Eyes on the Screen was a project to disseminate the American television documentary series ''

Eyes on the Prize ''Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Movement'' is an American television series and 14-part documentary about the 20th-century civil rights movement in the United States. The documentary originally aired on the PBS network, and it also ...

'' by

file sharing networks File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include r ...

without regard to copyright restrictions during the period the series was out of print, 1993-2006. Operating independently from the series producers,

Downhill Battle Downhill Battle is a non-profit organization based in Worcester, Massachusetts. It was founded by Nicholas Reville, Holmes Wilson, and Tiffiniy Cheng in August 2003. Downhill Battle is known for its argument that the four major recording labels ha ...

initiated the "Eyes on the Screen" project, along with civil rights activist

Lawrence Guyot Lawrence Guyot Jr. (July 17, 1939 – November 23, 2012) was an American civil rights activist and the director of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party in 1964. Biography Guyot was a native of Pass Christian, Mississippi, where he was rais ...

, in January 2005 digitized copies of the VHS tapes to encourage the use of file sharing networks such as BitTorrent to distribute the film. They also called for people to display the film, particularly on February 8, during

Black History Month Black History Month is an annual observance originating in the United States, where it is also known as African-American History Month. It has received official recognition from governments in the United States and Canada, and more recently ...

. Others took exception to Downhill's use of the series as a tool in the cause of challenging existing

copyright law A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

. Some affiliated with the production of the series (particularly producer

Henry Hampton Henry Eugene Hampton Jr. (8 January 1940 – 22 November 1998) was an African-American filmmaker. His production company, Blackside, Inc., produced over 80 programs—the most recognizable being the documentary ''Eyes on the Prize,'' which w ...

's family) have objected that a series about the civil rights movement had now been repositioned as an icon of the

copyright reform movement Criticism of copyright, or anti-copyright sentiment, is a dissenting view of the current state of copyright law or copyright as a concept. Critics often discuss philosophical, economical, or social rationales of such laws and the laws' implem ...

. They pointed out that widespread distribution of illegal copies would make investors and donors less interested in funding a public re-release. They initially pursued legal action against Downhill Battle and warned several schools planning to screen the film to keep from screening the film as a part of Eyes on the Screen. Hampton's family, represented by the firm Akin and Gump, and Downhill Battle came to a settlement agreement. As a result, soon after their campaign began, Downhill Battle removed their BitTorrent links and issued a statement asking that all digital and illegal copies of the series be destroyed. They expressed the hope "that our efforts have not interfered with Blackside's efforts" to bring back the series to the public. The campaign instead began to emphasize the promotion of public screening of the series in each state. ''Eyes on the Prize'' cleared all copyright hurdles and was released on DVD about one year from the time of Eyes on the Screen. Meanwhile, the Eyes on the Screen campaign had been endorsed by groups such as the Bay Area Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement, who wrote: "Therefore, in the spirit of the Southern Freedom Movement, we who once defied the laws and customs that denied people of color their human rights and dignity, we whose faces are seen in 'Eyes on the Prize,' we who helped produce it, tonight defy the media giants who have buried our story in their vaults by publicly sharing episodes of this forbidden knowledge with all who wish to see it."{{cite web , url=http://downhillbattle.org/?p=422 , title=Bay Area Civil Rights Veterans , date=2005-02-07 , work=Downhillbattle.org , accessdate=6 February 2013

References

External links

''Wired'' article on archival footage issueEyes on the Screen''Wired'' article on Eyes on the Screen screening in the Bay Area
Civil rights movement Copyright infringement Peer-to-peer file sharing Peercasting