Unhappy Birthday Interview Posted Wed, 26 Mar 2008

Unhappy Birthday -- a website that tries to educate the public and encourage folks to snitch on their friends for singing the (copyrighted!) Happy Birthday song in public places -- is perhaps the most widely read thing I've ever written. It's been seen by millions and I continue to get hate mail several times a week.

Last Sunday, the nationally broadcast CBC show WireTap aired an pseudonymous in-character interview with me about the site where I pretended to be a copyright high-protectionist. I think it turned out pretty well.

You can listen to it on the unofficial WireTap podcast. My interview starts at a bit more than 10 minutes into the show.

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Responses to This Post

Boy, what a lot of stupid people out there.  I'm the only one who can say that.
Posted by Jonas at Wed Mar 26 12:41:13 2008
Press on Don Quixote, your duel with the windmill awaits you.

Too much freaking time on your hands kid.  The hate mail is well earned and deserved.
Posted by Mike at Wed Mar 26 12:58:59 2008
Haha, wonderful interview!  Well played!  "Not everybody gets to have a birthday ever year!"  hahaha
Posted by Gabriel at Wed Mar 26 13:48:57 2008
If Stephen Colbert can 'Defend' the Right, why not give Raymond Ty his due as a patriotic defender of Copyright ;-)
(cue dragnet-style music)
If the US wants to Defend its IP via PROIP, someone has to be out there in the hinterlands out-ing those ner'do-wells who would skirt their duty to pay our creators for their innovative songs!
Posted by Kevin Mark at Wed Mar 26 15:42:40 2008
Priceless.
Posted by Blaise Alleyne at Wed Mar 26 16:50:28 2008
hilarious! i love wiretap. you did a really good job - was that in one take?
Posted by Colin at Wed Mar 26 21:26:16 2008
Yeah Colin. It was basically one take. That said, it was much longer, and they edited it down pretty substantially.
Posted by Benjamin Mako Hill at Wed Mar 26 23:39:11 2008
Mike, if it wasn't obvious. This recording was satire.
Posted by Benjamin Mako Hill at Wed Mar 26 23:40:10 2008
That interview was hilarious... nice work!
Posted by Jon Roig at Thu Mar 27 19:38:18 2008
Oh man is that funny.  Poor, poor Raymond.
Posted by Scott Carpenter at Thu Mar 27 21:27:35 2008
There's a pretty easy solution to the Happy Birthday copyright issue, which I've detailed on my blog: Roland Barthes declared the death of the author in 1967. Hence, all copyright should end in 2038.
http://dancingsausage.net/?p=955
Posted by gus andrews at Mon May 19 17:06:03 2008

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