Lessig On IP Protection, Conflict

cdlu writes "According to NewsForge [part of OSDN, like Slashdot], Stanford University law professor, author, and Creative Commons chairman Lawrence Lessig sharpened the definition of the ongoing legal struggle over intellectual property while talking at the Open Source Business Conference on Tuesday. According to Lessig: 'Contrary to what many people see as a cultural war between conservative business types and liberal independents, this is not a 'commerce versus anything' conflict. It's about powerful (business) interests and if they can stop new innovators'."

Comments

A threat to "developed nations"

[bizcoach]

According to Lessig,

Growth in creative industries such as radio, television, movies, publishing, music -- and, yes, software -- is threatened when "a few powerful interests control how culture develops."

Hence, if we in the so-called "developed nations" don't fix our legal systems, third-world countries, where "intellectual property law" cannot be enforced for lack of a functional legal system, will become the leaders in creative industries, including IT, right?

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[kfg]

Right.

Some of us have been trying to open people's eyes to that for decades.

China and Brazil have already had their eyes opened on this score. They are both large, resource rich countries.

They might even have an ax or two to grind.

KFG

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[BrynM]

...if we in the so-called "developed nations" don't fix our legal systems, third-world countries, where "intellectual property law" cannot be enforced for lack of a functional legal system, will become the leaders in creative industries, including IT, right?

Spot on. Further, we are outsourcing lots of jobs to these countries already (India, for example). Makes a helluva one-two punch doesn't it?

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

It worked for America. We ripped stuff off from the continent in the old days... even now, typefaces aren't protected in the US (as opposed to Europe and the UK.) Look at India - they built up manufacturing and research expertise churning out generic versions of patented drugs. Taiwan and China started out making cheap knockoff copies of goods... now they're making the bulk of the world's laptops and cheap industrial equipment.

Intellectual property is an artificial concept, especially now that digital media allows us to make unlimited copies. A book reader is a physical device that takes time and money to manufacture on a per-unit basis. An e-book is an intangible bundle of electrons that can easily be pulled from Project Gutenberg, if no modern publisher is willing to release books in that format.

Of course, what actually happens is that there's demand for some modern book as eBooks, and if nobody provides it, then some fan will make one, and blam - free copies all over the place, and the publisher gets nothing more than a big headache.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[RickHunter]

And, strangely enough, China turns out a lot of culture. How many of Holywood's best directors and actors over the past fifteen years have been from China or been influenced by the Chinese? A hell of a lot.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[nomadic]

If you exclude Taiwan and Hong Kong, not many.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

Intellectual property is an artificial concept, especially now that digital media allows us to make unlimited copies.

It's always been an artificial concept. That doesn't make it necessarily a bad one.

free copies all over the place, and the publisher gets nothing more than a big headache

And the author also gets nothing but a big headache. What a great way to stimulate people into writing....

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Eevee]

What part of 'Chinese' don't you understand?

Even if you were to limit it to just the People's Republic of China, then you'd still have to include Hong Kong. (The brits did give it back, after all.) And even then you'd get some saying that Taiwan is technically PRC territory anyway.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Thanatopsis]

HE's right on with this. Developed nations will be disintermediated and would not even notice. Previously you simply went to a new jurisdiction, like when the film industry came to California to avoid scrutiny by Edison's people and patents. Our current laws are really on a crash course with innovation. Innovators will simply route avoid them to countries where their IP laws allow them to innovate.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[RickHunter]

Why would I exclude Taiwan and Hong Kong? Hong Kong's had even less "IP" law enforcement than China. Ditto for Taiwan. And Hong Kong's had the benefit of a non-tyrannical government for much of the time and, even now, China's adopting a largely "hands off" policy. That just makes my point stronger, not weaker.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

And the author also gets nothing but a big headache. What a great way to stimulate people into writing....


And all because a publisher refused to supply a market with a product (just like the music industry refused to take advantage of Napster and MP3s...)

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Dirtside]

How many of Holywood's best directors and actors over the past fifteen years have been from China

A tiny handful.

or been influenced by the Chinese?

Probably quite a lot, but then the best filmmakers allow themselves to be influenced by other great filmmakers, no matter where they come from. I don't think that whatever point you're trying to make holds any water.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[10101001 10101001]

Is there a reason you substituted author for publisher? You do realize that it's the author who actually writes the books. Most authors want people to read their books first, profit hugely from them second. It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author. It's the publishers who front the investment, and it's the publishers who are bitching so much about IP laws being violated because it ruins their monopoly.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[kfg]

. . .Taiwan is technically PRC territory anyway.

Or vice versa. The only sticking point at all is that both involved parties recognize the other as part of China, and themselves as the only legitimate Chinese government.

KFG

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[dpilot]

I just get this ugly feeling that we in the US (and perhaps the West in general) are getting ready to diminish ourselves the way the Islamic empire diminished itself around the time of the Rennaissance. I know there's much more to it than IP laws, and that the Islamic empire was busy coping with barbarians, etc.

But there are some parallels: A civilization that grew to prosperity based on free thought, progress, and advancement of knowledge. Conservative elements that grew to dominance and stifled the very free thought that made them great. As for coping with barbarians, perhaps there is a modern parallel for that too, in terrorism.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[GAVollink]

The point is exactly right from the way I see it. When corporations try to change laws to keep new innovators out of there market, then everyone suffers. This is not a new idea either. It happened to Henry Ford back in 1906 when the other established car-makers tried to squash him.

The good news, Ford made it. The bad news, is it took a huge toll on him before he was able to sell his "horribly unsafe" car (usafe is the reasoning back then to quash his ability to sell cars.)

Already though Taiwan, Hong Kong, Brazil and yes... mainland China are starting to innovate by improving the technologies that they are "illegally" copying. Selling exact copies of a product to pay for the R&D dollars so that they can make their own improved product that they can uniquely call their own, and sell in the US.

What these companies do is extreme, and it's real innovation that's being squashed here - not the inflated innovation done by reverse engineering. Yet legal or not, these other countries will innovate on thier own.

What I'm saying here is ... just like movies the US is defininately way in the lead, but the rest of the world is catching up... slowly. There's no reason to allow large companies to save their short term profits by quashing US innovations forcing the the rest of the world to be catching up faster.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[GAVollink]

And on the technology and hardware side, we send the specs overseas to licensed manufacturing "partners", and they send the specs to their in-laws at the factory down the street, and the product gets copied for zero R&D and is sold for half the cost.

Sadly that's how it is.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[jafac]

PREcisely.
China
India
Pakistan
Brazil

When these guys get a decent legal system to enforce IP laws, they'll start getting stuff like workplace safety regulations, environmental regulations, etc. Then the megacorps will dump them like so many high-priced American white-collar workers.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

I am writing out of a sense of outrage and frustration at a great injustice that, I believe, threatens the very foundations of these United States of America.

The injustice is the Uniform Controlled Substances Act. Its unintended consequence is the creation of a vast organization that monopolizes the distribution of cocaine. I have been made aware of the Seattle crack "Family" which was able to use its monopoly and the immense resources in manpower and money available to it to illegally surveil me, trespass against my property, physically intimidate and threaten me, try to restrict my freedom of speech, try to poison me, and generally harass me in many other ways. The decisions of the "Family" are not subject to oversight by any publically-elected body. They are able to get away with illegal activity, using their money and their monopoly on crack distribution to keep law enforcement officials at bay.

I invite you to come to Seattle and see for yourself the open dealing on the streets in Belltown, at the bus stop on 3rd and Pine, both inside and outside Deano's on 23rd and Madison, in the Jinsonia apartments at 8th and Seneca (recently the site of two fires). Check out the ownership of radio station KUBE 93.3 FM. Investigate a rumor I heard that Governor Gary Locke is involved. Consider Officer Slaughter of the East Precinct, who was recently convicted of taking drugs from dealers and giving it to his friends, letting them use drugs in his patrol car. Is it so hard to imagine other policemen taking bribes?

My motivation in writing this is outrage and disbelief at the impunity with which the crack "Family" violated my constitutionally guaranteed rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, privacy, freedom of speech, freedom from discrimination, freedom from harassment, etc. First, they hooked me on crack; then, they decide to shut me down, cut off my medicine. They have made me angry, and all I can do is try to expose as much of the crack game as I can, in the hope that if it becomes visible enough people will realize how the illegality of crack is causing far more problems for our society than the drug itself, were it legal.

Repeal the Uniform Controlled Substances Act. Take back our country from hardened criminals whose power derives from crack prohibition.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[tepples]

Innovators will simply route avoid them to countries where their IP laws allow them to innovate.

What such countries? Previously, innovators could move to other countries. But now, because the United Nations now recognizes a sovereign jurisdiction over all land masses on the planet, it's nearly impossible to get away from copyright and patent "harmonization" that the United States seems to require as a condition of sla^H^H^H"free" trade treaties.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[nathanh]

Intellectual property is an artificial concept, especially now that digital media allows us to make unlimited copies.

Physical property is an artificial concept too, if you care to think about it.

I think what you want to say is that IP scarcity is an artificial concept.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

Growth in creative industries such as radio, television, movies, publishing, music -- and, yes, software -- is threatened when "a few powerful interests control how culture develops."

Obviously television belongs in that list, but there's another fundamental source of cultural homogenization in America: the public education system. We need more school choice.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[ryanjensen]

For half the cost, and with none of the profit going to the original creator -- thus, future R&D is halted ... unless you expect the pirates to do R&D in the future. That may be how it is, but that isn't how it has to be.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize that it's the author who actually writes the books. Most authors want people to read their books first, profit hugely from them second.

Most authors want their readers to value the work they're reading. It's a sad but true fact that people don't value what they get for free.

As an author I want as many people as possible to read my work. But I'd like to get something in return. Not to "profit hugely" but maybe a buck so I can buy a cup of coffee for having given someone a few hours worth of entertainment - which I don't think is unreasonable.

Without any kind of IP system (and I'm not saying the existing one works very well) then creative endeavours are relegated to being hobbies, and the quantity and quality of the output will be significantly reduced.

It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author

It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[ryanjensen]

And of course by "innovators" he means thieves/pirates/whatever. Come on, no one is innovating by making copies of another's work, even if what you consider innovation is making it available in another medium (p2p networks). True innovation occurs in countries where the creator's rights to his work are protected, not in countries where his work belongs to "society" the minute it is made.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[iminplaya]

Selling exact copies of a product...

Didn't the Americans do something similar early in their history? Maybe the Chinese might show us how dumb IP is, or, when they acquire a bunch of homegrown IP, they'll enforce it stronger than the likes of anything we've ever seen.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[TheSHAD0W]

Which makes it doubly interesting when China is making threats to prevent Taiwan from "freeing" them...

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[iminplaya]

It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author

It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.

Usually, the author has been paid by the publisher, and has probably given up all rights to said publisher. So p2p is more likely the publisher's headache. Most copyright laws are written to protect the publisher. Rather strange, I just finished reading (ok, skimming. This law stuff is hard.) the first copyright law of 1710. It did provide some protection for the author, much to the dismay of the publishers of the time. The part about this law that I really liked was that if there was a complaint about the price, the gov't could set a "fair" price. As I said in another post, If you want copyright protection, you must accept a price set by the "protectors".

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

Take it to Indymedia, pothead.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[10101001 10101001]

Most authors want their readers to value the work they're reading. It's a sad but true fact that people don't value what they get for free.

I value Linux. I value a lot of the free newspapers I read online. I don't value them by paying money necessarily, but there's more to value than just money.

As an author I want as many people as possible to read my work. But I'd like to get something in return. Not to "profit hugely" but maybe a buck so I can buy a cup of coffee for having given someone a few hours worth of entertainment - which I don't think is unreasonable.

So, you'd be happy getting say $0.59 per book, then? Fine, that's a fine price to me.

Without any kind of IP system (and I'm not saying the existing one works very well) then creative endeavours are relegated to being hobbies, and the quantity and quality of the output will be significantly reduced.

Considering you just want a cup of coffee, it sounds like book writing would have to be a hobby. Without being relatively successful, you can't begin to hope to live off of $0.59/book. In fact, simple math shows you'd have to sell at least 50,000 books just to make $30,000 (which should be enough to live off of).

However, this argument about IP laws sounds just like what pharmaceutical companies keep saying: keep paying whatever we tell you or you might just not get another miracle drug. That's now how economics is supposed to work. IP creates monopolies which authors can use to possible take hostage current or future intellectual works. There's no innate right to IP of any sort, and there's no reason why that sort of conjectured threat should lead to current or future protection for the bearer.

It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.

Ignoring that not all copyrighted works are "well crafted", unless people are changing the author's name on the book, the author is getting recognition. It's not money, admittedly. Maybe this same person wrote the best book in the world, but people still overlooked it. Creating creative works is a lot like a lottery: except for the direct results from writing it (feeling better, feeling you've expressed oneself, or whatever other direct justification for writing is), everything else is just luck. Would you want copyright owners to be able to sue publishers over money the expect even though no one's reading it (free or otherwise) because it's crap, but the author thinks it's the best thing since sliced bread? All these hypothetical points try to get around the core issue of whether copyright is doing its job by sugar coating it with the image that authors should be well paid.

The truth is, maybe they should and maybe they shouldn't be well paid. Maybe the result of less anal copyright laws will be less creative works, but copyright is designed as a trade off in free speech for some advancement in the arts and sciences. There's no proof that the extended copyright or even most of IP laws as they stand are increasing the quality of creative works, just the quantity (since more things inherently qualify, and there's a motive to make more of the same stuff that sells). IP laws might cover plagiarism, but then one could claim fraud laws do too (or could be spelled out to be made to). It'd be nice to get more than just conjecture that swings from coffee drinks to something that's a full time job.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Master of Transhuman]

Yes, it does make it a bad one because it conflicts with human nature and the evolution of trade and economics.

It's an attempt to extend contract law to overpower basic concepts of property.

It is fundamentally an attempt to achieve monopoly profit by forcibly - je jure instead of de facto - creating a "natural monopoly" - which is in no way "natural" - and, as current technology has demonstrated, is still subject to true economic competition.

Intellectual property is an oxymoron and supported by real morons.

And as I have said many times before Larry Lessig is fighting with both hands behind his back because he doesn't understand this.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Cognitive Dissident]

China and Brazil have already had their eyes opened on this score. They are both large, resource rich countries.


Add India to that list. The Indian government was outraged at a US company patenting Basmati rice. That variety was developed in India by Indian farmers over a period of centuries. But some US corporation has filed a patent and apparently won the right to control the name 'Basmati Rice' and prevent even native Indian growers from using the name or selling this variety of rice in the US! Lots of other countries in the world are getting fed up with Stupid Lawyer Tricks in the US.

http://www.biotech-info.net/basmati_patent.html

http://www.poptel.org.uk/panap/latest/lost.htm

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[nomadic]

Not if you're talking about the influence of Chinese film, as MOST of the influential directors from Hong Kong started influencing Hollywood back when it was a British colony. And neither Taiwan nor Hong Kong qualify as "large, resource-rich countries" as the poster was talking about. FOCUS ON THE WORDS, PEOPLE, DON'T TRY TO SCORE POINTS ON IRRELEVANCIES.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[nomadic]

Well for one thing, because Taiwan isn't part of China. And until recently Hong Kong wasn't. Grouping them together as a single entity when talking about creative production doesn't make sense when the only one in the group that qualifies as "undeveloped" is China.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

One of Thomas Jefferson's letters points out how property is a social invention, created to prevent constant fighting over the possession of naturally scarce items. You and I can't both fully possess the same house: one of us must win, and one of us must lose. (A free market trade of two scarce items might be a win/win proposition for both sides. A single item, in isolation, is a fixed pie.)

When you can make an "infinite" number of copies for "free" (or close to it), there is no need to invent property (formalized exclusive possession) to solve a natural conflict. There is no natural conflict; giving copies to everyone makes the pie bigger.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[GlassHeart]

future R&D is halted ... unless you expect the pirates to do R&D in the future.

You are sorely mistaken. Americans have been very innovative, but do not have monopoly in innovation. I very much expect the pirates of today to be the innovators of tomorrow.

In the 1980's, Taiwan was producing illegal Apple ][ clones (not just using the same ROM and DOS code, but literally the same plastic cases, some even with off-color Apple logos!). Today, Taiwanese businesses are some of the largest producers of computer electronics, including crucial parts like motherboards and monitors, and of course less crucial parts like keyboards and mice. Along the way, it has produced world-class brands like Asus, Acer, and others. These developments were funded (both in the money sense and the talent sense) by initially infringing on IP.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[silentbozo]

Heh. You can always find some submerged atoll, build an artificial island on top of it, declare yourself a sovereign nation (not under UN treaty) and avoid all that legal mumbo-jumbo. Of course, you'll need some sort of military defense, in case REAL pirates (with guns and attack boats), or their legal bretheren from the United States (ie, trial lawyers) show up...

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[fucksl4shd0t]

This is not a new idea either. It happened to Henry Ford back in 1906 when the other established car-makers tried to squash him.

Sorry bud, you'd have done better to cite Diesel instead. The Diesel engine was technically superior to the popular gasoline with spark plug engines, but the man was crushed under the burden of patent suits and died in poverty. The Diesel engine is still superior to gasoline engines, even if it smells bad, and remains in a niche market.

In any case, regardless of what you picked, the Wright Brothers very seriously and emphatically enforced their own patents. The result was that engineers had to work around their patents and ultimately built a better plane than the Wrights had, and built a foundation upon which solid planes were eventually built rather than the canvas pieces of junk the Wright brothers built. And the Wright Brothers sank off into la-la land. They should've spent less time enforcing their patents and more time fighting.

My only point is that there are plenty of examples where people have completely screwed up by enforcing their IP rights . What we need is proof that it's happening here and now, and crushing innovation and generally hurting society.

Not that I disagree with you, mind you, I just think we need more facts and a stronger argument and less historically based rhetoric. :)

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[fucksl4shd0t]

From the Committee to Re-Elect the President: "Don't change horsemen, mid-apocalypse."

From the Committee to throw out the President: "There wasn't a horseman named 'Stupid', stupid."

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[fucksl4shd0t]

unless people are changing the author's name on the book, the author is getting recognition. It's not money, admittedly. Maybe this same person wrote the best book in the world, but people still overlooked it.

PLease, please, please, Read what some authors really think about this.

Yes, Eric Flint seems to agree with you, but he also proves, well, I guess you should all go read it yourself. :)

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[rir]

What a great way to stimulate people into writing

Perhaps if writers were motivated by considerations other than monetary gain the volume of good literature
being written would increase.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Captain Bonzo]

just like movies the US is defininately way in the lead, but the rest of the world is catching up...

There is a danger of making complacent assumptions in this as in many other things. A very quick bit of Googling to back up my hunch revealed some information about "Bollywood", the Indian film industry which, according to this source (and a couple of others), has annual revenues heading towards $1B, and has a massively higher output than Hollywood. Consider the relative GDPs of India ($2.664 trillion) and the USA ($10.45 trillion -- according to the CIA), and it might not really be sensible to think of the USA being so comfortably in the lead in film production.

I know you said that many other countries are catching up with the US in technological innovation, but like the movie industry, it might be worth considering just how close some countries are coming.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[mpe]

Is there a reason you substituted author for publisher? You do realize that it's the author who actually writes the books.

This issue goes right to the heart of copyright. The concept was originally a permission given by the state to a publisher. The idea of a copyright being about authors is more recent by something like a century.

Most authors want people to read their books first, profit hugely from them second.

If they can't published niether will happen :)

It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author.

It's just as possible that few people will buy them because they don't want to read them.
It's probably still possible for the author to get screwed, but that is a lot less liklely than the situation with musicans.

It's the publishers who front the investment, and it's the publishers who are bitching so much about IP laws being violated because it ruins their monopoly.

At the end of the day publishers are "middlemen".

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[mpe]

Without any kind of IP system (and I'm not saying the existing one works very well)

There are possible alternatives which may do a better job of rewarding/encouraging authorship.
>BR> then creative endeavours are relegated to being hobbies, and the quantity and quality of the output will be significantly reduced.

There is nothing wrong with people enguaging in "creative endeavours" as "hobbies". A great many people do this. It's just as possible to argue that someone being a full time "creator" can negativly impact of their quality and even quantity. The human creative process does not always respond well to deadlines.

It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.

This "recognition" may be at the level of having their name stay attached.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[mpe]

However, this argument about IP laws sounds just like what pharmaceutical companies keep saying: keep paying whatever we tell you or you might just not get another miracle drug.

Though the best drug from the POV of a pharmaceutical company is one which simply supresses symptoms. A "miracle drug" which cured anything would not make them that much money...

Ignoring that not all copyrighted works are "well crafted", unless people are changing the author's name on the book, the author is getting recognition. It's not money, admittedly. Maybe this same person wrote the best book in the world, but people still overlooked it.

Actually there are two groups of people, publishers and readers (sometimes with professional reviewers acting as a third group). Just because a publisher accepts a book does not mean that anyone wants to read it.

Creating creative works is a lot like a lottery: except for the direct results from writing it (feeling better, feeling you've expressed oneself, or whatever other direct justification for writing is), everything else is just luck. Would you want copyright owners to be able to sue publishers over money the expect even though no one's reading it (free or otherwise) because it's crap, but the author thinks it's the best thing since sliced bread?

If this could happen no doubt publishers would want to sue the public.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[ratamacue]

Lots of other countries in the world are getting fed up with Stupid Lawyer Tricks in the US.

I know it's "in" to bash lawyers (I do it too), but lawyers only attempt to exploit the law because they know the law is exploitable. The root of the problem is government. The wider the scope of government, the more complex the law, hence the more exploitable the law. The more government is entangled in private affairs, the more the law will be exploited.

The simple fact that a common man needs to hire a specialist just to *interpret* the law illustrates how overly complex the law really is. Until this is fixed (until the scope of government is reduced), the law will continue to be exploited.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Mateito]

> just like movies the US is defininately way in
> the lead

If I read this correctly, you are commenting on how the US movies are leading the world.

I think we are starting to see the end of the US dominance of movies. Essentially people are running out of ideas. For every "Finding Nemo", "Lost in Translation" or "Mystic River" (the three killer US movies on the last year IMHO, there is a:

The Ring - Remake of a recent foriegn film, in this case "Ringu", Japanese flick

The Italian Job - Remake of 60s or 70s TV show or movie, in this case "The Italian Job" from 1969 (?)

Terminator 3 - Tired sequel to a franchise better left alone.

Cheaper by the Dozen - Known face, known plot, nothing new, happy ending.

The french hit "Nathalia" (I think) has been sold to a US company, who are going to _remake_ the movie with a "big name" American Lead. It seems that the amount of money required to remake the movie is more than the amount that would be lost by forcing US audiences to read subtitles.

Having said that, the success of "The Passion" suggests to me that US audiences are actually more than capable subtitle readers, and that its the studios who are way off the mark. None of the movies I've praised here are "safe movies"... and I think that's why the US is losing ground. People are bored of the latest formula "hit", and are looking for something a bit challenging.

Matt

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[truthsearch]

What a great way to stimulate people into writing....

This is one of the biggest misconceptions in the IP debate. Look at most great classics and you will find poor authors (and artists, if you consider creative works in general). It's only in modern times, with material demands far beyond survival needs, that we see artists expecting high compensation. Art is traditionally something done for oneself and to contribute to society. It's recently been morphed into a profit machine in the US.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[nickos]

"(as opposed to Europe and the UK.)"

I hate to break it to you, but the UK's part of Europe, both geographically and politically. What you said's like saying: "as opposed to the USA and Hawaii".

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[GAVollink]

You read it corectly, but maybe not fully in context... Yet, Hollywood is still the leader (money made, not necessarily quality). And as another comment points out, other countries, like India, are quickly catching up.

I don't disagree with any of what you are saying. Afterall, I am an American moviegoer. I try my best to avoid the formula crap that Hollywood tries to shovel my way.

That said - look at my comment in the context of the grandparent post. I'm trying to convince someone whom is dismissive of foreign influence on entertainment that they are misguided.

Finally, the success of the initial release of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (fully spoken in Mandarin, and sub-titled) was my first indication that maybe, just maybe, my fellow countrymen can read during movie entertainment. Still, it's always preferable to release a movie in the region's native language, as it helps an audience identify with the characters on screen.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, a big headache, but when their ideas spread throughout the globe without the need for publishers or other middlemen, they get a big high!

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Mateito]

Still, it's always preferable to release a movie in the region's native language, as it helps an audience identify with the characters on screen.

True, I am a native English speaker with a pretty good grasp of Spanish and very basic Portuguese... and I much rather watch a movie in any of these languages that is subtitled, not dubbed, no matter in which directiong its going. When you speak both languages you get the added "fun" of proofreading the subtitles. Sometimes they are so bad they distract you from the movie.

Animation isn't so bad... partly because the bad lip-syncing doesn't get in the way. For example, there are jokes in the Spanish and Portuguese versions of "Finding Nemo" that aren't in the English versions... mainly "play on words" type stuff.... so watching these dubbed is a definitely plus.

But could very well be the exception because its well done. Personally I hate English Dubbed Anime, but that could be because its usually so cheesily done.

Oh.. and MONKEY is the only TV program that's better dubbed than in its native language :)

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Minna Kirai]

has annual revenues heading towards $1B

Oh no! At this rate, by next year they might hit 1/50th of Hollywood's revenue! And from a country with only 1/4th the US's GDP.

and has a massively higher output than Hollywood.

Erhm, General Hospital has more output than Hollywood, but it's not much of a threat either. Last year, Jen Ringley exceeded Hollywood's output. Quantity is irrelevant.

The only comparison that really matters is what percentage of revenue comes from international releases (localized by either sub or dub). For Hollywood, that's more than 40%. Does Bollywood get even 1% of sales from non-Indian audiences? Doubtful.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Minna Kirai]

And as another comment points out, other countries, like India, are quickly catching up.

Nothing was pointed out there. It said India had nearly $1 billion of filmmaking revenue last year. Do you happen to know the US's revenue for the same period? Without that number, you can't make any comparison.

As it happens, Hollywood had $63 billion of revenue. How to lie with statistics...

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Minna Kirai]

Personally I hate English Dubbed Anime, but that could be because its usually so cheesily done.

The reason most english anime dubbing is horrible is because Hollywood is so successful.

The US is the world's largest movie exporter. Every other country imports Hollywood movies for their local theaters, so they have established companies and experienced actors ready to dub foreign works. The US lacks that foundation of dubbing ability.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Minna Kirai]

PS. If you think of attacking my numerical accuracy, please remember that "box office revenue" is different from total revenue. For Hollywood, theater receipts makes up less than half of the take for a film. Rental and TV are most of it. (And then there are other minor income sources like merchanidising, which for features like Star Wars is really huge)

Bollywood, however, gets relatively much less money from rental and TV. Partly because theaters are more available in India than good TV reception (and the electricity to run it, etc), partly because a lower respect for intellectual-property laws undermines the rental business.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[ChaosDiscord]

Hence, if we in the so-called "developed nations" don't fix our legal systems, third-world countries, where "intellectual property law" cannot be enforced for lack of a functional legal system, will become the leaders in creative industries, including IT, right?

There is at least some historical evidence for this. During the infancy of the United States we pretty much ignored copyrights from other countries; American publishers would happily reprint foreign books without compensating the author. One could argue that this gave the US a much needed boost early on.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Anonymous Coward]

Your post implies a common misconception about generic drugs, encouraged by the American drug corporations (which have a hissy fit whenever the subject arises).

When a drug is formulated, it receives two tiers of protection (the time is approximate, not exact)
1)The first one is for the chemical structure of the new drug, and is only protected for a rather short time (3-5 years, and that is short).
During this period, the drug is sold at an expensive rate to cover the costs of development.
2)The second level of protection is protection for the name, color, and exact formulation of the drug. During this period, you can legally make generic drugs using the same active ingredient, but with a different name. During this period, the price of the drug drops dramatically (1/10 to 1/200, IIRC)and generic drugs usually remain cheaper than the original.

The common misconception, enforced by drug companies, is that all generic drugs are patent breakers made in the first period of time.
This is simply WRONG.
One of Israel's biggest companies, Teva, (billions of dollars per year) is in the generic drug market, making cheap generic drugs in the second period. Of course, the corporations who develop the drug don't like this competion, so they petition the US government to throw a wrench in Teva's ability to sell these drugs (up to and including threatening trade sanctions on Israel).

One minor point - without generic drugs, most treatments wouldn't be available to anyone but well-off citizens of the Western World (most of the drugs slashdotters have received have probably been generic drugs made in the second period).

To summarize - there are patent-breaking drugs, and generic drugs (made legally after some protection expires). Lumping them all together is like explaining that everybody who uses DeCSS is a pirate.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[GAVollink]

Sorry if I took the post out of context, but it appears that as a percentage of Gross National Product, or as a percentage against population the statistics are amazing.

Yes, I realize that this prooves your point and does qualify as, "How to lie with statistics". But the growth trend does make a point (great-great grandfather at this time) that other contries besides the US _do_ have an impact on the global market

In many markets that the US is comfortably in the lead, other contries are catching up. I think the better reading on this is in another section of this same thread. They are at least closer to on topic for the article.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Sivaram_Velauthapill]

The brainwashed masses need to be educated. Obviously you have been brainwashed beyond repair... ;)

Sivaram Velauthapillai

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[russotto]

The company only patented certain strains of basmati rice, that it had created. Rather ridiculous, IMO, given that they did it through ordinary crossbreeding, but it in no way gave them the right to prevent the import or sale of Indian Basmati rice, nor did it give the rights to the name to Rice-Tec.

Mr. Sharma (author of the second article) appears confused on those points. As for labeling only rice grown in Basmati with the Basmati name, the US does not recognize 'geographical indications' as a general rule -- for instance US sparkling wines can be called champagne when sold in the US.

Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[Karapet]

As I see it, the biggest threat to innovation is the fact that many maybe most medium-large production companies are managed by people who believe that it is safer to sit tight and do nothing rather than risk something new that might not work. The gist of the matter is that the people that run these companies don't trust their own judgement (=lack competence) in these matters and fail to understand the relationship between what their organisation can provide and how their customers needs are going to change. It's no coincidence than the decision-taking power of senior management is often top-heavy with lawyers, accountants and financial business school graduates - "what have they ever sold?" as a friend of mine would say. These are the people that believe that cost-cutting exercises begin with the R&D dept. Contrary to what some people think, the Chinese buy what works rather than wait until they can copy it themselves. My expereience is that Chinese companies have no problems paying good money for good technology. Of course it'll get copied eventually, but what's new about that? The innovators have to make sure that they stay out there at the leading edge, where the money is! Finally, it's just not true that the US leads. I work with the foundry industry and the general concensus on both sides of the Atlantic is that Europe is the technological leader in most areas. And I'm sure other European slashdotters can come up with other industries where the US is at best a good #2. Remember pride comes before a fall.

Short term vision, short term interest

[RLiegh]

long term implications. What is going on with the corporations will, in the long run, turn america into a third-world nation -- while the economic infrastructure will follow the IT industry to somewhere more freindly to innovation.

Can you say 'brain drain'?

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[ShieldW0lf]

long term implications. What is going on with the corporations will, in the long run, turn america into a third-world nation -- while the economic infrastructure will follow the IT industry to somewhere more freindly to innovation.

<devilsadvocate>Just like it turned Britian into a third world nation?</devilsadvocate>

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[fermion]

Unfortunately the long term may not be so long. Over the past 10 years or so my U.S. city has increasingly resembled my third world city. The well off people are getting more well off, and increasingly afraid of the less well off people. Where up to the 80's the very rich, the middle class, and lower class lived relitively peacefully within walking distance of each other, we now have a situation where the very rich continue to live in thier castles, but the middle class have built gated bunkers on the rubble of lower class housing. These middle class persons emerge in thier assult vehicles to venture to work or the new trendy club. They complain about the ice houses, one of the few relics of the old neighborhood.

In first world countries we feel safe and classes live together with minimal bloodshed. In third world countries the rich are safe, the poor do what they can to eat, and the middle class, under attack from both directions, bunker down with whatever stuff they can acquire.

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[Saeger]

Long-term? Can you say 'self-sufficiency'?

In the long-term (< 30 years), there won't even be such a thing as a third-world nation because technology will have finally ushered in an economy of abundance. i.e. WalMart, Gilette, DeBeers, Agribiz, and host of other giant corps will be put out of business by cheap molecular manufacturing (a "3D printer" in every home/village), and not having a job won't mean starving, which is a good thing because very soon not everyone who WANTS a job will be able to have one since they're not necessary (so it will be the rabbles job to feel guilty as sin living a life of leisure, unless a Puritanical Global Police force has something to say about that :)

IMO, what's happening in America is only temporary, and things'll get worse before they get better.

--

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[Anonymous Coward]

Yuo forgot to mention the flying cars and the sex-starved female cyborgs.

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[fprefect]

Only if you believe that corporate America has already exhausted all the new ideas out there.

Trust me, there are still ways to innovate and succeed -- you just need to think harder.

Re:Short term vision, short term interest

[h4rm0ny]

*Ack* Wish I had some mod points, mate.

He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[ObviousGuy]

Creative people should mark all of their original content and allow it to be licensed according to their own will. To do this, they should register it with a qualified third party and allow it to be available for public review, so that the broad concepts of their creativity spur others on to additional creativity, he said. Every artist should share something in the public domain to some extent, Lessig said, while making sure that the work as a whole is protected as to its ownership.

Like licensing agreements and patents, Lawrence?

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[DeltaSigma]

Precisely, ObviousGuy. He's using license agreements registered with "a qualified third party" (creativecommons.org) so that the "broad concepts of [the artist's] creativity spur others on to additional creativity."

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[WryObservor]

Lessig's ideas are revolutionary. Before Stanford's Creative Commons project, nobody was seriously talking about bring the ability to create non-software media licenses to the masses. It was available only to those who could afford attorneys.

Revolutionary doesn't necessarily mean coming up with a different system -- it can be a revolutionary use of the existing system which is what Lessig has done.

In fact, he is even more of a genius for finding creative ways to use existing IP law to meet his ends (of course taking enormous inspiration from Stallman et co. in the software space).

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[Anonymous Coward]

So the realistic principles of growth and maintenance are lost on the religion of the masses. It only enforces the paradigms shaped by millenia of western culture.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[Roger Keith Barrett]

I have never been under the impression that L.L. was against copyright or patents in principle (at least not as they were conceived of in the constitution), he was just against how they have been distorted and twisted into long-term monopolies that are used for no other reason than make money. When I saw him speak, he pointed out that copyright was set up to encourage writers (and at first it was ONLY writers) to continuously work and release stuff out into the creative commons, where in a limited period of time (conservatively, more list 7 years instead of the lifetime of the artist) it would be released out to open for everyone to use freely.

If copyright was instituted correctly and as the founding fathers intended it would encourage a continuous upgrade of ideas from everyone, including the original author. For instance, if a writer of a novel would have to keep on writing in one way or another. When corps cry about the importance of copyright, it's often forgotten that a fiction writer, for example, could just release a new edition of their work that might have a new introduction or new essays about the work or even slight revisions on the story and this would be a BRAND NEW copyright, giving them a new 7 years (or whatever) for the new work. A nonfiction writer could also add evidence or do other rewrites to their work and they would likewise get a BRAND NEW copyright, or a new author could then build on the previous ideas brought forward freely. As you can see, this "classic" copyright encourages continuous work while our version of copyright encourages you to sit back and collect the dough for the rest of your life.

So he's not really anti-copyright or anti-license. He's against using it in a way that goes against what its original intent. So in a you're right.. he's not revolutionary. He wants to go back to the original rules. I for one agree with him.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[howlatthemoon]

If you have ever bothered to read Lessig's work or hear him speak, you would know that he is all in favor of people making a living off their creative works. You should really read The Future of Ideas. He sees, as the founding fathers seemed to, that to have innovation, protection should be limited. It was never intended to protect authors, much less their heirs (or companies) for, what is in a cultural sense, forever. Let them get real jobs and do their own creating. That is how cultures advance. What the Creative Commons is doing is attempting to restore some semblance of the public domain as it was originally proscribed.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[shark72]

"When I saw him speak, he pointed out that copyright was set up to encourage writers (and at first it was ONLY writers) to continuously work and release stuff out into the creative commons, where in a limited period of time (conservatively, more list 7 years instead of the lifetime of the artist) it would be released out to open for everyone to use freely."

To amplify the above, this happened in 1790, and books, maps and charts were the universe of items that could be copyrighted. The term was 14 years with the priveledge of renewing for another 14 years.

It wasn't until 1831 that musical works were added, to protect against unauthorized printing and selling of sheet music. The term was increased to 28 years at the same time.

Plays were added in 1856 and photos were added in 1865.

The complete history is here.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[howlatthemoon]

Also, he is just trying to restore has slowly taken away by large corporations (like Disney, MPAA, RIAA - who do you think is buying off the politicians to take away fair use and the public domain?). No, it is not a revolution, but in these times, it sometimes seems like it.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[qtp]

To erradicate all licensing agreements and patent law would remove all protections that a creator has over the work that he has created.

Lawrence Lessig is working to craft systems that increase the control that a creator has over his work, which today means working to reduce the opportunities that companies have to take that contropl away and giving creators the legal tools neccissary for them to colaborate and share without giving away all of their rights to their original work.

Eliminating licensing, copyright, and patents would benefit only those companies large enough to control large marketing and distribution systems and allow for companies and individuals to take your work out without contributing back in the way you have chosen.

The idea that those who are against centralized government or corporate control of creative works are against any form of copyright or patent law is disinformation that is spread by the companies that currently benefit most by the flawed systems that are now in effect. This "revolution" cannot be won by removing those laws, but only by working to change those laws to reflect the original intent of limited time exclusive rights being granted to creators, the right of creators to license their work however they see fit, and enforcement of those rights so that those who make use of creators works (including use by driving other works) are required to obey the licensing agreements.

In other words, he is working to make the law "more Free".

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[jafac]

I, for one, wish he'd run for President.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[MrNovember]

Don't forget that, according to this online info the average human lifespan in 1790 was about 37 years. So a 14 year copyright with a right to renew for 14 years is 75% of the life span of a typical person at the time.

That means, to me at least, that a 58 year copyright is probably not unreasonable (in comparison) as thats 75% of the life span of a typical person today.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[shark72]

"Don't forget that, according to this online info the average human lifespan in 1790 was about 37 years. So a 14 year copyright with a right to renew for 14 years is 75% of the life span of a typical person at the time."

We are getting off-topic here, but "average" and "typical" have different meanings in this context. When somebody quotes that the average lifespan of a person in some forgotten century was under 40, they are referring to the arithmetic mean, and not stating that the typical person dropped dead before 40.

George Washington died in 1799 at 67 years of age. Thomas Jefferson lived to be 83. Were they extraordinarily long-lived in an era when the average lifespan was 37 years? No.

The reason why the average -- again, we mean arithmetic mean -- lifespan was so low back then was because people did not survive childhood diseases the way they did now. Your odds of dropping dead before you were 18 were vastly higher than they are now, but once you survived your teens, the odds were good that you'd live to well beyond 37.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[drsmithy]

That means, to me at least, that a 58 year copyright is probably not unreasonable (in comparison) as thats 75% of the life span of a typical person today.

Uh, copyright term should have *shortened*, to reflect the ever decreasing costs of reproduction and distribution. Remember, it's meant to be a way to make a reasonable amount of money off "intellectual property", not give some entity monopoly control for a proportion of a lifetime.

Personally, I think copyright length should be determined by ROI, not an across-the-board fixed length of time. Once the cost to create a work has been recovered, that work should enter the public domain - its creator has received their "reasonable restitution".

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[shark72]

"Personally, I think copyright length should be determined by ROI, not an across-the-board fixed length of time. Once the cost to create a work has been recovered, that work should enter the public domain - its creator has received their "reasonable restitution"."

If I understand you, you think that being an artist, writer, musician or a similar profession should be a zero sum game -- they should be allowed only to break even, and leave the money-making to the rest of us. Is this correct?

For those slashdotters that agree with this sentiment, I have a follow-up question: when you hear of a singer, artist or novelist who has more money than you -- does this make you angry or jealous? Do you see copyright form as a way of "getting even?" Do you think that, say, IT managers or coders are better people than those who choose to make their money with their voice or their skills at writing prose?

I feel that one way of measuring a society is by how it treats its artists. This apparently widespread sentiment that aritsts should be second-class citizens doesn't bode well.

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[drsmithy]

If I understand you, you think that being an artist, writer, musician or a similar profession should be a zero sum game -- they should be allowed only to break even, and leave the money-making to the rest of us. Is this correct?

No. My interest in the above philosophy is primarily to derail corporate profiteering from copyright, by requiring them to enter their work into the public domain once it has broken even. After that, the free market should be allowed to play its natural course.

Look, pretty much the whole purpose of copyright is to facilitate making money off ideas by making them artificially scarce. It seems ludicrous to me, then, that the period of time someone is allowed to make money off an idea is in no way connected to the revenue said idea generates. For example, I cannot conceive of any legitimate moral reason songs sung by The Beatles nearly half a century ago should remain protected by copyright. They've all had their "reasonable return" thousands of times over.

From the perspective of individual artists, I'd consider reasonable restitution to be some function of time taken to complete the work multiplied by the average wage. After that they can make their money from public appearances, revisions to older works (thus gaining a new copyrightable product), merchandise, product endorsements and the like (which is basically exactly the same way they do today, anyway). Naturally, there's a lot of scope for "abuse" in applying that to individuals who wouldn't have the necessary financial records to give accurate costs, but IMHO, for the guys just getting started singing music in pubs, that's an acceptable situation.

I'd also like to see the punishment for not "following the rules" to be severe - the immediate (and retrospective) entry of the work into the public domain, a forfeiture of all revenue generated by the work and a fine equivalent to the original reported "investment cost".

The main thrust of my position is that copyright term should be governed by reasonable returns, it shouldn't allow someone (or a corporation) to spend the rest of their life benefitting from a brief period of productivity - and it certainly shouldn't allow the gross profiteering and anti-innovation behaviour currently practiced by large corporations. No other type of productive work allows workers the same "rights" copyright does.

My secondary interest is in maximising the usefulness of the public domain by having the best/most popular works enter it before less popular/worse works and by effectively *requiring* to ongoing innovation and creation of new works.

For those slashdotters that agree with this sentiment, I have a follow-up question: when you hear of a singer, artist or novelist who has more money than you -- does this make you angry or jealous?

Jealous. Not so much because of the wealth per se, but because of cool stuff it allows them to do. Anyone who doesn't feel a little bit jealous of the wealthy is either lying or extraordinarily altruistic. Fame, on the other hand, I consider to be the curse of (most of) the wealthy. So, it's a bit of a two edged sword.

Do you see copyright form as a way of "getting even?"

I presume you mean "reform". I see copyright reform as way of levelling the playing field, which is currently stacked ridiculously in favour of "artists". You can call that "getting even" if you want, but I certainly don't mean it in the malicious and/or vengeful way you seem to be implying.

Do you think that, say, IT managers or coders are better people than those who choose to make their money with their voice or their skills at writing prose?

I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make here. While, in broad principle, IT Managers and coders derive their income in the same ways as artists (by leveraging their "intellectual property"), the primary difference is IT Managers and coders (generally) don't continue to derive income from work once they've completed it. Realistically s

Re:He sometimes doesn't sound so revolutionary

[Sri Lumpa]

Sorry, but Creative Commons is not revolutionary.

Like you said he took inspiration from Stallman with the GPL and extended the revolutionary concept of the GPL (which would be the copyleft concept) in some CC licenses (though not all of them) that better apply to non-software material.

This, by definition, is evolutionary over the revolutionary part of the GPL.

If you believe that applying the ideas of the GPL to non-software is revolutionary then you must also believe that applying the ideas of the real world to the Internet is revolutionary and, by extension, patent worthy. Maybe you do believe that but I don't.

This doesn't detract from his accomplishment and from his efforts whic h are both great and maybe CC has other revolutionary parts that I am unaware of but this one is not one of them.

The SCO Business Model

[NoSuchGuy]

Take SCO's (formerly known as Caldera) Business Model:

- If I can make money with Linux ==> Go big, make a "Linux IPO"

- If no one uses my puroducts ==> sue the company with products/services that are the biggest threats to my business

this is a difficult issue

[timmarhy]

the problem is that people need to be able to protect their work and profit from it if they wish. with out this there is no real incentive for most people to do anything much. patents are a good thing when given out under very strict conditions, and should never be used to kill compeditors in an already developed market. eg. patenting gif files. licensing can also provide a steady and secure income for a company allowing further development of products which can benifit us all. the key is not so much that licensing and patents are bad, it's how they are misused. unfortunately this is a symptom of american corperate culture.

Re:this is a difficult issue

[RickHunter]

with out this there is no real incentive for most people to do anything much.

Actually, history has shown this to be untrue. There has, historically, been more innovation in countries where the duration of "IP" protection, be it copyright or patent, is less than the average "apprentice to journeyman" cycle. This was the case in Germany and America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and they both lept ahead of Britain (which had much more stringent IP laws) technologically because of it. Likewise, much of our most innovative music has been given to us by people who didn't give a fuck about whether or not they got paid - they just wanted to make music.

Yes, there are practical issues... But any sane society should already handle taking care of those.

Re:this is a difficult issue

[Roger Keith Barrett]

There is more incentive for people to do stuff if the amount of time they get a monopoly on their work is short. If there is only 7 years before something goes into public domain, a fiction writer has to either make a new edition of the book or write a new one. This encourages artists to create a lot more and put a lot more ideas out into the wild. Getting more and more ideas out into the open so they could evolve was the orginal intent of copyright in the U.S. It was not created so someone (usally a middleman) can horde ideas and make money off them almost ad infinitum... which is how it's being used today.

Re:this is a difficult issue

[RickHunter]

Also true. But from a more technical point of view, a patent/copyright length shorter than the typical "apprentice to journeyman" cycle means that you can use cutting-edge stuff however you want when you're ready to do work on your own. In other words, software patents (heck, most patents these days) should last a decade, MAXIMUM. And six years is more than enough in most fields.

Copyrights are a little trickier, but seven years seems to be reasonable.

Re:this is a difficult issue

[EndlessNameless]

The major point about this I would mention is that it's necessary to provide some means of financial reward to creators so they can create at will instead of being compelled to take regular jobs. That way, truly talented creators will be able to do so full-time if desired, and other people who are either not as interested or not as talented could still receive something to encourage them to produce.

While the most recognized creative endeavours probably were not done with a profit motive (or at least not much of a profit motive), there are a lot of things that people have come up with simply because they needed to find a way to pay their bills (or maintain positive cashflow, in the case of those unlucky enough to be corporate drones :) ).

Re:this is a difficult issue

[red floyd]

The major point about this I would mention is that it's necessary to provide some means of financial reward to creators so they can create at will instead of being compelled to take regular jobs. That way, truly talented creators will be able to do so full-time if desired, and other people who are either not as interested or not as talented could still receive something to encourage them to produce.

I see, so there's still a financial incentive for Elvis to produce music? Kind of useless since he's dead, but his stuff won't go PD until 2050 or so.

Re:this is a difficult issue

[EndlessNameless]

To clarify: I do not support present copyright laws. Providing incentive to create is very important. Little-to-no copyright protection does not provide this, but neither do the current laws. Why produce if you can continue making money off the things you developed 60 years ago?

I'm not arguing that the current system is unflawed; I'm only pointing out that ignoring the need for incentives will hamper creativity and innovation nearly as much as the idiotic maze of patents and legal obstacles we have at present.

This is how copyright currently works

[stubear]

Creative people should mark all of their original content and allow it to be licensed according to their own will. To do this, they should register it with a qualified third party and allow it to be available for public review, so that the broad concepts of their creativity spur others on to additional creativity, he said. Every artist should share something in the public domain to some extent, Lessig said, while making sure that the work as a whole is protected as to its ownership.

Ummm, this is how Copyright currently works. I create my work (establish the expression of an idea in a fixed medium; original content), send a copy along with $20 to the Library of Congress (the qualified third party), then I show others the work in a gallery, on the radio, in a theatre, or wherever (shared to the public) and the public can come and view, listen to, or whatever as long as they don't infringe upon my five basic rights to distribution, derivatives, public performance, public display, and copying (work protected as a whole as to its ownership).

Re:This is how copyright currently works

[djradon]

Lessig's twin contributions:

- $20 not needed
- You can give people the right to distribute, derive, perform, display and/or copy your work if you want, on your own terms.

Lessig is saying that all creators should allow some of their work to be d,d,p,d and/or c'ed for free, to encourage the creative community.

Re:This is how copyright currently works

[stubear]

"$20 not needed"

As has already been mentioned, the $20 fee is not necessary but it does grant you specific rights should legal issues arise. I could just as easily send a copy of the copyrighted works in a sealed envelope to myself and never open it until needed. While this won't give you the full rights registering with the Library ocCongress would, it does establish a date of creation that courts will recognize.

"You can give people the right to distribute, derive, perform, display and/or copy your work if you want, on your own terms."

You can do this now. If you want to recreate a painting of mine in poster form I can give you the rights to do so.

"Lessig is saying that all creators should allow some of their work to be d,d,p,d and/or c'ed for free, to encourage the creative community."

He can say this all he wants but it's still up to the individual creators to follow through. He offers nothing new to copyright that makes this any more or less possible.

Re:This is how copyright currently works

[djradon]

The "full rights" of which you speak are described in the LOC's "Copyright Basics Circular. IANAL, but the biggest benefit I see is:

If registration is made within 3 months after publication of the work or prior to an infringement of the work, statutory damages and attorney's fees will be available to the copyright owner in court actions. Otherwise, only an award of actual damages and profits is available to the copyright owner.

That's disgusting to me. What if I'm too poor to pony up $20 for each comic book I self-publish? With Creative Commons, you can do it for free and get legally enforceable license terms. Theoretically.

"You can do this now. If you want to recreate a painting of mine in poster form I can give you the rights to do so."

Lessig's point: Encourage a creative community where people can share their work however they want and still own it in a contractually enforcable way without paying lawyers or the government.

BTW...
"As has already been mentioned, ... " indeed we have parallel threads going here. The other one is much more interesting: rick hunter points out that Lessig thinks it may be impossible to waive your rights to a work.

Is it our right to restrict the use of our ideas?

[syousef]

I can understand the argument for compensating the creator of an original work be it an invention or an artistic work, since otherwise there would be little incentive to innovate.

I do not understand why individuals and companies consider it a right to be able to control the use of their invention or demand extravagant or prohibitive compensation for its use. An idea or work of art, once formulated should be equally available to everyone to build upon. Determining what is or isn't prohibitive is trickier though I think we'd be able to do better than the current broken system.

Digital didn't change anything.

[Thinkit4]

The digital revolution doesn't change the philosophy behind "intellectual property". Information can be independently discovered--thus it exists outside of time. That was true during the printing press and its true with the internet. And "intellectual property" law was wrong then and it's wrong now.

This has happened before

[ewn]

According to this wiki Hollywood was built this way:

"Thus, filmmakers working in California could work independent of Edison's control, and if Edison ever sent agents to California, word would usually reach Los Angeles before the agents did, and the filmmakers could escape to nearby Mexico."

Re:Information wants to be free!

[Bull999999]

But it's easier to tell others to give up their IP than contributing to public domain yourself.

Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[turnstyle]

From something I sent to Dave Farber's IP:

Given the recent Grey Tuesday brouhaha that followed the release of DJ Danger Mouse's Grey Album, it's worth pausing for a moment to take a look at the Creative Commons:

"We work to offer creators a best-of-both-worlds way to protect their works while encouraging certain uses of them -- to declare 'some rights reserved.'"

Among the rights an artist may choose to reserve when configuring their Creative Commons license is "No Derivative Works," explained in cartoon here:

http://creativecommons.org/images/comics/10.gif

Indeed, the Creative Commons' leading example musician is Roger McGuinn who: "chose the Creative Commons license that maximizes a combination of free distribution with artistic control and integrity." -- note that Roger McGuinn chose "No Derivative Works."

However, the Grey Tuesday movement seeks to take that right away. Notably, Larry Lessig (Creative Commons Chairman of the Board) commented in his blog:

http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/001754.shtml

"Should the law give DJ Danger Mouse the right to remix without permission? I think so, though I understand how others find the matter a bit more grey."

"Should the law give DJ Danger Mouse a compulsory right to remix? That is, the right, conditioned upon his paying a small fee per sale? Again, I think so, and again, you might find this a bit less grey."

So, what exactly does Creative Commons mean by "some rights reserved" -- would it perhaps be more accurate if they said: "some rights reserved until we can cook up a new compulsory license to take those rights away"?

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[MunchMunch]

It is indeed possible to create a Creative Commons license that bars someone from creating derivative works. However, this isn't entirely a contradiction. It may be a compromise meant to allow the maximum public benefit to be created under current copyright conditions (which limit derivative works). The idea that Lessig is amenable to compromise despite having stronger believes which he expresses in his blog doesn't prove that he's being hypocritical.

The fact is, if you look at this, you see that the license includes a notice that fair use is still protected, and that the CC license with "no derivative" clause does so in order to facilitate copying and sharing. It is still closer to Lessig's position than current copyright law.

I do believe and agree that in this area, compromise like what Lessig may be endorsing with the CC license (and like copyright law itself has been doing for the last hundred years) might create confusion about what the 'principles' of copyright law are. This surely will make some of us uncomfortable -- especially those of us who believe that copyright is supposed to make some sort of moral/logical sense, and not merely be a pragmatic engine for creativity.

However, as we've already seen, copyright does not operate under any principles except to enable more creativity than it disables. Copyright is not a moral law. It does not have unimpeachable logic that directs its content. Thus, Lessig need not either be totally black or white, and does not contradict himself by agreeing to less than he wishes for in his blog--since copyright allows [sorry, I can't help it] "gray" principles.

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[Gonarat]

"Should the law give DJ Danger Mouse the right to remix without permission? I think so, though I understand how others find the matter a bit more grey."

"Should the law give DJ Danger Mouse a compulsory right to remix? That is, the right, conditioned upon his paying a small fee per sale? Again, I think so, and again, you might find this a bit less grey."

Personally, I think DJ Danger Mouse should have the right to remix without permission and distribute it as long as no profit is made. Now, If DJ Danger Mouse wants to make money with/off of the work, then permission needs to be given and royalities paid to The Beatles and Jay Z. Of course, if we still had the original 14 year (or even 28 year) maximum copyrights, then the Beatles would be public domain.

I think non-profit remixes (in the case of music) or fan fiction (in the case of Books, Movies, and TV) should always be legal and permitted. Once something is released, it becomes part of our common experience, and perhaps our culture.

Just my 2 cents.

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[turnstyle]

"It is indeed possible to create a Creative Commons license that bars someone from creating derivative works. However, this isn't entirely a contradiction."

Aw, come on! CC speaks in clear and positive terms about artists getting to make decisions -- "some rights reserved" -- and so on. One of those rights is "no derivative works" (which they themselves say can protect "artistic integrity").

And Lessig is clearly calling fot that same right to be taken away.

(obviously a CC license can't trump constitutional 'fair use' -- but remixes are not 'fair use' and in any case, Lessig's call applies to *all* use anyway)

That's the general problem with Lessig, EFF, etc. They're just as bad as the RIAA when they act as if they're speaking on behalf of artists' interests.

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[turnstyle]

"Personally, I think DJ Danger Mouse should have the right to remix without permission and distribute it as long as no profit is made. Now, If DJ Danger Mouse wants to make money with/off of the work, then permission needs to be given and royalities paid to The Beatles and Jay Z."

And you do know that DJ Danger Mouse pressed 3000 CDs, yes?

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[cubic6]

How do you draw the line between "remix without permission and distribute" and just plain distribute?

If I take a popular single and speed it up 0.1%, does that qualify as a remix, and can I then distribute it as long as I don't make a profit?

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[MunchMunch]

"That's the general problem with Lessig, EFF, etc. They're just as bad as the RIAA when they act as if they're speaking on behalf of artists' interests.

You'll have to forgive me, but I really don't see what the problem is. Lessig supports copyright to a limited extent, but (as evinced by his implicit support of unimpeded remixing) he believes in advancing creativity more than copyright as an end in and of itself. His words and actions on his blog support this, though it may indeed be argued to be counterproductive to support a CC license that allows a 'no derivative' clause. However, that isn't your argument.

Your argument is that Lessig wishes to empower the 'artists' via a 'no derivative' CC clause, but contradicts himself when he simultaneously argues for a cultural freedom to 'remix' art. In that sense, you're confusing speaking on the 'artists' behalf with speaking on the 'publishers' behalf. (I speak of these as different roles -- I don't deny a single person may often take on both.) Lessig wants to empower the artists by expanding creativity, and that is the sensible aim of copyright law.

However, a 'no derivative' clause is a negative clause. It prevents creativity from taking place while a lack of a 'no derivative' clause does not prevent or preclude the original. If someone remixes a song, the original still remains. The 'vision' is not compromised unless someone tries to pass off the remix as the original, which is far short of the extent of the 'no derivative' clause.

Finally, yes, Lessig appears to support the CC license. However, this is not a human rights issue, and as I said, it may make sense for him to support the license if the net effect is positive for creativity.

If he has explicitly said "I support the 'no derivative' clause," (and if so, I would love to see it) then he's contradicting himself. Otherwise, there's no reason to think he isn't just being pragmatic and supporting a license whose positive aspects outweight the negative.

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[Gonarat]

And you do know that DJ Danger Mouse pressed 3000 CDs, yes?

From what I understand, 3000 CDs were pressed, and a number of these were sold on Ebay. As long as DJ Danger Mouse did not sell them (he had no arrangement with the Beatles or Jay-Z) he is okay (not making a profit), but the resale of these CDs (in this case, there is no "first sale" ) is not okay. That would be the same as if I took my mp3 copy and created a CD version and sold it -- not okay.

I'm not sure if DJ Dangermouse personally sold any of the CDs, or if the sales were all second party, but IMHO, no money should change hands at any point for these CDs.

Disclaimer: I am using okay/not okay because according to current copyright law (the "real world"), the whole Grey Album project was illegal. Okay / not okay only pertains to my current opinion on how copyright (IMHO) should work, not how it actually works. That's why I support Lessig -- he has thought of things that I'm sure I have never thought of as far as how copyright law should work fairly for all parties.

Re:Lessig the Grey vs. Creative Commons

[Morosoph]

You're missing something: rights are first being taken away from the purchaser. Artist's rights are about incentives, but in truth, this right is achieved through restriction.

I'm not saying that we don't need to preserve incentives, but I am saying that we need to see that rights are not completely one-sided.

Topical journal entry.

No it isn't...

[schon]

.. and hasn't been since the Berne Convention.

send a copy along with $20 to the Library of Congress (the qualified third party)

There is no need to send your copy to the Library of Congress to receive copyright protection. You only need to send your copy if you want to sue someone for infringement, and you want to collect monetary damages. Oh, and you don't need to send the whole thing, just part of it will be fine.

Welcome to 2004 - where have you been for the last 20 years?

Re:No it isn't...

[stubear]

I only put this in there to show the correlation to the authorized third party Lessig mentions. I realize that copyrigt is granted automatically at the time of creation but to gain further legal protection you must send a copy to the Library of COngress.

Re:No it isn't...

[RickHunter]

Except, and this is really interesting, you might not be able to waive your rights to your own work. The GPL and BSDL are probably still leagal... But, according to Lessig, its somewhat unclear about whether an author can intentionally put a work into the public domain, or even use an "effectively public domain" license. As copying the work might still be a Federal offense in the USA.

As Bill G himself put it. . .

[kfg]

during the antitrust trial:

"Microsoft is just one good idea away from oblivion."

I may not have the quote exactly right, but the idea expressed is correct.

Therefore, to protect one's future, if one is a power player, one must protect innovation from outside the company. Excessive innovation from inside the company is, more often than not, antithetical to profits.

As an example from outside IT, a Trinity factory oval racer who used to practice at my track once told me the story of his first race for the team. He not only won, but he broke the track race record by two seconds.

When he got off the driver's stand, glowing with pride and accomplishment, the team manager stormed up to him and said, "Don't ever let me see you do anything like that again, or your fired. We came here with seconds in hand. You only needed to win by one second, not half a lap. Now every other team knows how fast we are, and they're all going to go home and figure out how to go just as fast before they come out to a major meet again. You just threw away a full season's advantage by showing off. And a full season's sales advantage that goes with it."

There is no advantage to an established company in offering too much "advancment" to the public. Especially if they can get the public to buy chrome as advancment.

Anybody from outside who offers advancement when the public is willing to buy chrome simply needs to be stopped.

A large and powerful corporation, again using Microsoft as the obvious example, by necessity becomes conservative. They have little to gain. They can live off of the the return of their outside investments, effectively, for eternity. They can only lose.

They don't like losing.

If they can create a conservative general atmosphere in society and at law that favors them, well, they don't have to because they can't have any real competition.

Other powerful corporations aren't real competition in innovation because they're all playing by the same rule sheet. Only try to win by one second, so you can sell the other seconds you've already got later, when people get tired of this year's chrome.

KFG

Re:As Bill G himself put it. . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you implying that:

• Intel is holding back a 10GHz CPU?
• AMD agreed not to race past Intel anymore?
• Maxtor has a 1000GB drive ready for production?
• Pharma companys have a cure for cancer but are holding back?
• Biotech companys are killing the leading scientists for being wildcards?

Bullpucky. competition keeps things very even.

Re:As Bill G himself put it. . .

[kfg]

competition keeps things very even.

Exactly.

KFG

Re:As Bill G himself put it. . .

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that very few people are willing to buy upgrades to their MS software. There's been dozens of articles on this, maybe you should have read them before going off on a half cocked rant. People haven't been buying chrome; that's why MS needed to introduce that subscription plan.

Your anecdote about racing had nothing to do with what you're saying, and you gave no reason why they wouldn't want to offer advancement. Advancement only means more sales. There's no real risk to them in making .NET or making a DB-like FS; they only to stand to gain.

Re:As Bill G himself put it. . .

[kfg]

I myself am running a pre-SE version of Windows 98 right now as I post, running Mozilla FireHydrant, or whatever it's called at the moment. I use Eudora for mail. I've got a copy of Office 97 lying around in a box somewhere, but really, why bother when I've got Open Office and do virtually all of my editing in Windows with WinVi32?

I think the last bit of software I bought that traces back to Microsoft was Age of Empires II:The Conquerers Expansion. How many years ago was that released?

So, I have some personal experience with the slow down in the purchasing of Microsoft software, although a good many home computers that I've been called to unwonk lately have been running XP, without having to read about it.

I hear rumors thought that this might due, at least in part, to some "Linux" thingy or other, which I also hear does not play by the large, mature, conservative corporate rule sheet.

Can you suggest where I might go to read about some user experiences with this "Linux" thingy and the effect it might have on the software industry and how Microsoft might respond to it?

KFG

Re:As Bill G himself put it. . .

[fedtmule]

"Microsoft is just one good idea away from oblivion."

That would have to be one hell of an idea. Even WWW did only hurt MS temporarily. Now, they are the leading (market share) producer of browsers and have fairly good control of the market.

Bush / Blair parody

[spood]

The link to the Bush/Blair Endless Love parody in that article is hilarious! See, sometimes it's good to actually read the article.

The following is public domain.

[Thinkit4]

Given that an idea, in all its forms, can be independently discovered, the idea itself is never created.

Re:The following is public domain.

[Bull999999]

How about, why research when you can leech ideas off of others?

A big step in the right direction...

[ShieldW0lf]

...would be to prevent the transfer of ownership or licensing rights.

Want to keep it, fine. Sell copies at a profit, fine. License it out for commercial use, fine. Sell ownership to the big immortal mulitnational that owns everything else? Sorry, not permitted.

This doesn't kill the distribution and marketing industries, just puts them in the service of the artists, instead of the other way around. Bang, no more monopoly is possible, yet artists get rewarded.

There would no longer be a motive to remove things from circulation the way the big media companies do... that only comes from the fact that song a and song b are competing for market share, but media company x owns both, so they kill b to focus on a. If ownership fell only to the creators, they'd be more inclined to give away the non-marketables as a way of promoting themselves.

I leave the excercise of how to deal with collaborative works for someone who isn't sleep deprived and fuzzy-eyes from too much coding :P

Re:A big step in the right direction...

[Bull999999]

If the artist gets screwed because they sold their rights, then they have no one to blame but themselves. Besides those big media companies get shafted time to time. Remember Mariah Carry?

Re:A big step in the right direction...

[ShieldW0lf]

That's not the point. Rewarding both the artist and the media companies isn't an end, it's a means. The laws aren't directly intended to benefit them, they're intended to benefit us all. In other words, rewarding creators is a mechanism, not a goal.

Re:A big step in the right direction...

[Bull999999]

Why should the law be created to benefit us all for someone else's work? If you work to make money to buy a new car or a gaming machine, it does not benifit me one bit. So if someone choses to work to create a work of art, it has to benefit all of us? It doesn't sound fair.

Re:A big step in the right direction...

[ShieldW0lf]

I chose to clean my home yesterday... I think I should be paid for that... I worked hard, why shouldn't I be rewarded?

When you get down to it, no one asked you to create anything, and no one needs you to make themselves a copy once it's created, so unless you're commissioning an artist in advance to make something, there's no reason why they should be rewarded. No one asked them to waste their time when they could have been making money fixing my car instead.

It benefits us all for ppl to make things, so we make this contrived system to make it happen... not because artists deserve it, but because we're all better off if we can get them to make stuff.

Make sense when you look at it like that?

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Bull999999]

If that's the case, you'll never be able to recoup your R&D costs because your competitors will be able to underprice you.

For example, you have an idea for invention. You borrow $100,000 for R&D to invent a widget. You sell them at $10 each to cover your expenses (which includes loan repayment). Your competitor copies your idea and produces widgets and since he/she does not have a loan to repay, your competitor sells the same widget for $5. You'll end up going bankrupt due to the poor sales.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[shark72]

"I do not understand why individuals and companies consider it a right to be able to control the use of their invention or demand extravagant or prohibitive compensation for its use."

This is the free market economy at work. If I create a work and charge too much for it, it won't sell. If I charge too little, I don't make enough to stay in business.

I ocasionally with a well-respected analyst firm that publishes an annual seven-year forecast report for a particular industry. This report is eight pages, and costs $4,500.00. Yet it is considered by many to be a fair price. I know that many people reading this will simply not comprehend why on earth an eight page report would be sold for $4,500.00, but trust me on this one.

If that analyst firm can write something that people want to buy for $562 per page, then they deserve that money. It is their right and prerogative to charge what the market will bear.

"An idea or work of art, once formulated should be equally available to everyone to build upon."

If tomorrow we enacted a price control law that said that a publisher could not charge more than $X per page, then there's a good chance that the analyst firm would simply no longer publish that particular report. This would be a loss for everybody.

"Determining what is or isn't prohibitive is trickier though I think we'd be able to do better than the current broken system."

I disagree here. The free market works incredibly well in this case. If nobody buys their report this year for $4,500.00, then they'll lower the price next year. And so on. By allowing the analyst firm to charge whatever they like for this forecast report, they are ultimately in control of their business. Putting price controls on copyrighted works is not the answer.

more on Lessig

[bgs4]

Eldred v. Ashcroft was one of the more interesting stories I've followed on slashdot. Here is Lessig's take on losing the case, one year later.

How I Lost the Big One

Very interesting read.

What it really comes down to...

[3seas]

as it becomes easier and easier to invent and create, the intellectually property of such gets longer and longer term and more controlled.

Don't believe me?

I think SCO is a very good example, in many ways.... hell you don't even have to invent or create to anything to make your claim to fame and fortune....

What should be happening is that the term length should be getting shorter and control should be being removed....

How does an inventor or creator get a return?

Far better than they are now!!!

Just because you can invent or create, there is no proof that there is some magical power included or connected to such that says you will know best how to market or distribute it....

If such marketing and distribution is open to all to do, simply paying back to the inventor or creator, some reasonable percentage ..... then invention and creation will flourish, instead of marketing monopolies...playing constrained stradegy games over consumer choice.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[metlin]

I'm not discounting your point that having incentive helps motivate people to innovate.

But the truth is, most of the good stuff out there was not created by people looking for an incentive - it was created by people who _loved_ doing what they did, and hacked it to their advantage.

All of the world's greatest works, and greatest genuises never worked for money or incentive - that helped, sure, but it was not the goal. The purpose was to innovate for the love of the subject, for the very sake of innovation itself.

Look at Nikolas Tesla, or any of the really great inventors. Or physicsts and mathematicians. Or even musicians. The real good ones do not really care about the money - they do it because they love playing music - its their life, and its in their blood. Sure, a little incentive helps them move on, but with or without it they will do what they do simply because it gives them happiness.

Now, thats whats wrong with today's culture. People are not willing to do anything without compensation. We expect something in return. Look at the trash quality of music today - its only because the morons who are making it are interested only in making money and fame, and not music in itself. Why do so many patents exist? People are not willing to innovate because they love what they do, they are willing to innovate if they can profit and get something in return.

I feel that this is a very bad trend, and a very bad notion. If you notice where true innovation comes from, even today it is only from people who do not care about what they get in return - take Linus Torvalds for example. What he did was simply for the love of what he did best - nothing more.

Unless this attitude changes, and people accept that knowledge belongs to humanity - you may profit from it, but thats not the reason you should be doing it - we are fucked.

*YOU* Can Change the Copyright Laws

[MichaelCrawford]

In Change the Law, I point out that while the Constitution permits Congress to enact copyright laws, it doesn't actually require Congress to do so. Copyright is not a Constitutional right.

Congress could repeal the copyright laws tomorrow, if you could get enough votes to do so. That's more of a possibility than you might think, if you consider that more Americans use peer-to-peer networks than voted for George Bush.

My article suggests a number of steps you can take to bring about much needed copyright reform, ranging from speaking out to practicing civil disobedience.

I want every American peer-to-peer network user to read my article by the time of the elections. Presently it gets about 2000 readers a day, but needs to get read about a hundred times more frequently to achieve my goal. If you feel as I do that what I have to say is important, then you can help by linking to my article from your own website, weblog or from message boards.

You'll see from my sig that I've been asking readers to Googlebomb it with the phrase "free music downloads". This has been pretty successful so far, with my article now ranking #3 at Google for that query. It's getting about 800 search engine referrals each day for "free music downloads".

My article has a Creative Commons license if you'd like to mirror it.

Re:*YOU* Can Change the Copyright Laws

[hwstar]

As soon as this came close to passing in Congress, and the President were to sign it. America would experience its first Coup-de-tat, and we would become a dictatorship run by the mega corporations. These guys are just too powerful. They'll tolerate democracy just as long as it doen't interfere with thier financial models.

Re:*YOU* Can Change the Copyright Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

As soon as this came close to passing in Congress, and the President were to sign it. America would experience its first Coup-de-tat, and we would become a dictatorship run by the mega corporations.

Assuming this has not already happened.

Re:*YOU* Can Change the Copyright Laws

[shark72]

Interesting page! On it, you wrote:

"When compact discs first appeared, they were much more expensive than vinyl LPs because there were only a couple of factories in the world that could manufacture them. The equipment to make CDs was very expensive, and the factories' production was very limited, so the cost was justified. But years later, although the cost of pressing a "glass master" compact disc has dropped to a few cents, the retail price of CDs has not dropped at all."

To avoid getting an unexpected reaction from this, you should consider acknowledging the following points:

1. Your statement ignores inflation. The first CDs were around $18.99 when they arrived in the late 80s. That would be about $29 in today's dollars. In reality, the average price of a new CD has dropped to $13.42, according to NPD MusicWatch. Your statement that the retail price of CDs "hasn't dropped at all" is false -- it has dropped in both absolute and constant dollars.
2. You mention only the pressing costs of a CD; this gives the impression that you believe this to be a significant factor in the price of CDs. You overlook the fact that most (or all, in the case of an unprofitable CD) of the final price paid ends up going to somebody's salary, whether it's the session musician, the engineer, or the person who works at the record stores. Salaries have risen significantly since the 1980s.
3. You state that the cost to press a CD has dropped to "a few cents," implying that it's less than ten cents. This estimate is off several-fold. "Less than fifty cents" is more accurate. As an aside, people should not confuse the price to press a CD-R vs. pressing a CD. At any rate, the pressing cost is one of the least significant factors in the price of a CD.

Contrary to your article's claims, the price of CDs has been cut in half since their introduction, when you properly use constant dollars. This is despite the fact that the cost of about every aspect of CD production, marketing and distribution has gone up. Compare this to other forms of entertainment, like movie tickets, whose price has remained about the same in constant dollars since the 1980s.

Your article makes many good points, but a mistake like this may make people think that you are trying to fool readers who aren't privy to a basic course in economics -- and there are a lot of them out there.

For what it's worth, the average net margin on a music CD is south of 30%. The recording industry is speculative; the costs of producing the bulk of the CDs are covered by that rare CD that recoups its costs. For a major label, a million examples must typically be sold to break even; indie labels, whose overhead is much lower, have to sell only about 100,000 pieces, but that's more difficult to do when you don't have the marketing budget of the majors.

Of course, CD distribution via the traditional system is inefficient as all hell; 21st century solutions like iTunes totally kick traditional distribution's ass. However, the issue of the inefficient CD distribution system has nothing to do with copyright reform.

Not Quite

[bryan1945]

He missd the point about free enterprise that "rents" IP rights. ALmost any company can buy these rights for the "right" price, but yet we let these companies "use" rights as long as the contracts for both companies are not violated. Usually, both companies profit from such an arrangement.

Principle vs. practice

[tepples]

[Copyrights, trademarks, patents, and publicity rights have] always been an artificial concept. That doesn't make it necessarily a bad one.

I agree with the principle behind copyright, that giving an author an economic incentive to create can promote Progress, but I disagree with its implementation in the U.S. Code as of today, such as the effectively perpetual term of monopoly, the breadth of the monopoly on musical works given that there exist a provably finite number of melodies, and the breadth of the monopoly on derivative works that in the end prevents authors lacking deep pockets for a "fair use" legal defense from creating some satiric works.

I agree with the principle behind patents, that giving an inventor an economic incentive to invent can promote Progress, but I disagree with the poor job that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has done with respect to examining patents for obviousness given prior art.

Re:Principle vs. practice

[jc42]

... given that there exist a provably finite number of melodies, ...

OK, here's a business model: First, find out what the courts have decided is too short a melody fragment to be copyrightable. This probably isn't quite the same in every jurisdiction, but it's likely under 10 notes. Let this be N. For example, the distinguished first phrase of Happy Birthday is just 5 notes, all the same length, so N is at most 4.

Next, write a little program to generate all the tune fragments from N+1 to, say, 2*N notes. We probably can limit the melody to just an 8-note octave, or maybe make it 12 notes to be on the safe side. OTOH, we might want to include variants of the fragments with various notes of double length, to take into account rhythmic variations.

Apply for copyright on all of these fragments. Whether they all get processed and approved is irrelevant; you'll have applied so you can claim them.

When a new hit song comes out, compare it with your archive of melody fragments. It will match some of them. File suit for copyright infringement. ...

Profit!

Re:Principle vs. practice

[fucksl4shd0t]

the distinguished first phrase of Happy Birthday is just 5 notes, all the same length

That's funny, I always thought the first two notes of that melody were a dotted eigth followed by a sixteenth, followed by three quarters and ending with a dotted quarter "yoooooooooooooooou".

We probably can limit the melody to just an 8-note octave, or maybe make it 12 notes to be on the safe side.

Ah, I see where you were confused. You saw "oct" in "octave" and thought that meant an octave was 8 pitches. Well, it's not, exactly. There are 11 pitches at regular intervals in either direction before you repeat a pitch, in the western scale. The east as 23.

Consider your basic sound wave. It's just a sine wave, and it reverberates at certain frequencies. Well, when it reverberates at the rate of 440/second (or is it per minute? Well, Hertz, anyway), you have a pitch that guitarists generally refer to as "A". When that same sound wave reverberates at exactly twice the speed, or 880 Herz, you have another "A". Typically, those two A's are referred to as being an 'octave' apart from one another. But here in the west, including both A's, there are 12 pitches in an octave, not 8.

Now, there used to be 8. When Pope Gregor, famous for his Gregorian chants, figured out a way to use five lines and four spaces to represent pitch, he created a system of writing music that used only 8 pitches, uneventy spaced. Those original 8 pitches are now referred to as a 'major scale', and it is from here that the word 'octave' is derived. However, if you take the intervals of the major scale and try to play a major scale using each pitch in Gregor's original scale as a tonic, you will find a total of 11 unique pitches before one is repeated. That is why we now have an 'octave' that contains 12 pitches.

Re:Principle vs. practice

[jc42]

All very true, and legally irrelevant. If you were to, say, take a major-mode tune, convert it to minor, and claim it's original, there's not a court in the world that would find you not guilty of copyright infringement. Similarly, replacing a single note with a repeated note, or vice versa, or changing the length of notes (especially at the end of a phrase ) would not produce a new tune in anyone's mind.

All those things may be musically very important. But small changes don't make for a new tune, and won't get you out of a copyright infringement charge. You have to make significant changes, so that the tunes don't sound similar to the ear of whatever judge you happen to end up with.

Just ask George Harrison. Oh, wait, we can't ... ;-)

Re:Principle vs. practice

[fucksl4shd0t]

All very true, and legally irrelevant.

Um, what does the law have to do with my reply? I noticed a couple of things about your post that indicated that you didn't know the things I wrote about, so I wrote about them. I wasn't even talking about law and crap.

Re:Principle vs. practice

[jc42]

I wasn't even talking about law and crap.

Huh? Then you're totally off topic. Look back at the messages. The top level is about Lawrence Lessig's recent comments to the effect that the "IP" story isn't about culture, but is about businesses using the growing idiocy of the copyright and patent laws to throttle innovation and cretivity. Someone commented about the finite limit to possible (copyrightable) tunes, so I facetiously proposed a business model based on copyrighting all possible tune fragments.

This is totally about law and crap. The crap is, of course, the growing concept of making money via IP lawsuits.

If you're not talking about that, you're off topic.

And yes, I do understand your musical comments. I play a lot of music like you described. I'd bet that a lot of others here do, too. But, interesting as this is, it isn't really relevant to a discussion of businesses using copyright and patent law to stifle creativity.

I wonder if it's possible to get a discussion of music theory going here on /.? If you can think of a way, try to submit a story on the topic.

Re:Principle vs. practice

[fucksl4shd0t]

And yes, I do understand your musical comments. I play a lot of music like you described. I'd bet that a lot of others here do, too. But, interesting as this is, it isn't really relevant to a discussion of businesses using copyright and patent law to stifle creativity.

My post was completely on topic in relation to yours. And your post demonstrated that regardless of what you say, you do/did not understand the concepts you were using in your facetious proposal. See, had you used very poor grammar, some grammar nazi would have come along and corrected it.

Instead, you got spanked by a music nazi. And totally trolled to boot. :) Good day.

Illusion

[Mark_MF-WN]

Unfortunately, America will never LOOK like a third-world nation. Rich Americans are still making all the money, so America will still have a high GNP. It's just the other 99% of US citizens who ultimately suffer. And since most Americans are quite gullible, it'll never occur to them that their poverty is not of their own doing.

Re:Illusion

[zhenlin]

Something that I learned in statistics is that, when you deal with dataset with a very large variance, it is best to present the average as the median rather that the mean.

That, and the median has the nice by-definition property of having (in theory) 50% of the sample/population below it.

Re:Illusion

[Mark_MF-WN]

Even a trimmed-mean would be SOMETHING. But governments often deliberately use inappropriate statistical measures for precisely this reason -- it makes the country look good even when it is well on the road to ruin.

A particularly good example is the fact that prison-inmates are usually not counted in unemployment statistics. This makes unemployment seem lower than it actually is. I know the US does this, although I'm not sure which other nations do likewise.

I.P.?

[Roger Keith Barrett]

"Intelectual Property" is such a crap term, which is why I always put it in quotes.

How can it be property if I still have it after I sell it to you?

How can it be theft if I still have it after you've taken it?

Maybe the language isn't there yet, but "property" and "theft" are not terms that make any sense in when it comes to copyright and patents. All the property talk does is confuse the and prejudice public opinion. The term "I.T." needs to be abandoned if there is ever to be any smart public debate about this.

Re:I.P.?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't you get it? Intellectual Property is a misleading term. It sounds like a noble idea, but it simply states that mneumenal conceptualization (ideas) are owned. There is no physicality involved. It is the patenting of IDEAS, not products.

Also, copyright and patent are totally different. They have no commonalities.

Copyrights are created to allow an artist to be able to profit from a creative work. The copyright gives him/her the ability to regain lost profit when someone else physically copied it and distributed it without permission. To foster creative continuity, the copyrights were of limited term. Of course, these were written when the act of copying and publishing a creative work was work in itself, and not simply shuffling electrons.

Patents are for physical inventions. You design a widget, you patent it, so that someone else will not take your design, copy it and sell it. It does not give you the right to prevent someone else from reinventing or improving your widget. That is a seperately patented widget.

IP tries to take the two different legal entities and tie them into a prohibitive knot. It attempts to take an IDEA, even if not created yet, and make it a patentable commodity, as if it were physical. Beyond that, the nazgul who profit from these anti-competetive concepts attempt to make mimicry, enhancement or improvement licensable, which is clearly antithetical to the origins of both copyright and patent.

crud

[bgs4]

make that here

Lwssig's has got it backwards

[geekee]

In the 19th century a patent was for a very specific widget, and a detailed design was presented. So, the idea of photography could not be patented, but only a specific method of creating a photograph. Therefore, improvements in photography wpuld not be hampered by patents. Today, however, it appears possible to patent vaugue concepts that are explained by drawing a couple of boxes, such as streaming video, 1-click shopping, launching a helper application, etc. It seems that the new ideas about what a patent should allow, not the old ideas, are the ones that are flawed.

Re:Lwssig's has got it backwards

[zhenlin]

The Patent Office could do with more people who could actually judge inventions properly.

The Patent Office could do with more Einsteins.

Even worse..

[Kwil]

..what's really scary about this is that it applies just as much to pharmaceutical companies.

Think about that next time some politician is talking about having to protect the industry.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Kwil]

Yes.. but you miss one key point.

Man does not live by gratification alone. If we don't ensure that the innovators, inventors, and creators get some monetary benefit out of the work they create, then they're simply going to wind up spending a lot of their time doing other crap so that they can put food on the table.

That's simply a waste of their talents. I'd rather be encouraging some crap inventors simply so that the truly talented ones could be spending the majority of their time doing what they're best at.

Election latency

[tepples]

Congress could repeal the copyright laws tomorrow, if you could get enough votes to do so.

Actually, repealing huge chunks of Title 17, United States Code, would take two years and about 10 months, as that's how long it would take to cycle out a majority of representatives and senators in the Congress. Those who have held their offices since 1997 or before have showed by their unanimous consent to the Bono Act and the DMCA that many of them are so bought-and-paid-for that they won't listen to letters from those who care about the rights of users of works.

more Americans use peer-to-peer networks than voted for George Bush.

I'll vote based on my research of the issues from a broad spectrum of sources. However, too many people vote based mostly on what they see on news networks owned by the movie studios, who have an economic interest in stifling discussion about rolling back the scope and duration of copyright. In addition, both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party seem bought and paid for; not enough people have considered a third party to be able to get even four-tenths of the vote in any given House district.

ranging from speaking out

Such as handing out leaflets in support of a boycott of The Walt Disney Company?

to practicing civil disobedience.

What about this civil disobedience?

We need to work together

[max born]

The essential building blocks of all technology come the pursuit of truth, not dollars.

I think the general public really believes that money is the sole incentive of technical creativity. I agree money can be a good incentive if you're selling televisions or computers, but the real underlying work that went into the ability to produce these things was done, not for profit, but more because people were compelled by the process of discovery.

The integrated circuit is a good example. Most of the fundamental research that went into the chip came from a lot of painstaking research in solid state physics and was carried out by researchers in university labs making less than they would working for a Fortune 500 OEM.

People really are capable of doing things just for fun, because they're interested in them, or just like knowing how things work.

However, people do need to get paid. But the question here should be, how do we bring people together to create technology? Wouldn't it be great to get all the top cancer researchers together and see if they could make some headway on understanding tumors? But how do we meet their needs, keep them happy, make sure they are adequately compensated, etc.? Though this may be difficult to accomplish under our current economic system, I think you'll agree it's something we need to work towards as it seems to me a much better approach than saying, "we have a pattent system, and if you can find the cure for cancer, you can make a lot of money." This seems so inefficient as comapanies tend to scramble over each other, reinventing the wheel, keeping their research secret and trying to make as much money as they can.

Thoughts?

The mainstream media should pick up on this

[GillBates0]

Lessig is a well-known public figure...the least we can hope for is that the mainstream media picks up his lecture -- which sums up most of the concerns voiced on Slashdot pretty well.

Incase somebody's planning to publish it, I would like to (as I have done earlier) point to the RMS's essay: The Right to Read cached on Google here (incase gnu.org is down -- they're moving their machines to another location).

Some of you might have seen the essay earlier, but I think it deserves a much wider audience.

Expanding Creative Commons

[Anonymous Coward]

There are indications that this struggle, which has mostly involved copyright, is about to move more heavily into patents. One well-placed patent, for instance, could do more harm to Linux or open source than a thousand alleged copyright infringements. You can't just rewrite the code to get around a patent dispute.

It might be a good idea for Creative Commons or a group like them to move into the patent arena in a big way. Two ideas would be particularly helpful.

1. A "prior art" registry. It would include ideas their posters think is new with bullet-proof date stamping and public access. This would keep those ideas from being patented. It would also allow people to post descriptions of prior art they are aware of dating back several decades, along with contact information where that prior art can be documented. That could be used to fight dangerous existing patents or patents-to-be. With a bit of pressure, patent office examiners could be forced to use the database before issuing a patent. It would save a lot of grief.

2. A open source patent portfolio with a GPL-type license. Corporations could acquire the right to use patents in the portfolio in exchange for licensing the use of their patents in open source. This would approximate how corporations like IBM avoid patent suits. Patents could be obtained by donation or by developing ideas into patents.

Acting now could save a lot of trouble later.

--Mike Perry, Inkling Books, Seattle

http://www.InklingBooks.com/

Politically Accountable Decisions

[Thunderstruck]

Here in South Dakota, we are blessed with ONE member of the house of representatives and TWO elections for that seat this year. (Long story) Elections are a great time to bring national issues into public discussion. But do the masses really care?

I've though about bringing up the whole problem with perpetually extended copyrights and other IP debacles at one of the many public Q&A forums the candidates have, but I'm afraid I'd be the only one there who knows or cares what I'm talking about.

The courts in Eldred v. Ashcroft directed IP complaints to Congress, and I suspect our congressmen will direct our complaints to /dev/nul.

Being informed: the dmca-discuss list

[Openstandards.net]

I subscribed to this mailing list several years ago and have found that virtually no news slips through the list's fingers.

http://lists.anti-dmca.org/mailman/listinfo/dmca_d iscuss

To be informed of all patent, copyright and other related news, subscribe to this list. You can also throw your two cents in the ongoing discussion, or just enjoy the articles.

Re:Being informed: the dmca-discuss list

[Openstandards.net]

Easy link:

http://lists.anti-dmca.org/mailman/listinfo/dmca_d iscuss

OSBC talks + Re:A threat to "developed nations"

[planesp0tter]

I was at the OSBC and heard Lessig talk. A few things to relate:

1. He actually talked about developing nations, pointing out that although in theory these countries are given lesser constraints negotiated via the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), in reality the U.S. is apparently creating bi-lateral agreements with these countries to strong-arm them into falling in line with U.S. IP practices. To hear Lessig tell the tale, this may result in some backlash on the economic front, as some of the countries are banding together to try to stand up to Uncle Sam

2. Lessig said in the Q&A that he's tired of hearing his words played back to him with the implication that he's against patent and copyrights. His talk actually reinforced them as a good thing, IF properly applied, i.e. in a balanced way.

He pointed out that the retention of IP rights gives the creator the ability to provide clear guidelines about the acceptable use of the work. He countered that, though, by pointing out that in the 70's IP law changed so that everything was by DEFAULT protected, vs. works having to be explicitly registered. One of the /. posters said this is the way the system currently works. That's wrong. You don't have to register your work to have copyright. In current law, the right exists implicitly in the creative act. If you register it, you are just making it easier to demonstrate ownership in the case of a conflict.

3. The argument for limiting the duration of copyright of course builds off the whole notion of 'balance.' There was an interesting point Lessig made about the goal of well-managed businesses... that they basically try hard to be boring, i.e. to avoid major disruptions. It was interesting because the ending keynote speaker of the day wasClayton Christensen (Innovator's Dilemma, Innovator's Solution) from Harvard Business School who had models that showed why this kind of business behavior ultimately leads to innovative startup's 'killing off' the big guys. Seemed to reinforce Lessig's point that the 'boring companies' need the crutch of artificial (& ridiculous, IMHO) constructs in the law to prop them up.

C'mon, you goliaths, what are you afraid of? Can't take a little honest competition without the help of your legal teams? Now that Michael Eisner's powerbase is weakening, maybe we'll see some movement on this front?.... ;)

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[syousef]

Free market + Copyrights + Patents + Trade Secrets are what we have now and they clearly aren't working.

I'm not advocating traditional price controls, socialism or communism at all. What I'm saying is that you shouldn't allow one company the option to restrict the use of intellectual property by another company. Intellectual property is not the same as physical property and it is only the fact that we didn't have the technology to copy things at will that made the existing systems, which do treat them in the same way, workable for so long.

We need to evolve past this way of thinking, before we REALLY see a mess develop. I'd say we're on the brink of seeing just that as technology continues to accelerate.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[syousef]

That's why compensation is tricky. You'd need to find a way to ensure that your competitor could copy the idea but only by sharing in the cost of the development and giving you a cut of the profits too.

I've suggested before on /. that perhaps allocating a percentage of the cost of manufacture of an item to all contributing contributors ("patent"/"copyright" holders) - a tax of sorts but not one that goes to the government. The tricky part would be administering this.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. Also note that while they certainly abuse the system, the drug industry isn't creating new drugs for the love of it. Without some IP protection (which is not an argument for the status quo, merely some form of protection) there would be a lot fewer healthy people.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[runderwo]

I'd rather be encouraging some crap inventors simply so that the truly talented ones could be spending the majority of their time doing what they're best at.

Yep. As long as the "crap" inventors don't use the incentive we gave them as leverage to sue the "truly talented" ones into poverty. Is that better or worse than simply not providing incentive to begin with?

It almost seems like anti-incentive, to know that I could get sued for reverse engineering an API to implement a program that works with it, or by independently developing software code which happen to be covered by non-specific patents. Having that fear in the back of my mind is frequently enough to quash any self-generated incentive that I would have had in the first place. Without intervention, the other party's crap product wouldn't have been produced, and I would have been free to produce mine without being cowed by vague IP claims.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[drsmithy]

But it's not a free market, it's a monopoly market - that's how copyright works...

May need to rethink compensation model

[dmeranda]

It always seems that most arguments over IP tends to resolve around the issue of compensation. Yet both sides seem to be missing two fundamental assumptions they are both making in the economics of intellectual work.

1. Creators of intellectual work have a right to compensation, and
2. Compensation occurs after the work has been completed.

I think we all need to challenge both of those axioms. I find myself in a particularly unique position (on /. anyway it seems) of being both mostly conservative with strong belief in the capitalistic society, while also abhoring most IP facades and even the very idea of exclusive artifical ownership of ideas. And I think the apparent conflict between these extremes is actually the result of poorly chosen axioms.

Think about economics outside the IP arena. Compensation is most usually made *prior* to (or in synchronism with) the creation/product. Townsfolk pay farmers for eggs they will receive, not for the past egg-yield of the farmer. Employers pay programmers' salaries for new programs they will write, not their past work. The church commissioned artists for masterpieces they would paint on the ceilings of their cathederals, not for the right to view already prepared graffitti. And even music cartels hire musicians mostly based upon contract for future creations.

So why are we so eager to assume without question that artists and authors are always due compensation on what they have already done, rather than as encouragement for what we want them to do. I'm sure it must have something to do with intrinsic differences in the supply/demand models and the opportunity v. incremental costs between physical and intellectual works. Also the concept of inventory of intellectual "property" seems to make little sense. The "intellectual" industry seems to have the same effect on traditional economic laws, as black holes have on physics. We can't keep using the traditional models to argue the IP world.

Yes, I am aware that I am overgeneralizing and that this argument has some holes; but I do believe there is some insight to be gained in this line of thought, and I'm curious what others may think....by the way, you have my permission to mayke derivative works of this comment by making your own intelligent response to it.

Re:May need to rethink compensation model

[h4rm0ny]

by the way, you have my permission to mayke derivative works of this comment by making your own intelligent response to it.

*L* Sorry but the part I've quoted above is short enough to be 'fair-use.' ;)

Actually, what you've proposed is already the case in many ways. Art is often commisioned from established artists and publishers often pay an advance to an author so he can complete a book for them. Now that doesn't mean that it isn't hard to break into one of these fields however. Still, for most of this sort of work there isn't such a huge financial outlay to begin with. You can even (with a lot of luck) get a publisher to give you an advance on the strength of a few opening chapters. For the projects that really do require money (very big statues?) there are grants available here in the UK (such as the Lottery Fund), perhaps this is less common in the USA.

Anyway, what I really wanted to say was something else: The most important art is always a break with tradition. If you're applying for a grant or whatever to produce a 'creative work,' then will the person in power appreciate what you do? Imagine Scott Joplin or Fats Domino going to a classical conductor to ask for funding. Imagine Kurt Cobain then going to Scott Joplin. Imagine The Darkness going to ... okay forget the last one, but you get my point?

Often commercial factors are bad for art in general. At least where Big Business is concerned. If the public don't want to pay to see a new band well that's one thing. But if a Major Record label has a lock on Radio airtime and don't want anyone to compete with their current bands, you've got a problem.

Hmmm, I'm going to mod myself off-topic in a minute so I'll stop. My other posts in this thread are more relevant. ;)

That video clip is hilarious

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, so I'm slow, but I've never seen the bushblair_endlesslove.mov clip before!

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Roydd McWilson]

That's exactly how it works right now. You license out your technology to the manufacturer (or reseller, or whatever) in exchange for money. Like the fraction of a PC running Windows that goes to Microsoft. Or the fraction of the price of your $20 5-wire USB cables that goes to Intel, et al.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Very well said...

bonus points to you :)

This Lessig guy is smoking something potent

[melted]

Look at Russia or China for example. Nobody gives a shit about IP over there for the most part. So the innovation should bloom over there, right? WRONG! There is NO software market in these countries. So please try your laws on lab mice first. The job situation in the US is bad already, don't fuck it up even more by your stupid propaganda.

Re:This Lessig guy is smoking something potent

[(void*)]

Their software market is being suppressed by the huge influx of pirated MS software. Stop that, and see what happens!

Re:This Lessig guy is smoking something potent

[Anonymous Coward]

The people who want to free software and free p2p want information to be free and belong to everybody. Many in the media and big software want it to be controlled just by the copyright lords. The people in china and russia want it ALL to be controlled by the government.

There is no equivalency relationship here, In a country where the government controlls ALL information, the debate of wether copyright lords or the people should controll it means nothing.

"powerful business interests" are not all the same

[agebringswisdom]

I am often surprised by the tendency to generalize in the media (including slashdot). One of the most conservative companies in the IT industry is IBM. I wonder how people are able to deal with the fact that they are both a very active supporter of Linux, while at the same time working very hard to protect their own intellectual property in the form of patents and software. The "free" software world seems to want to make this into some kind of intellectual war, but the reality seems much more complicated. While it's convenient to make statements like "you're either with us or against us", the reality is that some people are more pragmatic than others. I would hope that the IT world doesn't become as divided as the political world, and statements that lump all companies into a unified force are too simplistic to be taken very seriously. The same goes for the open source software movement.

If we all have something in common, I suspect we could identify it as respect for creativity.

and that's what'll bring about World War 3

[Anonymous Coward]

that stupid and prolific lawyering bullshit

I'm an angry gumball!

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[shark72]

"Free market + Copyrights + Patents + Trade Secrets are what we have now and they clearly aren't working."

It may not be clear enough. How are they not working, and for whom are they not working?

Sorry if that's a dumb question.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[shark72]

"All of the world's greatest works, and greatest genuises never worked for money or incentive - that helped, sure, but it was not the goal."

Not true in the least. Innumerable artistic greats of the past millennium, inclusing most classical composers that most of us can name -- chased money just like we do today. There's simply no way to credibly generalize otherwise. Brahms died a rich man. Vivaldi died in poverty. This has no effect on their relative worth as musicians. Kanye West and John Mayer are also rich men. Perhaps their work will still be remembered a hundred years ago, and perhaps not, but we cannot claim that they have any less love of the art than Brahms or Vivaldi did.

Sadly, greed isn't a new invention. While there will always be people who create for creation's sake -- today's Torvalds, yesterday's Tesla -- there have been dozens of Beatles, Porters, Dickens, Twains, Da Vincis, Shakespeares, Chopins and the like who were motivated by money and got quite rich doing what they did.

"Look at the trash quality of music today - its only because the morons who are making it are interested only in making money and fame, and not music in itself."

Your father said the same thing, as did his father, and so on. People in the 1870's were pining for a return to the superior music of the 1850's. Nostalgia is one of those universal forces. Statments like "today's music is crappy," no matter what decade or century they're uttered in, are ultimately meaningless.

Correction, should read

[Rogerborg]

"Long time courtroom loser and overpaid theoretical wafflespouter Lawrence Lessig"

Artist create art. Uncondintionally.

[trezor]

• the problem is that people need to be able to protect their work and profit from it if they wish. with out this there is no real incentive for most people to do anything much.

Untrue. Historicly speaking, many of the greatest composers of all time, Bach, Mozart, Wagner and so on, were poor people, and didn't make fortunes making music.

They did create music, because they wanted to create music. Are your blood so purely capitalistic that you see no other incentive for anything, than money?

By your logic, social security creates no incentive for anyone at all to do any actual work. If you care to check in any country with a actual, functioning social security, you may be shocked to find that this is as far from the truth as it gets.

In my opinion, that by granting a de-facto perpetual copyright, you create no more incentive to create than for one single thing, and then nothing more. After that you can sit on your lazy ass.

There is no line of work in the world that has the same protection and reward as being an artist. Not one. They are obviously considered uber-elite, and with current copyright laws, everyone else their drones.

And with the music quality of todays so called "artists"... Had I been an actual artist, I would have felt ridiculed. By those so called "artists". Mozart was an artist dammit, by the definition. The music he created was art.

Britney is not an artist, she does not create art. If she creates anything at all. Actually she is a puppet, nothing more. And she shouldn't get paid any more than one anyway.

Please learn how to use links.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please learn how to use links.

<a href="http://www.biotech-info.net/basmati_patent.h tml">Here</a> and <a href="http://www.poptel.org.uk/panap/latest/lost.h tm">here</a>.

yields: Here and here.

18th Century Brain in a 12st Century Head.

[h4rm0ny]

You make a couple of assumptions in there that could be challenged. While I agree we have the potential to free ourselves, the current model of society doesn't allow it. Consider that most in society are in the position of employees rather than owners. If they cannot provide a service that an 'Owner' (read self-sufficient individual or group) is willing to pay for then they cannot support themselves because they have no legal rights to what they need. The rights to what they need belong to a small group and backed up by the governments powers. One example would be the water supply, another government taxes on land, housing, trade. What you are advocating (self-sufficiency) is not possible in this model.

You suggest that the big corps will go out of business due to self-sufficiency. IP and patents are a means for big business to prevent this. Consider that even food is now being patented. Google for some information on Monsanto's business practices. It isn't pretty.

Now I don't want to distract from my main point, but there is a secondary argument and that is status. It's perfectly possible for us all to buy good quality, locally produced shoes if we want, but Nike still does great business. Self-sufficiency is not enough for most people. Sadly, most want to emulate those in power.

So while I agree that we have now reached the level where we can support ourselves with reduced effort, our society is structured around having to work for our daily bread, and work hard. This is becoming an increasingly big problem. Witness all the people who would like to work but just aren't needed. In the UK there are plenty. You can find jobs here and there, but a good job that lets you achieve a good standard of living is becoming harder and harder to get. Consider the term 'jobless recovery.'

IMO, what's happening in America is only temporary, and things'll get worse before they get better.

I think you're right that things are going to get better. I hope that they get better without too much upheaval however. My current favourite revolutionary tool is the local currency. Start one in your area and you might just get to see that three day week one day. ;)

Power to the People, eh?

GPL

[h4rm0ny]

As I understand the GPL, it's a license. Software under the GPL does not become public domain as such in that the author retains copyright. What she does is grant the public an irrevocable right to use it.

Because of this, copyright is essential to the GPL. Now if copyright were shortened to even six years for software, would this be a bad thing for OSS? Probably not. After six years, the industry would have moved on and unless your idea was absolutely divinely inspired, would you benefit from branching off an old source tree?

Probably not.

You Are So Right

[4of12]

What we need is proof that it's happening here and now, and crushing innovation and generally hurting society.

And that is very difficult to prove.

When a company or small group of companies successfully quash competition but yet provide some product or service, they can claim

1. that they're providing a very valuable product or service,
2. that they are innovating,
3. that they are in their position because consumer's or the market chose them as the provider.

and they can make such claims with a voice amplified by the amount of money they derive from their activities both in the mass media and to the politicians that make the rules.

Such claims can be made even if they're false or ridiculous, just because it is so damn difficult to prove conclusively what the alternate reality would have been.

[Eg, if Microsoft did not 0\/\/n PC operating systems and Office software, who's to prove the market wouldn't have been equivalently badly raped by IBM, Apple or Sun?]

Self-sufficiency... no

[truthsearch]

How many times have we heard this prophecy in the past? They said exactly the same during the boom of the industrial age. These visions always ignore some very important fundamental facts that we take for granted. For example, the manufacturing piece of the consumer economy has always had the rich taking advantage of the poor (as in owners getting rich while paying workers as little as possible). When the rich find they can't take as much advantage of their local population they go abroad.

How will not having a job not mean starving? Even if the "3D printer" could create food it's not out of thin air. There is a limited commons from which to take resources. That requires bartering. We don't (yet) live in a pure communist or socialist society where everyone gets at least the bare minimum to survive.

I don't know if your vision is just wishful thinking or missing some basic facts of current society. Either way, it won't happen any time soon. Since we never simply drop history and think from a blank slate it would take centuries for your vision to take shape.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[Bull999999]

And the administrering part would be the downfall of this plan as people tend to favor others with connections.

Reason to invest...

[rumblin'rabbit]

Let me quote Lessig...

"But the creators need to maintain the freedom to distribute their ideas any way they want. They shouldn't be bogged down by 20-year copyrights and other old restrictions that bottle up good ideas"

A few points...

Why should businesses pay software developers the big fat salaries they do if the developers retain control over many of the software rights? I know that the full transcript was not presented here, but incentive to invest is critically important. It didn't go away just because we entered the 21st century.

Copyright does not bottle up good ideas. Patents maybe, but not copyright. People are perfectly free to steal ideas from other peoples software - they just have to write their own damn code. If they are too lazy or incompetent to do that, I have little sympathy.

Lessig continually differentiates between "creators" and "commercial interests", yet it is often the business side of the equation which is the most inspired - identifying an untapped market, bringing together the "talent", getting them to produce a good product, marketing, distribution, and so on. Stanford law professors may have a little trouble seeing that.

IP Rights - a stronger argument

[GAVollink]

I use historical perspective because it's always difficult to see the impact of current actions without loking at the historic implications of similar actions.

I use Henry Ford and the Ford Motor Company because in general, most people know who Henry Ford is (though they may not know that his business almost failed under the crushing weight of bogus law-suits brought on by his competitors). I also believe, that like Henry Ford, the right person has a good chance of getting the credit for thier own innovations. I try to not be a pessimist.

That brings me to another historic point. The IP issue is actually very well illustrated by Tesla and Marconi. Marconi was given full patent to the Radio, but as Tesla said, "Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents.". This is actually a case where NOT defending one's IP led to failure.

I do not think that IP rights should be abandoned, but I believe that changing laws (or using laws in creative ways) to try to stifle a competitive market is very wrong and hurtful.

Finally, the stronger argument that I do NOT point out (because it's so over-used on Slashdot, that even I don't want to hear about it anymore) is the negative impact of the DMCA [Digital Millenium Copyright Act]. I'll let the others continue on about the current impact of the DMCA. The problem is as 4of12's comment (above) points out, such current impact is hard to proove.

Re:IP Rights - a stronger argument

[fucksl4shd0t]

oo, I didn't mean to leave out historical perspective entirely, we still need that. The problem with using historical perspective is that it winds up frequently being anecdotal evidence, and in this specific case there are lots of anecdotal examples on both sides of the fence.

Re:IP Rights - a stronger argument

[GAVollink]

Fair enough.

Really, until decided in court, and judged by history, it's all anecdotal.

probably old enough a story to not get any zealots screaming at me...

SCO: If they really think that they own all rights to UNIX, there are certainly things in Linux that are reverse engineered out of UNIX (Intellectual Property [IP]), and there are definately (since re-written) parts of UNIX (copyright) that have shown up in various forks of the Linux kernel. If they own the IP rights to some of the stuff that Linux is doing, then BSD will feel the burn, too. It appears that the copyright issue itself is moot, with the evidence in the public, now... But this is too current to have decent perspective.

DMCA? The fact that the DMCA is being used to protect otherwise uncopyrightable data could be quashing competitive things. Certainly This story and the comments that go with it point to that possibility. But also, mostly anecdotal.

So to defend any single entity that feels they are being hurt, the arguments can go both ways. The issues get confused. Every side thinks that they are doing the right thing. For this reason, I lean on history (and up until my post, nobody else had been pointing out that perspective).

At least you and I put thought into our posts. <egotist>I don't have excellent Karma for nothing.</egotist> :-D

Re:IP Rights - a stronger argument

[fucksl4shd0t]

IP is just a generally difficult concept to deal with, with very few people agreeing on what it actually is. The reason history doesn't support us as well here as it does in other places (mind you, I frequently pull out history myself in discussions) is because it's such a tangled issue. History supports both sides of the discussion, and it's not really possible to invoke history for one side without ignoring history that supports the other side.

And, unfortunately, even after being decided in court and judged by history an issue still isn't always settled. :( (ref: Roe vs Wade on that one, and a fair amount of civil rights issues, sexual harassment, and so forth)

Don't get me wrong, when I come to a discussion early (which I didn't this time), I'm usually the first one invoking history. No sense trying to relearn the lessons history gives us for free, right? And it's also not that I disagree with you, I strongly agree with you. Ford just also has a history of being anticompetitive themselves......

Design Patent

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

Hell, you can even file a "DESIGN PATENT", which is basically just a patent on the way something looks. For instance, it is my understanding that alot of Nike shoes are 'Patented', not for any new fangled speed adding ability or innovation, just for the way they look.

copyright==gravytrain

[mojoNYC]

it's great that Lessig has formulated a positive approach to altering the balance of power in the copyright arena, but i'd also like to see somebody who is willing to demolish the straw man who is holding up the ideology of the current system, i.e. the idea that copyright is for protecting the artist

the straw man in this case is the artist him/herself--if you look back through history, you'll find a large percentage of artists who failed to profit off their ideas, and many who died broke--the people who have made the money are the 'support system' (dealers, brokers, attorneys,estates, etc) and, of course, the family and descendents, many who don't actually give a s#!t about the artwork itself, but the revenue stream that it has created...

the recent contretemps of the Joyce estate prohibiting readings in Ireland is but the latest example--look at any successful artist and you'll see them at the center of a cottage industry, often to the point where the surrounding industry becomes so large that the artist him/herself becomes secondary--think of the RIAA and all of their talk about paying the artist, when all they are really after is preserving their own money flow...

i'm not begrudging anybody a job, but i am taking aim at those people who use other people's creative work from years past as a perpetual annuity--original copyright laws were designed to balance individual creativity and common access, not a gravytrain for family members and lawyers!

Because it refers...

[Kjella]

...to the copyright, you own the copyright. The right is your property.

You never sold your property (copyright) when you sold me a copy (which used to be your property, but now mine).

You still have your copy, but I stole your property (the copyright) in order to make a copy when I took it.

The only real bad thing about the term is that people use it deliberately obtuse - is this copyright, patents, trademarks or WTF is he talking about?

Kjella

Lessig (and ESR) == COOPERATIONIST

[argoff]

In the 1850's there was a political movement called the cooperationists. Basically they wanted the free states to get along with the slave states, while working out some compromise where the southern states could keep slavery.

Not only did their position guarantee that history would mark them irrelavent, and morally shallow, but they were also easy prey to the plantation masters who exploited them to shift the debate away from the slavery issue at hand. In the end they just delayed the inevitable and made the problem at hand worse by playing into the hands of the plantation masters and strengthening their position.

Well I'm sorry, but if that doesn't describe ESR and Lessing to a tee - then what does. Yeah, by shifting the argument away from the copyright debate they've lessened the pain at hand, but in the long run have really screwed us over. and helped consolidate power to the copyright lords. I believe too that they will be proven to be morally shallow and history will make them irrelavent.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[syousef]

Except that right now Microsoft can refuse to sell windows altogether and Intel can refuse to license 5-wire USB cables if it chooses. For all practical purposes they won't, but that's not the case with all products and inventions

The next invention may depend on the use of the last. If that use is restricted so is the ability to innovate. Which is exactly how it works right now as you put it.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[syousef]

They aren't working because they've led to legal nonsenses such as 12 year olds being sued for breaking laws that they either don't understand or that are ignored by the great majority of people.

They aren't working because large companies can buy representation in the the legislature and fund inefficient and wasteful law suits to attempt to scare the majority into laws that most consider unjust.

They aren't working because right now a company could make a major breakthrough and prevent anyone else from using that breakthrough.

I believe they aren't working for anyone but companies who can afford to put their weight behind them.

I'd say I'm glad that my tax dollars aren't used to fund this sort of thing because I don't live in America but I'd be living in a fools paradise. We here in Aus seem to copy what you Americans do whether its good or not. And our politicians are no more moral than yours.

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[shark72]

"They aren't working because they've led to legal nonsenses such as 12 year olds being sued for breaking laws that they either don't understand or that are ignored by the great majority of people."

That singular 12-year-old was named on the paperwork because her mother chose to put her name on the bill when she signed up for broadband. This has nothing to do with copyright law. If you saw fit to sue a local business, and the owner had placed their child's name on the business license, then you might be in the same situation. Can we give this silliness a rest?

At any rate, I don't see how you got from A to B. If, say, you're a car mechanic and you have to take a customer to court for failing to pay a bill -- and this sort of thing happens much more frequently than the RIAA suits -- does it imply that the law that requires customers pay for goods isn't working?

"They aren't working because large companies can buy representation in the the legislature and fund inefficient and wasteful law suits to attempt to scare the majority into laws that most consider unjust."

This is hardly limited to the world of IP, copyright or trademark. Copyright reform would have no effect on this. Big companies will continue to buy, or attempt to buy, our elected officials.

"They aren't working because right now a company could make a major breakthrough and prevent anyone else from using that breakthrough."

Companies are generally in business to make money. If there is not sufficient financial incentive to pursue something, there's a good chance that it won't be pursued. Whether we like it or not, the race to deliver cures for AIDs, cancer, and other ills is largely being led by companies who expect a financial reward to offset the thousands of person-years and millions of dollars they are investing into research.

"I believe they aren't working for anyone but companies who can afford to put their weight behind them."

I've seen innumerable cases of an individual successfully asserting their copyright. Copyright law protects us all.

[OT] Nit

[amplt1337]

Today, Taiwanese businesses are some of the largest producers of computer electronics, including crucial parts like motherboards and monitors, and of course less crucial parts like keyboards and mice.

Less crucial?

Uhh... have you ever tried to use a computer without a keyboard or a mouse? (besides a server that you can ssh into or whatever...)

Re:[OT] Nit

[arose]

Ever tried to ssh without a keyboard? :-D

Re:Is it our right to restrict the use of our idea

[syousef]

That singular 12-year-old was named on the paperwork because her mother chose to put her name on the bill when she signed up for broadband. This has nothing to do with copyright law.

How can you possibly say this had nothing to do with copyright law? It doesn't matter whose name was on her net bill or how they got it at all. All that matters is that she was sued for violating copyright.

If, say, you're a car mechanic and you have to take a customer to court for failing to pay a bill -- and this sort of thing happens much more frequently than the RIAA suits -- does it imply that the law that requires customers pay for goods isn't working?

It simply isn't the same thing. You can't copy the person's work 40 times with a simple action on a PC now can you? Your confusing ideas with effort - thoughts with labour.

This is hardly limited to the world of IP, copyright or trademark. Copyright reform would have no effect on this. Big companies will continue to buy, or attempt to buy, our elected officials.

On this we agree. But does that mean if we are able to remove this reason for buying a politician, that we shouldn't? One less reason is a good thing.

Companies are generally in business to make money. If there is not sufficient financial incentive to pursue something, there's a good chance that it won't be pursued. Whether we like it or not, the race to deliver cures for AIDs, cancer, and other ills is largely being led by companies who expect a financial reward to offset the thousands of person-years and millions of dollars they are investing into research.

...and what if its more profitable to just keep treating the patients than to develop the cure? What if a cure were already available and drug company decided it would put their other divisions that provide other treatment out of business? Is this okay with you that not only would they not develop or sell the cure, but that they'd hinder other companies from doing it? Its not okay with me. The mighty dollar and the well being of the public are most certainly not always served by serving the interests of big business.

Copyright law protects us all.

Tell me that if ever either of us ends up in a legal dispute with a large company over copyright.

I disagree with your blind faith in market forces ultimately benefiting eveyrone and the legal system providing justice for all in all cases.

Foundry Industry

[GAVollink]

You have a very intelligent point here.

The foundary industry itself is divided into many sections. For large cast projects, innovative materials and span engineering... I have no doubt that Europe is number one. The US had the lead there until the mid-1980s. I would point out; here the US didn't loose because of un-protected IP, but lack of R&D - and a general swing to buy foundry products from cheaper (non-US) labor markets.

Cheaper labor markets also exacerbate the problem of loosing the advantage of having well protected patents

However, IIRC the US still leads the technological foundry effort where it comes to micro-foundry (same industry, different sector). US foundry companies have been leading the double-digit micron market in technical advancement for some time, and again - to the point of the article - it doesn't appear to be Europe that's catching up, but Taiwan and Malaysia. Much of this thread has been based on IP and emerging market countries - I'd consider Europe to be established, and to have decent IP protection laws. Micro-foundry is a leading industry that is loosing ground because of process copying and low R&D overhead of emerging economic markets.

Re:Foundry Industry

[Karapet]

Point taken! I'd forgotten that "foundry" is also used by the microelectronics guys - I was thinking of large pieces of metal. It might be worth adding that the whole environmental debate is about changing/replacing methods of manufacture. Corporations that are leaders in these areas tend to remain profitable and keep their employees simply because they renew themselves. One way of stopping jobs leaking from high pay societies is for governments and users to insist that importers show that manufacturers use environmentally sound processes, no matter where the products are made. What's the point of closing down users of dirty processes in one country yet allowing them to continue to supply their markets with the same goods made in the same way in some third world country that doesn't or can't afford to give a damn.

Just like Movies?

[poptones]

Movies in the US definitely in the lead?

Apparently you haven't seen ANY of the big budget flicks (action and otherwise) coming out of Hong Kong and Korea. they can spin the forumla just like we do - the only obstacle is language. Stick jackie Chan and a couple other big time Hollywood stars on a plane, send'em to Hong Kong, and there's no reason at all you couldn't get back a mainstream US hit.

Check out "Natural City" some time and see just how well this part of the world can compete right now.

Here's some examples of why Hollywood's "lead" is far from certain.