Cheggers' Chegwin. In fact I have only ever found him to be a barely ignorable irritation. But I have been considering something that came to my attention recently and it involves the said Keith. You see, he has been posting jokes on twitter and has caused a bit of a stir because some of the jokes ‘belong’ to other people. Yes, we’re back with issues of ownership and copyright.

I have not investigated this particular matter too closely, not beyond a cursory reading of two articles on the subject of Keith Chegwin’s twittering, but it has once again forced me to think about this Intellectual Property issue. Laws regarding intellectual property were originally put there to ensure appropriate remuneration for the ‘originator’ of a piece of work – like a story or a poem or maybe even a joke (it’s broader than that, of course). But it was also meant to allow for the free movement of ideas. UK copyright law actually stipulates that it protects the expression of an idea but not the idea itself. UK copyright law even says that an idea may be copied, but it is the words that may not be copied. So, what does that mean here?

If Keith Chegwin has used these jokes ‘belonging’ to other comedians by adding something to the joke, and thereby changing the joke and ‘making it his own’, then this would, according to copyright law, be legitimate. However, if he simply reproduced the joke, unaltered from its original state, then that would be an infringement of copyright. As I said, I have not looked into the charges against Keith Chegwin so cannot comment on whether or not he has done wrong in posting what he posted on twitter. (In fact, I think I recall that in this matter Keith Chegwin was not actually claiming that the jokes were his and did in fact say that they actually weren't.)

What I can say, however, is that it seems odd to me that a joke requires such protection and this seems to me to be symptomatic of the litigious society we have moved towards. Groucho Marx jokes are frequently recycled and Tommy Cooper jokes, too, and catch phrases. Does any of this constitute ‘theft’ in any reasonable sense of that word? If at a dinner-party I tell a joke that I heard at a stand-up comedy show, am I infringing copyright in so doing? If I put it on a blog, does that make it more likely to be copyright infringement? If Keith Chegwin posts one of Jimmy Carr’s jokes on his twitter page, is Jimmy Carr deprived of any money through this use? Is Jimmy Carr’s reputation as a comic diminished in any way? Is he prevented from using the joke again so that his livelihood is compromised by Keith Chegwin’s posting of the joke on twitter?

Apparently Keith Chegwin’s response to charges of plagiarism here has been to label the offended comics as ‘precious’ and to admonish them to just write newer stuff. Does he have a point? Once a joke has been put into the public domain, presumably the comic has made his money out of the joke, and people have laughed at it, and if they have they have possibly wanted to hear more and paid to see that comic’s live show or forked out for his DVD… doesn’t that joke, put into the public domain, then cease to be owned by the teller of the joke? If it is exceptionally funny, will it not be passed from person to person, at work the next day or in the pub or over coffee? Isn’t that part of the battle that comics face, that tv forces them to always be coming up with new material because once it has been aired on television their material is quickly old and so of little use to them? Is it then churlish of these comics to be upset when someone else tells ‘their’ joke? What if someone else makes money out of their joke, or someone else's reputation is enhanced by the telling of the joke, does that then mean we are in different territory? If I tell a Jimmy Carr joke in a job interview, and thereby make a positive impression on the interview panel, does my getting of the job require me to in some way remunerate Jimmy Carr? It can very quickly become ridiculous when taken to its logical conclusion.

Don't get me wrong. Some protection is necessary, that was why Thomas Jefferson laid down guidelines for Intellectual Property legislation. But it seems to me, in this money-driven culture we move in, that what has been lost sight of is that the same law was intended to allow a certain freedom in the movement of ideas from one person to another. If I see something funny in the street, I can’t wait for the opportunity to tell someone what I saw and do so at the soonest next opportunity. When a great joke gets into my head, put there by Jimmy Carr telling it on national television, it begs for me to tell it to someone. I can’t wait to tell it, to make someone else laugh as I laughed. I HAVE to tell it to someone. That’s how jokes work, just as it is how ideas work – like a virus, spreading from one mind to another. That’s how jokes and ideas want to work and it would be absurd to think that a society could legislate against that happening… it would also not be desirable for society to so legislate. It seems a little absurd then to be thinking of protecting such things as ideas and jokes as though they were pieces of property like wallets, because they are not such things.

I would be surprised if Keith Chegwin faced prosecution for his twittering of 'other people's' jokes. I don't see how that could happen. I apologise if this appears to be a fan letter to Keith Chegwin. I am not and never have been and probably never will be a fan. But I am a firm believer (more and more firm the more that I read on the matter) in Thomas Jefferson's original conception of intellectual property and what he was trying to do. I believe that Keith Chegwin has the right to retell the jokes he hears, especially if he tells them in his own inimitable style... and then we are back to Keith Chegwin as a barely ignorable irritation.