Piracy in the arts is the overarching theme of the sixth edition of the Dutch Incubate festival. With this theme the multi-disciplinary festival in Tilburg will respond to the public debate that has been raging for quite some time now. Boundaries of copyright are questioned and creative and economical ownership, especially with the digitization of society, are no fixed rules anymore.

Instead of putting together a program around a central guest (jazz phenomenon Sun Ra in 2008, performance artist Hermann Nitsch in 2009), this year Incubate opts for a social phenomenon as the central theme for the festival on independent culture. The main focus of the piracy program will be on Friday, September 17th with the Pirate Conference at the Midi Theatre in Tilburg. Through panels, workshops, keynote speeches and information stands, both supporters and opponents of piracy will get a chance to express their views. The keynote speech will be given by Matt Mason, bestselling author of The Pirate’s Dilemma, the first book in  history to hit the number one spot on Amazon’s economics/free enterprise bestseller list, and the rap bestseller list, at the same time. Mason was recently voted Pirate of the Year by BusinessWeek. He began his career as a pirate radio and club DJ in London, produced TV series, comic strips, viral videos and records, and his articles have appeared in The Guardian, The Independent and Vice among others. The Pirate’s Dilemma tells the story of how youth culture drives innovation and is changing the the world. These ideas have often been adopted by businesses, to become global industries and ultimately changing everybody’s lives.

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On September 17, Matt Mason will give a keynote speech at the Incubate Pirate Conference. Mason is the bestselling author of The Pirate’s Dilemma, the first book in the history of the world to hit the number one spot on Amazon’s economics/free enterprise bestseller list, and the rap bestseller list, at the same time.

In advance to the conference, you can download The Pirate’s Dilemma from Mason’s own site. The price is entirely up to you. Of course, we can only recommend you to download it and pay the price you think it is worth. It truly is an inspirational book.

In his own words: “There are millions of books on amazon.com, and on average each will sell around 500 copies a year. The average American is reading just one book a year, and that number is falling. The problem (to quote Tim O’Reilly) isn’t piracy, it’s obscurity.”