We need new cultural myths
As it stands, the common references everyone knows all come from media franchises firmly under the control of giant faceless megacorps.
To tell a new story about culture's heros and villains without permission from the House of Mouse could land you in prison.
The root problem is the absurd length of copyright protection for published works.
Here's a proposal: all the best authors come together to create new fantasy, sci-fi, superhero, and action hero worlds and then release the characters, worlds, weapons, magic, etc into the public domain. To kick things off, these authors commit to write a collection of short stories within these worlds and using these characters.
The potential result: knowing they have a pool of quality, modern public domain material to work from, producers create adaptations for screen, which jumpstarts the myths into the broader public consciousness.
I love this idea.
Video games and comic book characters are definitely the most relevant cultural myths these days. They need to be open source.
That’s basically Bill Willingham’s Fables comics
and these copyright owners have proven that they can and will revise history or character traits to push narratives that deviate so far from the original IP you wonder how the IP is even enforceable.
Yes, I am a writer I and can help.
Narrative management is not for bureaucrats only. We must create a new pantheon of protagonists to represent FOSS ideals, or be doomed to loop the current hash of AI + regime fables.
The current attempt at "new cultural myths" have already sourced from the public domain... Comrade
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