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Lessig Spins Copyright Law
ceebABC writes "In the always riveting CIO Insight magazine, tech-pundit (and professor) Lawrence Lessig examines the copyright laws and how they can be applied to e-books and other electronic forms of rights management... i.e., in today's world, the author doesn't receive a royalty everytime someone reads a book from the library. Will they in the future?"
in today's world, the author doesn't receive a royalty everytime someone reads a book from the library. Will they in the future?
The ultimate goal of most publishers is likely to be pay-per-read. In other words, royalties for the PUBLISHER. The author might recieve 0.00000001% of this, or something like that, if they are lucky.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
I certainly hope that authors in the future don't recieve royalties for public library readers.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to be anti-copyright here, Authors should definitely recieve royalties - just not from a public library that my tax dollars went to fund.
Just my 2 cents.
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
in today's world, the author doesn't receive a royalty everytime someone reads a book from the library. Will they in the future?
Nope. This was tried with new-fangled technology - the pay-per-view DVDs. It failed because folks aren't (quite) that dumb.
If you think that folks will 'buy that' for the written word - a technology that has been around for a long time, you're a fool. Hell, folks won't even buy e-books that they can re-read.
He's got good points about if you have a book now, you can loan it to friends or borrow it from the library without any troubles.
The problem is, that before eBooks, you couldn't "loan" your copy of the book to 10,000 of your friends on Kazaa.
There are some interesting ideas in there, but I don't think his ideas are the answer. They are a good start though.
What happens when I get my artificially enhanced memory modules in 2025? Will the DMCA dictate what kind of memories I can have? Will media distributors discriminate against me as a buyer since I can play back my memories whenever I want?
--LinuxParanoid, only somewhat tongue in cheek
copyrighting popups, and extracting a royalty for everytime someone "reads" one...
Guess what? I got a fever! And the only prescription.. is more cowbell!
Do I collect money every time someone walks across my yard? I'm a big supporter of the "Pay for it once" philosophy. If I buy a book, its mine, I can loan it to whoever I want. The idea can remain the writer's or whoever came up with it and copyrigted it, but the book is mine. I'm pretty sure that a "book" , as in a collection of paper with words on it, cannot be copyrighted, so as long as I don't make money off of it, how is it violating copyright if I let someone else "see" (I'm not talking about copying the book, just one copy). As I see it anything printed on paper can be seen by anyone, and read by anyone because it exsists on prior art.
We never had to pay an author before for trading in a book, why should the model change now? Content should be paid for once. Continual payment to use it is just crap.
"If I were bound by all laws everywhere I'm sure I would have committed a capital crime somewhere."
The ultimate goal of most publishers is likely to be pay-per-read. In other words, royalties for the PUBLISHER. The author might recieve 0.00000001% of this, or something like that, if they are lucky.
The publishers are out of luck if they want to kill an author's percentage.
For most, it's contractually set at a certain rate (whole percantage points of the gross sale), and the publisher making MORE money only means more money for the author.
Last numbers I heard had an author's royalties at somewhere between 1% and 5%. And the big names--those that bring in the massive ammounts of sales that keep publishers in busienss--certainly won't sell their already-done-and-anyone-can-print-it books for less than this.
Why not have a short copyright term as the standard (say life + 10 years). But if a corporate entity wants to keep that copyright past that point, it would have to pay a substantial fixed fee plus some small royalties to the government (i.e. a tax on profits).
This way, the list of long-term copyrights would be small, maintained in a single place, and thus easily searchable. There would be a financial disincentive in place to keep companies from locking up works unless they were actively making money. Companies are happy, museums are happy, the gov'ment is happy, and the internet is happy.
-- Heisenberg might have slept here.
Lessig brings up an excellent point that only 147 out of about 10000 books from the 20's are still in print. What happened to the rest of this knowledge? The rest of this creativity? It has been lost and forgotten.
We were supposed to build our society on the shoulders of giants. Instead we've institutionally forgotten everything that came before us. It seems appropriate that our attention spans are now short enough not to notice what we've lost.
Societally, we're only a step away from being the old lady in a flannel nighty that keeps wandering away from the old folks home.
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
This story, which you all really should have read by now, depicts a world of copyright/DRM/Etc. laws to the extreme:
The Right to Read
The scariest line definitely comes after:
most of the specific laws and practices described above have already been proposed
A Minesweeper clone that doesn't suck
I've always thought pay-per-use was a perfectly reasonable idea, as long as the usage fees were low enough.
;)
Imagine, you could build a vast library for free.. in fact, you wouldn't even NEED a personal library, because EVERYTHING would be available freely on the net.
Then, you pay based on what you use. So, if you listen to the latest Britney song 1000 times, you owe her some cash. And why shouldn't you?? If you listen to the song that much, obviously you're enjoying it.
If you grab a movie and only watch it once, you pay next to nothing. But if it becomes your all time favourite, and you watch it over and over again, you pay more money. It's totally fair.
I know a lot of people would be opposed to this, because they want to pay a flat OWNERSHIP fee, and get infinite usage. But in the Internet connected world, where anything digitizable can be copied infinitely for near zero cost, I posit that the concept of ownership is obsolete. We have the capacity for everyone to own everything, in other words, and just pay for what they actually use.
Speaking for myself, I have a library of hundreds of DVDs, which has cost thousands of dollars to build. If instead of purchasing copies, I could watch ANY movie I wanted for say, 50 cents, I imagine I would have seen a lot more movies, for a lot cheaper, than I would've by purchasing a personal library. And the number of times I've seen Aliens could probably fund Cameron's retirement.
Now of course, I'm not saying converting to such a system would be easy, or even possible right now. It would require universal, mandatory ID3 tags or equivalent, a ubiquitous micropayment infrastructure, and global co-operation of everyone who designs media playback mechanisms.
"Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
...till I have to play "catch the monkey" in order to read the climax?
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
Authors should definitely recieve royalties - just not from a public library that my tax dollars went to fund.
I'm an author, and I don't object at all to my books ending up on library shelves. When it happens, it means I'm probably "relieved" of 97% of my royalty for each time the book is read -- given that I suppose the average library book is checked out 30 times. But I don't care that this is such a bad deal for me, since I think it's great that people are reading my book.
But I bristle at your notion that libraries ought to be entitled to distribute recently created copyrighted works, with no compensation whatsoever to the author. On what basis do you feel that government should essentially engage in intellectual theft?
I'm trying to understand your point of view, but I can't make any sense of it. It seems totally selfish and poorly thought out.
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
Did you know that even when you own a paper version of a book, it is illegal to download an electronic version of the book? The current copyright applies not only to the content (as it should; especially since copyright is supposed to promote advancement in arts), but also the format (which should be protected by patents, not copyright). As a consequence, under the copyright law you have to pay twice for the same book - the paper and the electronic version.
Top of the third page:
The purpose of copyright law is to create incentives that "promote...Progress." But extensions of copyright for works that already exist do not promote progress.
Easily the best comment I've heard against Pro Bono for copyright terms.
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
I read the actual copy right law as applied to print and recordings. It seems fairly straight forward.
You buy a book. You own the book. You can sell the book. You can make copies of the book for personal use. If you sell the original, all the copies have to be destroyed, or go with the original. You can't sell copies with out the copy right holders permission. You can even loan the book, as long as the person you loan it to returns it and doesn't keep a copy.
I can't understand why software is being treated in a different manner.
Just my two cents.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Sorry, what are we talking about again?
"Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
Treasure Planet - Treasure Island (duh)
Snow White - Grim
Pinocchio - Grim
Cinderella - Grim
Peter Pan
Sleeping Beauty - Grimm
The Jungle Book - Kipling
The Little Mermaid - Andersen
Beauty and the Beast
Alice in Wonderland - Carrol
I may be wrong on the authors (from memory) but those are all books in the Public Domain that have been hijacked by Disney, and are aggressively defended by them.
Funny.
As someone who creates a lot of material that falls under the protection of copyright law I think it's time that other writers and publishers lighten up a little.
I'm certainly not in favor of people being able to copy and republish or redistribute my work for free without my permission -- but I can't think of a single occasion when I've refused a request from someone who wished to do so.
The only condition usually associated with the granting of such rights is a clear attribution.
Of course if the NY Times comes knocking on my door asking to republish something I've written then I'll probably ask a fair fee for the privilege -- but when it's another not-for-profit website or there's a measure of public good then I simply grant a non-exclusive right to republish without charge.
This usually works well for all concerned:
* The republisher gets some good free content.
* My work becomes more widely known
* The general public has more access to my writing.
In marketing terms, these free republication licenses are a loss-leader. What I lose (which is probably very little in cash terms) by giving away the content, I gain by being able to charge more for material that I write specifically for other publishers.
What those who produce material protected by copyright have to appreciate is that just because you can enforce your rights to be paid for copying doesn't mean it's always a good idea to do so.
I cringe every time I hear Microsoft, the RIAA or MPAA preach about how much money they've lost through unauthorized copying. How on earth do they know that those who copied their IP would have actually purchased it otherwise?
Ever notice that the Trekkie philosophy of not making multiple copies of something with the transporter is just DRM in disguise?
Actually, it's Heisenberg's quantum reality. As you measure the quantum state of the object you're transporting, you also destroy that state. Think of it as God's DRM.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Like what? Playing with computer code? Flipping hamburgers? Lying to the public?
1. Building shelters (architecture)
2. Healing others (medical doctor)
3. Feeding others (restaurant management)
4. Listening to others (psychiatry)
5. Making kitch (manufacturing)
6. Hospitality (hotel management)
7. Risk management (actuarial science)
I could go on if I wanted to, but I don't. And yes, there are billions of people in the world who flip hamburgers, lie to the public, and write code which makes sense to them, but doesn't necessarily have any greater use (myself included). Many of these people are making minimum wage, or slightly better. What they are not doing is making $100K per year, $1M per year, or $1M per month. People who run restaurants, hotels, casinos, heal others, and make kitch can make $1M per year or more.
There are a LOT of people who want to write books or play instruments for a living. Most of them suck.
Agreed. Unfortunately, the fact that most of them suck is a side affect of statistics. (somebody has to create the bulk of a statistical distribution, by which 'average,' 'above average,' and 'below average' are measured by.) I also agree that a lot of people want to write books or play instruments for a living. Doesn't necessarily mean that other people are going to pay them to do it, however. Which is my point, in regards to eBooks. People shouldn't worry about copyrights on written works. Worry about patents on physical things, processess, and systems (such as building a house, opening a restaurant or hotel, making kitch, or building a more efficient automobile.)
My point is that in the information age, there is so much information in the world that its a loosing proposition to try to stand out from the crowd and to actually make a living by merely writing for a living... The competition is too numerous. Writing and coding are merely skills that a person must know how to utilize, in addition, to other skills.
The key to ebooks et al is TRANSFER of the copies. If I buy an ebook, I should be able to give that book to any one person that I want to
Actually, I think I agree with you in regards to the distinction between 'copy' and 'move'. And I definately agree with the physical tie-in, however I also suspect that floppy disks and compact disks are going to be obsolete within the next decade. (optic storage cubes, biochips, wireless transmitters, and smart cards are were tech is currently going).
Everyone realizes that not everything is scalable; what works on a certain scale may not on another.
Libraries are a wonderful institution that doubtlessly cut into the income of those who produce the books. More importantly (to me) they are repositories of books that are out of print and can't easily be located. Older books doubtless stimulate interest in buying newer ones. In the very earliest days, of course, few could afford books at all.
The thing is, electonic distribution blows up the apple cart. It's just too easy. And I worry it will somehow fundamentally change a system that we have grown used to over many decades. Just because the library system is familiar and effective doesn't mean that scaling it to the Web will work. It will be wonderful for the user, but the producer? In fact, in could be a disaster, save the current reality that reading books on a computer just isn't like a real book.
Pinocchio - Grim
The Adventures of Pinocchio is not by the Grimm Bros. but rather by Carlo "Collodi" Lorenzini. You can read about Collodi, or read an English translation of Pinocchio .
books in the Public Domain that have been hijacked by Disney, and are aggressively defended by them.
The Walt Disney Company does not own the rights to the novel Pinocchio or to the name "Pinocchio". DisneyCo owns only the copyright on its film adaptation[1], including the likenesses of the characters as drawn by Disney animators, and has no grounds to prevent other publishers' film adaptations of the original novel. DisneyCo most definitely does not own the rights to "Noddy", a character created by Enid Blyton that may have been inspired by Pinocchio.
The Jungle Book - Kipling
Which exemplifies . No less than one year after The Jungle Book went PD in a major market, DisneyCo published a film adaptation. The company was obviously waiting for the copyright to run out. Now DisneyCo has closed the door behind itself by pushing copyright term extensions through Congress.
Peter Pan
NOT IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN WORLDWIDE! The European Union recognizes a monopoly on literary works for the life of the last surviving author, plus the remainder of the calendar year, plus 70 years. Because J. M. Barrie, the author of Peter Pan, died in 1937, copyright in Peter Pan does not expire in the European Union until 2007, and DisneyCo has to pay GOSH a royalty for every Peter Pan and Return to Never Land disc sold in the EU. In fact, the United Kingdom has granted a statutory perpetual copyright on the work, with royalties going to a children's hospital.
[1] DisneyCo may lose even that if the Supreme Court in Eldred v. Ashcroft happens to strike down the 1976 extension along with the Bono Act.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I really think copyright has been turned up side down. All the arguments are about "content owners" "intellectual property" etc.
Look at it this way for a moment (or the rest of your life):
I have a CD with nice music. I have a CD burner. I have a blank CD. All of it is my property. Why should the law limit my freedom to copy the CD and give or sell it to a friend?
All laws put restrictions on my freedom, but we need to justify these restrictions. The law says I can't hit you over the head and gives me back the security that you probably won't hit me over the head. It gives us as society the benefit that we don't need to wear helmets all the time.
The answer to my opening question "Why can't I copy?" lies in the premise that my friend will purchase the music in a way that economically will encourage the musician to productivity. But only as far as this gives something back to society can we justify the restrictions copyright places on our freedom.
[END OF RANT] (Well, preaching to the choir anyway)
Any sufficiently advanced libertarian utopia is indistinguishable from government.
Lessig a good point in his article of how just about every digital use of information involves copying. Perhaps all of the craziness that we're going through is just a result of poor semantics. We've focused on "copying" because our term is "copyright". In reality, I think that what most reasonable people (MPAA & RIAA need not apply) could agree on is that we really want to protect and control the right to distribute. Is loaning a copy to a friend distribution? I think we can all agree no. Is "sharing" the file over Kazaa with 10,000 others distribution - well, I think the answer has to be yes. Copying from CD to MP3 is not distribution nor is making a backup copy or putting it on all the computers in your house.
Lessig's main point is no less valid if we begin to talk about "distributionright", however - there needs to be a time limit and it can't be continually extended.
The problem is, what exactly constitues an open? A file open? A read from memory? A sleep cycle? A power off/power on cycle? A pause of reading over X minutes of time?
This sticks of something else: the ruling that called a read from a hard drive to memory a 'copy'.
I feel that this is one point where the analogy between physical and digital breaks down...
libraries will only be distributing pulic domain works in digital form. They aren't in the business of collecting royalties for authors, nor do they wish to be. That's kind of part of the point.
And for the most part customers of libraries *don't want ebooks.*
This is not to say they do not *pay* royalties to authors though.
What do you suppose would happen if *libraries stopped buying books*?
I guess most people aren't aware of the fact that for a comparitively huge percentage of books published library sales make up a huge percentage of *total* sales.
If libraries boycotted publishers an awful lot of publishers would simply go out of business overnight. Particularly the "specialty" houses.
What the hell kind of world are we building anyways when *public libraries* are regarded as "theives"?
KFG
He did not re-evaluate the purpose of copyright law and the deal made to acheive that purpose. People keep mentioning the fact that you can make coppies of information cheaply and easily as if that were bad. Far from it. Copyright and patent laws exist to further the useful arts and the public domain. They do so by prohibiting others from exploiting work for a period of years, then 14 for copyright. At that time publishing was much more expensive, yet 14 years of exclusivity was seen as adequate incentive for publishers. So now that anyone can share information and publish, why do we need exclusivity? So that Disney can keep Mickey Mouse movies to themselves? Much more important works will rot in obscurity while Mickey generates cash for amusement park owners. Copyright needs to be evaluated from the perspective of it's purpose. New technology, which should and is obsoleting many large publishers, is also being perverted to artificailly make infomation imobile, as if it were confined to dead trees or vinyl that had to be trucked from central warehouses. To parphrase Bill Clinton, who signed the DMCA into law, Just because it's easy and profitable to hoard information, does not make it right.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
The type of protection a creative work receives should not hinge on the notion that transmitting an e-book involves making a copy or that reading a library book does not. These are legal nitpicks. The Supreme Court could decide that reading a book constitutes copying the contents of the book into your brain. Then the very act of reading would technically be regulated by copyright law. To me it doesn't matter whether this type of regulation is achieved by ridiculously redefining the notion of "copying" or by introducing book licensing. Either tactic is government by hair-splitting.
The question of copyright shouldn't revolve around the technical interpretation of existing law. The question should be how, in real terms in today's world, copyright law can best implement the intent that is stated in the Constitution, which is simply to provide incentive to produce new works.
If e-books are to be considered a threat to creativity and invention, it should be because e-books might make it difficult for an author to recoup the cost of creating the work, thus discouraging new works. It should not be because somebody decided that transmitting an e-book is technically making a copy. The latter argument assumes that the point of copyright is to protect authors indirectly by protecting the copy-making business directly. It isn't, and it never was.
As much as I respect Lessig, I wish he and other high-profile people who are thrashing out this issue would depart from dissecting the fine points of laws that weren't written with enough resolution to cover current conditions. What they are doing amounts to adding extra zeroes after the decimal point and arguing over the accuracy of the numbers. I wish they would consider that in a very few years, when almost anybody on earth will have the capability to publish their own work to the entire world at practically zero cost. Copyright law of the future should provide an incentive for the people and institutions who PRODUCE new works, not for those who merely make and sell copies.
The major issue with copyright is that instead of defining a principle (an author has the exclusive artistical and revenue rights from the produced works) it just edicts one possible *technical* (hence the word "copy" in "copyright") way to enforce the intents.
:
And that technical solution is flawed in several ways
- It is legal to prevent an auhor form getting revenue as long as no copies are made (by lending or reselling a book)
- It is illegal to make copies even if it does not hurt the author revenues (out of print works).
The notions of copies and public performance have greatly evolved during the last decade and the copyright laws are innapropriate.
These flaws were less apparent when copy and distribution were restricted to publishing companies, but now that Internet gives these possibilities to individuals, these flaws are becoming more and more evident.