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Harvard Study Says Weak Copyright Benefits Society
An anonymous reader writes "Michael Geist summarizes
an important new study on file sharing from economists Felix
Oberholzer-Gee and Koleman Strumpf. The Harvard Business School working paper
finds that given the increase in artistic production along with the
greater public
access conclude that 'weaker copyright protection, it seems, has
benefited society.' The authors point out that file sharing may not
result in
reduced incentives to create if the willingness to pay for
'complements' such as concerts or author speaking tours increases."
These kind of studies are largely pointless. We already know this, and the media industry will not believe it regardless of how many studies come to this conclusion.
Now, where's a media frenzy when you need one? Anyone on here work for a major news corporation?
Excuse for why is your room always messy?
The media industry is not society. Why would they care if society benefits if their bottom line does not also benefit?
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
laws are not passed to benefit society, laws are bought to protect business models.
+1 fashionably cynical
A similar study has been conducted before in the Netherlands: Downloading benefits the Dutch economy (in Dutch, Google Translation). This study had been ordered by the department of Education, Culture and Science, the department of Economic Affairs and the Justice department.
A downloaded movie, CD or game is not equal to a product not sold, say the researchers. Also, "Amongst downloaders of music and film, the percentage of buyers is as high as with non-downloaders, in games, the percentage of buyers even higher. Music downloaders are also more likely to concerts and buy more merchandise. Downloaders buy more games than gamers who never downloaded and movies downloaders buy more DVDs than non-downloaders."
What if you're an artist but only want to create art and not tour all over the place just to make money? I realise that most musicians seem to like doing concerts, but what if that's not what you want to do and just want to record albums?
You just got troll'd!
I think the primary concern is the different views on society that citizens, politicians and corporations have. A report that says that something is good for society isn't so clear cut as you'd like.
For corporations, long copyrights are good for society - they couldn't make quality music otherwise and people want quality music!
Lobbyists persuading politicians means that long copyrights are beneficial for society as well. After all, how would artists make a living otherwise? Very common argument these days and more or less what the common man is thinking, too.
Fight for your digital freedom, join the EFF *now*: http://www.eff.org/support/
Copyright was invented to allow creators to get an income from their creations before the creations are released to the public domain. The state should have stood firm in keeping the copyright protection short. However they didn't, but instead succumbed to the "industry" interests. This resulted to turning every creation in a cash-cow with no expiry date, which obviously hinders innovation and creation: there is little incentive to create a second good work since the first one you created will provide you and your descendants with a steady flow of cash for the next 200 years.
I understand that the above is a bit simplified because it omits the role of the "industry" in the flow of cash. The "industry" pimps will absorb much of the cash intended for the creator (after all, they forced him to sell them for pennies the copyright of his work). This will keep the creator going because he doesn't really earn that much to retire. But it will also degrade his output because he knows that even if he does really-really good with his next creation, it is the "industry" pimps that will get the most out of his work.
Still quite simplified, but I think you get my point: You can't grant quasi-perpetual copyright protection (google "The Mickey Mouse Protection Act") and still expect the same amount of innovative creations.
The study says "Piracy (filesharing) was the driving force behind increased creative output" -- more movies, songs etc., which is complete nonsense. The real reason is the cost of producing and distributing art has dropped due to new software for creating the art and using the web for distribution.
The study encourages artists to use complements -- "speaking tours, concerts, t-shirts etc." to make income. Well, that only works for famous, top 5% artists. What about the remaining 95%? They are not famous enough to make any income from such "complements."
Lawyers and especially that of Politicians who are also Lawyers.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
I am not trying to defend pirates at all here.
But I was just telling somebody about that possibility last week.
I had just watched an interview with an old theater actor which is pretty wealthy today. He said he made most of his money acting in theaters almost everyday, 2 or 3 shows a day. He said: "That was real work, there was almost no TV or movies in those times."
He added: "Pay was god, because not that many people would be crazy enough to do it, but we had a lot of fun and I enjoyed every minute of it".
I then envisioned things like a return of the pendulum, which sometimes seems like something natural in society. Nowadays, a limited set of actors get work making movies/TV shows and get paid the big bucks. Either you get famous and make millions or you starve. A lot more actors/musicians would get work if they had to do live shows. I can see how more diversity, thus availability would benefit society. Of course, the big names would lose but this is another story already largely covered here before..
I guess the point I am trying to make is that even if technology is involved, like with nature, society seem sometimes driven by a magical hand that cause a return of the pendulum at some point when we have reached a breaking point in one direction ;-)) Like nature, society sometimes seem to tend to come back to an equilibrium by itself !!
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
The authors fail to take into account that the displacement rate would very easily be affected by the ease of filesharing which is a function of its legality. They treat the displacement rate as fixed.
At the present, there are many instances where individuals buy instead of download. For simplicity, this can be separated into three groups: 1) People who could very easily have downloaded (they have a fast internet connection, the required software and the knowledge how to) yet still choose to buy, 2) People who could not easily have downloaded for physical reasons (e.g. lack of speedy internet connection), 3) People who could not have downloaded for reasons of mental blocks, for example, lack of understanding of how to apply cracks, or worry over being caught.
If downloading is make legal, there is likely to be an explosion of technologies to enable filesharing and make it even easier for group 1, and remove all barriers for group 3. Group 2 should dwindle over time in line with the spread of fast broadband. Off the top of my head you would be highly likely to see a couple of NEW technologies;
1) a cell phone app that lets you take a picture of the front of a DVD cover, and automatically schedule its downloading to your computer.
2) a program that shows you the release dates of software or music ahead for the next year, letting you one-click the automatic scheduling for whenever it's available up to six months ahead.
each of these could have a very significant impact on the displacement rate itself. If no. 1 was available, I can honestly say that I would never buy a DVD again unless I was swimming in cash and feeling extremely lazy. If you treat the displacement rate as NOT being a function of ease which is partly a function of the legality of filesharing, you're an idiot.
This is a study that looks at other study's major findings, they are:
Illegal burning of DVDs and downloading make up 5.2% of movie viewing; unpaid consumption reduces paid consumption by 3.5%.
For every pirated CD, sales fall by 0.42 units. Estimated effect is not robust to including year fixed effects and estimating separate displacement effects for high- and low-income countries.
Students with faster internet connections are more likely to sample music; sampling increases the propensity to buy.
Free broadcasts of movies on TV increase DVD sales on Amazon by 118% during the first week after the broadcast. Piracy does not affect this increase in demand.
Most of the people working in the record industry are just there to get the media to the stores. Since it costs very little to put songs on the internet, the business model of selling the songs in stores doesn't make sense. The record industry is dieing slowly because of this. Fortunately. artists are not in the same predicament. They have more then just that one way(which wasn't that much either) of making money.
Get a job like the rest of us? You can't just label yourself an artist and go around whining about loss of income if you don't want to go the extra mile. I'm terribly sorry for people's overly romantic view of stardom, but it just sucks, especially if you're not a star (yet).
By the way, pretty much any artist has a side job. In my experience, the more serious the job is, the less serious the artist is about being an artist and vice versa. There is only a very limited subset of artists that can make a living from their art.
It is truly crippling to see the mental fails that keep being propogated by the press and even supposedly academia here. "Piracy (filesharing) was the driving force behind increased creative output". It's simply not true that one caused the other. There isn't an artist or an amorphous group of artists who are outputting more per artist because they are thinking ex-ante "shit I'm going to get paid less than I used to so I better produce more". That might work for widgets and industry but for artistic output? Total rubbish. I'm not entering into the debate about the pros and cons of filesharing by the way but this sort of causative fail is just depressing and so utterly prevalent.
It had always been that way through history. All performing artists (actors, musicians, dancers etc) were paid for their live performances (surprising, huh?). The advent of technology that enabled the recording of performances gave the illusion that one (studio) performance should be enough to make a living and be rich. However this was a situation that worked only temporarily. It worked because the demand for the creations of the artists was high and the mass-copying machines were too expensive and controlled by few distribution companies.
While this situation worked, laws were passed to extend copyrights. The distribution companies were able to pass the law because nobody in the society cared. It was a case of company defending their copyrighted work from other companies. The average Joe couldn't think of a vinyl copying machine (and those who could knew that they wouldn't be able to afford it), so he didn't really care to object extending copyrights. It seemed fair at that time. However now the technology for copying performances exists, so the game now is the (super-extended) copyright holders vs the society. The copyright holders are so gonna lose and they know it. They just try to make a buck while they can.
And the artists? Well, since the artists have already been deprived from the copyright of their work, it's all over touring for them like the old days. Not that they don't like it.
"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
I wish people would actually read the constitution.
"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts," : not to promote the interests of monied pockets of power.
"securing limited Time to Authors and Inventors," : limited time (we've gone over this time and time again), but *Authors* and *Inventors*
The people that wrote the constitution were damn smart people. Too bad we stopped listening. Copyright is supposed to benefit all of us so of course a limited copyright span that balances the rights of *Authors* (not Corporations) vs. the public is the best. Here's to another study that didn't need to be done.
This working paper is distributed for purposes of comment and discussion only. It may not be reproduced without permission of the copyright holder.
"I have downloaded hundreds and hundreds of records, why would I care if somebody downloads ours?" Robin Pecknold
Nope, you were talking about someone who didn't want to tour.
No, I was talking about someone who only wanted to make studio albums.
Don't expect to be paid for the work you WANT to do if nobody is willing to pay you to do it.
But people have always been willing to pay for it.
Tell you what, if the artist creates by their personal hand EACH AND EVERY COPY, distributes it and ensures quality control on the recording and its copy, then this is when he did something to get the copy to us and he can ask to be paid.
That's retarded.
But if I take MY CD recorder, MY blank CDR, use MY time to create MY copy, why the hell should I pay HIM for MY work?
That's twice as retarded. That's like saying that all the worth of an album is the manufacturing costs.
You just got troll'd!
The Harvard Business School working paper finds that given the increase in artistic production along with the greater public access conclude that "weaker copyright protection, it seems, has benefited society."
Wait! Don't tell them that yet!
Look at the explosion of user generated content on the Internet. People everywhere are creating their own media and cutting out the traditional copyright CABAL precisely because the traditionalists are broken. As long as the buggy-whip manufacturers continue to believe that their business model is viable, they will not innovate. As long as they don't innovate, the silent hand of the market will continue to move artists out of the CABAL and into the independent new media space. As soon as the CABAL realizes they are failing because they are wrong, they might start trying to do just enough of the right thing to survive while retaining their payola, large venue control, and other forms of market manipulation.
Don't tip them off yet - let them die of chronic denial. :)
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
its really all in the eye of the beholder.
However, being the nice person I am, you get to experience my world.
So if I hear a band that I really like (it doesn't happen often as i'm a blues rock fan and todays music.... uhmm... sucks) chances are that i'll download a song or two... although I can't remember the last time I downloaded a song by a new band
I digress... So if I were to do that, and enjoyed the song, I might enjoy 3 other songs max on the album... most CD's now days are just horrid vs the older days (i'm only thirtyish) when the whole album was a gem to listen to.
So if I really really really enjoy it, i'll buy the CD. Same with video games. The last CD I bought was a "best of" of Clapton's and the last video game was Call of Duty 4.
So... ignoring the video game perspective, I would think that if I were a fan of todays music (and I have done this following scenario) I would do as such...
1 - hear a song and maybe like it.
2 - download the album to see if its just a "one song album"
3 - if i'm happy with the results of 2, I might buy the CD.
HERES THE KICKER
4 - if I really like the band, i'll go to their concert and spend some serious cash.
So... who does my personal actions benefit? Lets see... we have the band itself... ticketmaster (the one big company), the local people selling stuff at the concert, whoever owns the land that i'm parking on, the convienience stores in between my house and the concert destination...
I'm sure there is more, but my point is that good music makes money. The RIAA just thinks they can "protect" garbage when they are actually just chasing their tail.
And no.. i'm not sorry for being long winded.
Seven years is pretty short, but considering that the purpose of copyrights and patents is to "promote the useful arts and sciences", twenty years is reasonable. That's all you get to keep a patent for, why should copyright last longer? The whole purpose of copyright is to get creative works into the public domain.
Free Martian Whores!
That's like saying that all the worth of an album is the manufacturing costs.
I have bad news for you. Worth is not determined by the producer. It is determined by the consumer.
Interestingly, you say that we can't just say that it should be free and have it be that way, and you're right. WE didn't say that, and that is not what is happening.
What is happening is much the same thing as what would happen to Gold if it were suddenly as abundant as Hydrogen, the only value that Gold has is tied to it's scarcity, if the market is flooded with Gold, there is no value.
This is what is happening to Copyright, it used to be that distribution and production made things of a Copyrightable nature scarce (Maybe not scarce per se, but certainly limited.) The internet has made it so that this is not the case, nearly anyone can produce for next to nothing and distribution CAN be had for so ridiculously close to nothing that it's practically indistinguishable. The value has evaporated, the people that are willing to pay for such things will get fewer and fewer as the obstacles become smaller and smaller, and the value gets less and less.
The day may soon be upon us that the hypothetical artist you refer to as only making albums, will have so little general value as to be only capable of generating income from devoted fans that bestow value on the works and know he can only produce if they are willing to pay. To go back to your point about composers working on commission "back in the day", this will once again become the model, only the people commissioning the works will be the patrons themselves through their donations/purchases rather than a rich aristocrat.
Finally a point that you haven't touched on, if we suddenly came upon a replication technology that allowed us to cheaply and easily reproduce anything and everything (Much like the internet has done with media) should we start making laws to control what people can and can't make with their own replicators? In the name of GM making a buck should it be against the law to replicate a '69 Camaro Z28, even when it costs them nothing for me to do so, conversely I had to expend my own energies, time and presumably money making the duplicate? If so, why?
lol, I have bad news for you, you're so wrong, and the record industry is a good example of that, but an even better example of that is the oil industry. Seriously, think about the oil industry, how does the consumer determine the worth of oil? He doesn't, he needs the oil so he'll pay for it no matter the price. And yes, the price here equals the worth, cause if you're gonna pay the price it means it's worth it to you. Of course in the record industry there's a bit less price elasticity, but I'm addressing your generalistic claim.
Why is it that all the Slashdotters I ever argue with have a shitty grasp of basic economics?
You just got troll'd!
'Armchair Pirates' (lol) don't force anyone to give anything for free. They redistribute for free what they already have access to, if I was an artist I would say they would be doing me a favour by distributing my work for me. If you mean forcing people to give away for free by undermining copyright.. how is not asking for money worse than forcing people to give you money?
Basically you decide arbitrarily that studio recorded music should be free, and therefore as a sort of feedback loop that makes it inherently unworthy of any money. You can't just say "this should be free, make it free" for something that's not free and that the market validated as something you can ask money for.
Firstly, information is already free. The law might want to change the way reality works but you're not going to win an argument by saying 'it's true because it's written down', even religions have gotten over that notion. What copyright puts a price on is your liberty, not the information it purports to protect. Even taxes have to benefit those who pay them in some way, copyright does nothing of the sort.
Oh, Market Validated. Now I see how I've been wrong.. because people have been paying for it they should be forced to pay for it! Uh, wait, lets think about what market means for a start. Markets are about exchange of goods. If I get given a copy of a song by someone then that is an exchange between me and them not me and the artist. If there are infinite goods available for exchange for free then the market value is zero. That doesn't stop you charging for it but people who buy it aren't paying the market value of the song.
Most Slashdotters are libertarians, but when it comes to stuff you want for free you all turn to commies.
Damn, now I know why you got modded troll.. although flamebait would have been more accurate. Maybe you should look up what libertarian and communism mean and realise that libertarian ideals are kinda the anti-hero of copyright. I'm not even sure how you think communism is relevant to anything in this thread at all.
Finally a point that you haven't touched on, if we suddenly came upon a replication technology that allowed us to cheaply and easily reproduce anything and everything (Much like the internet has done with media) should we start making laws to control what people can and can't make with their own replicators? In the name of GM making a buck should it be against the law to replicate a '69 Camaro Z28, even when it costs them nothing for me to do so, conversely I had to expend my own energies, time and presumably money making the duplicate? If so, why?
Good question. If you wanted things to be "fair", then by doing the replication, the only things you're sparing GM are the entire manufacturing costs. So if you wanted to be "fair", you'd pay GM the price of the car minus its manufacturing costs, so that it would get the same money to pay for its designers and whatever else that is paid for when you buy a car, minus the manufacturing.
If you didn't pay anything to GM because you think it's all in the manufacturing, GM wouldn't have any incentive to make any car if they're only going to sell one, and neither would any other car manufacturer, so you'd successfully kill the auto industry, and be doomed to replicate cars that were made before the replication craze started, which means that even in 200 years people would drive 20th and 21st century cars.
The actual sensible solution that would save the auto industry from dying and make things fair would come from a license system, in which you wouldn't buy a car but a license to duplicate a car, much in the same way as software licenses. The licensing costs would of course depend on how much GM thinks it should get paid for a particular car model, and also how much GM would think the buyer would be ready to cash out, just like it currently does right now, except with a different kind of product.
You just got troll'd!
These kind of studies are largely pointless. We already know this, and the media industry will not believe it regardless of how many studies come to this conclusion.
It is equally pointless to post a summary of this economic paper to slashdot. Everyone here "already knows" the answers.
Let me explain what it means when an economist says "society benefits". (By the way, I am one.) If a policy change causes Person A to lose $1 and Person B to gain $2, then "society benefits". If a policy change causes Persons A and B and C each to lose $1,000, but Person D gains $5,000, then "society benefits".
If you RTFpdf, you'll notice one argument they make: While file sharing may have caused the music industry (including artists) to lose money, sales of MP3 players skyrocketed! Therefore, it is plausible that "society benefited."
Now, see why it's not so simple? We may prefer artists to get $1, rather than Apple and Sandisk to get $2.
It gets even worse. The main argument of the paper is on page 6:
Three conditions need to hold for [file sharing] to undermine the
incentives for artistic production: [1] original works and copies on file-sharing networks
must be reasonably close substitutes; [2] artists and the entertainment industry must not be
able to shift from previous sources of income to the (similarly profitable) sale of
complements; and [3] falling incomes must be an important-enough motivator for artists to
reduce production. Only if all three conditions hold will file sharing hurt social welfare.
Translation: Social welfare goes down if:
[1] the mp3's you share are just as good as the one's you'd rip yourself.
[2] the extra concert/tshirt revenues you make are less than the revenue lost to file sharing.
[3] Some artists would have to quit the business if their pay goes down.
[1] and [3] are laughably true. One could debate whether [2] is true, but certainly there are artists who make good music, but would not survive when the music execs tell them they have to bring in more revenue from concerts.
Holy crap, you're using a comparison with the oil industry to strengthen your argument for copyright? That's kinda like saying murder is OK because we have wars.
Good question. If you wanted things to be "fair", then by doing the replication, the only things you're sparing GM are the entire manufacturing costs. So if you wanted to be "fair", you'd pay GM the price of the car minus its manufacturing costs, so that it would get the same money to pay for its designers and whatever else that is paid for when you buy a car, minus the manufacturing.
The manufacturing costs are the only things to spare, they already designed the car so those costs have already been met (even if they had to take out a loan to do it). What I think you mean is that they would be denied a return on their investment, the question is should someone who never signed a contract with GM be obliged to provide a return on their investment.
If you didn't pay anything to GM because you think it's all in the manufacturing, GM wouldn't have any incentive to make any car if they're only going to sell one, and neither would any other car manufacturer, so you'd successfully kill the auto industry, and be doomed to replicate cars that were made before the replication craze started, which means that even in 200 years people would drive 20th and 21st century cars.
Leaving aside how you attribute the death of the auto industry to peoples intent rather than natural progression, why would we need the auto industry in its previous form at that point? There will still be plenty of incentive for new designs.. for example more eco-friendly cars and safer cars. When you run out of incentives there's no point in doing any more work, the question is not whether they will get paid, it is how. If you can't think how people would get the money considering we've done things from providing countrywide support networks funded by charity to putting a man on the moon funded by political desire then perhaps you should exercise your imagination more.
So now in order to make sure I make a profit on my paintings I have to book a speaking tour? Or I need to lecture on my crappy little casual game software. This is bullshite and pointless.
Why bother
Yeah I'd watch the grammar and spelling flames there stewie. You aint got so great a hand at it yer damnself!
Why bother
Wow, don't you think that was a hell of a stretch? Even a double stretch. I talked about the oil industry to prove the other guy's claim that "Worth is not determined by the producer. It is determined by the consumer." is wrong. Nothing whatsoever to do with copyrights. And even then I don't see how it's like murder and war. Seriously, get subtle when you're trolling, or if you can't get subtle, do like me and throw insults in the mix.
You just got troll'd!
You mean like a Coke and a fistful of fries? Supersize me!
Leaving aside how you attribute the death of the auto industry to peoples intent rather than natural progression, why would we need the auto industry in its previous form at that point?
That's completely off topic. You're extrapolating on the situation of the analogy used to make a point that has little connection with the subject the analogy was used for. But sure, why not.
There will still be plenty of incentive for new designs.. for example more eco-friendly cars and safer cars.
So you have that car duplicator thing, and you don't want to pay the license I talked about to GM for duplicating their cars, am I right? So what's the incentive for GM to innovate anything if they're not gonna get any money for it? It pains me to even have to explain it (seriously, more people should read about Adam Smith, it's getting old always explaining why corporations do the things they do), but GM doesn't care about eco-friendly cars, or safer cars, it only cares about money. So where's the incentive if you don't pay GM something for their new cars? (Also, what's wrong with my license idea? Please address that).
If you can't think how people would get the money considering we've done things from providing countrywide support networks funded by charity to putting a man on the moon funded by political desire then perhaps you should exercise your imagination more.
lol.. what? Are you trying to say that car makers should be publicly funded either through charity, or be entirely nationalised, paid for by tax payers money and told what to do by the government? Let me guess, would you use 5-year plans like communists do?
Seriously, it's getting painful to listen to people's suggestions that wouldn't begin to hold together if someone was mad enough to even try these.
You just got troll'd!
... it cares only about benefiting itself. IP is the new Last Frontier of land grabs, and unlike actual land they can create an infinite amount of the stuff to control.
Typos hardly count, and I see two in my post. I blame the lousy forum tools. What grammar do you take offense to in my post?
While it indeed was a typo, it would still be relevant to my intent. Likewise, I could have typed "Some" chick (as in pick any half-way decent looking chick on the planet, like they do now), same schtick.
So we can get away from my side note and focus on my point. Easing copyright seems to encourage copycat "cultural production", especially at the lowest common denominator level. Hence, we get Pussy Cat Dolls (x15 knock-off girl groups)and Britney Spears (x25 knock-off talentless bimbos). This has been true since forever (hair bands of the 80s, disco music of the 70s, peace & love music of the 60s). Easing copyright doesn't encourage more, diverse, better, whatever music, it only encourages more of the same revenue-generating music. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but the slant to the story is that easy copyright laws are somehow leading us to cultural enlightenment.
I just can't get Vanilla Ice out of my head, trying to explain how his riff is completely different than Queen's riff.
Professional musicians still make their living by performing live, like they've done for thousands of years. Even the famous ones. Theoretically a recording contract gets you royalties from sales of records, but in a standard recording contract all the expenses of recording, manufacturing, packaging, distributing and marketing the record are deducted from the royalties, so the musician generally gets ZERO actual cash. Except for a tiny minority who have the clout and business savvy to negotiate their own contracts, even well established musicians still get their income by performing. A century of recording technology hasn't changed that basic fact. So if you only want to record and not perform, better think of it as a hobby.
Sorry? just couldn't parse this exactly: Data are plural, thus data "indicate"--they don't "indicates".
Why bother
That's completely off topic. You're extrapolating on the situation of the analogy used to make a point that has little connection with the subject the analogy was used for. But sure, why not.
What was off topic?
So you have that car duplicator thing, and you don't want to pay the license I talked about to GM for duplicating their cars, am I right? So what's the incentive for GM to innovate anything if they're not gonna get any money for it? It pains me to even have to explain it (seriously, more people should read about Adam Smith, it's getting old always explaining why corporations do the things they do), but GM doesn't care about eco-friendly cars, or safer cars, it only cares about money. So where's the incentive if you don't pay GM something for their new cars? (Also, what's wrong with my license idea? Please address that).
The incentive is that their old business model doesn't work and they need a new one, they can always move to a different industry if they don't want to design cars. You still haven't explained why people won't pay them to design new cars if they want new car designs. If there is a market for it then people will pay for it, if there isn't then they won't. Not paying for something is only a problem if you made an exchange, if you copied their car design you have not made an exchange and therefore they are not damaged by your lack of patronage. If you told them you were going to pay them for a design and then didn't then that would be a problem as they have exchanged their time and effort for your promise of payment.
lol.. what? Are you trying to say that car makers should be publicly funded either through charity, or be entirely nationalised, paid for by tax payers money and told what to do by the government? Let me guess, would you use 5-year plans like communists do?
I'm saying that where people don't find a business model there is still money if there is a demand. If you insist on a business example then just look at building architects. The burden for funding is between those who want to invest in car designs and those who want to make money out of car designs. I am certainly NOT saying they should be funded in any particular way, you appear to be the only one saying that.
Seriously, it's getting painful to listen to people's suggestions that wouldn't begin to hold together if someone was mad enough to even try these.
Nobody is forcing you to look at the screen, are they? If it helps you feel better, I won't cry if you stop posting.
Insults? I thought you were just throwing wildly inaccurate statements into the mix, like calling me a troll for using a simile to show why I think your argument is poor. I find that ironic.
As you apparently couldn't understand my use of a simile I'll spell it out for you; The oil industry have a history of being far more evil bastards than anyone thinks the RIAA are. Using them as an example of why we should have the choice whether to pay people if they cannot set the price is, I would wager, counter-productive.
As well as that, oil is a limited resource governed by the effects of scarcity. If someone mined some oil and it was possible to copy that oil at no expense to the person who mined it then I certainly wouldn't be paying them for every bit of oil that got copied. If you would, then that's your call and I have no problem with that.
*cough* I meant shouldn't have the choice in that middle paragraph. I also shouldn't post while I'm in a hurry.
Bank Account Number 2753 9482 6732
Routing Number 103000143
Password gep493m
Social Security Number 428636487
Credit Card Number 4268 1664 7623 9264
These belong to user name Opportunity02
Weak copyright is beneficial.
Feel free to copy this information
and use it.
Score & Karma: SASA: Slashdot Approval Seekers Anonymous
Data indicate something, they don't indicates something. Perhaps I am being pedantic, but I figured slashdot was the one place left on the Internet where such pedantry was encouraged.
Data is plural datum is singular thus datum indicate data indicates.
Why bother
from the article:
"Our approach, however, reflects the original intent of copyright protection, which was conceived not as a welfare program for authors but to encourage the creation of new works."
I think you might want to re-read your post. I agree the word "data" is plural. I don't agree that a plural subject takes a singular verb conjugation like your example provides.
Replace your subject with "dog" and "dogs", and I think you'd agree that dogs indicate, but a dog indicates.
My bad got backwards you are correct, don't know what I was thinking. But I can parse that sentence now.
Why bother
Yes. Is something wrong with that? A software project that has not been touched in 7 years is dead. The whole point of limited times on copyright is the old works drop into the public domain and are free for use without restrictions. I think that, at least for software, you will be hard-pressed to find someone who is not willing to call a 7 year old piece of software "old".
GPL is a legal hack to get around copyright being too strong. If copyright weakens then the GPL becomes both weaker and less important.
Centralization breaks the internet.
Yes, we all know that the vast majority of authors are invited on speaking tours, so they should give their books away. The very wording used in this summary points to a biased study. Not surprising.
Open Source: Eroding the Digital Divide
I think the argument he's trying to make is that if there's another possible revenue stream (concerts, public speaking) then you shouldn't be allowed to make money from another (recordings, books).
I mean it's not fair having two incomes, is it? Call the waaaaaghmbulance!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
What was off topic?
The issues of the auto industry, they're irrelevant (do you really read my entire comments in their entirety?)
The incentive is that their old business model doesn't work
We're talking about car duplication, right? Of course their business model isn't going to work if you kill it by making counterfeit copies of their products. That's like saying paper money doesn't work anymore if you print out one trillion fake dollar bills that look real.
if you copied their car design you have not made an exchange and therefore they are not damaged by your lack of patronage.
God fucking damn, if you're not fucking retarded then you're one hell of a successful troll. Do I need to point out the obvious? If you don't buy their car and make a copy instead then they're damaged in that they're not getting a sale. I'm familiar with the way you morons think so in your feeble mind it won't register as anything obvious, so scale things up if you're even capable of it and think, think of how many car sales if EVERYBODY duplicated their cars. Then how many cars would they sell? 0? 1? Do you see now how they would be damaged, or are you too much of a cretin to see how that works out? Or are you going to argue that they should have seen this coming and moved on to something different, which is just as retarded? You can't destroy an industry and act like it's fair game. I wish you to live in a world where duplicating everything is possible and legal, and see how you like never getting any new computers or telephones because everyone just copies what's already out there and won't pay a dime and ruined all these industries. See how that works out.
Nobody is forcing you to look at the screen, are they?
No it's okay, if I keep trolling you libertardians there must be a good reason. I think the reason is that I get a kick out of seeing you suckers struggle with your pathetic and nearly non-existent grasp of how the economy and to a larger extent how reality works. No wonder no one listens to your laughable opinions but yourselves.
You just got troll'd!
The oil industry have a history of being far more evil bastards than anyone thinks the RIAA are. Using them as an example of why we should have the choice whether to pay people if they cannot set the price is, I would wager, counter-productive.
That's irrelevant. What's relevant is that there are products out there that people will pay for no matter the price, hence proving that "Worth is not determined by the producer" is a bullshit claim. I could have used the example of food too, but that's a crappier example because people can produce their own food.
God damnit you suckers are so full of shit, you can't just take the meaning of a point, you have to take the analogy used in the point (once again) and stretch the fuck out of it to end up talking about shit that has nothing to do with it. Don't be fooled, the only reason why you're being modded up is ideological, no matter how poor and invalid your claims are you're in Slashdot's ideological home turf, and that's all it takes when it comes to the red hot topic of... ..copying music for free.
You just got troll'd!
The issues of the auto industry, they're irrelevant (do you really read my entire comments in their entirety?)
I did, which is why I mentioned the auto industry.. you were following on from a previous posters metaphor involving GM. I guess it's only off topic if you're not the one posting?
God fucking damn, if you're not fucking retarded then you're one hell of a successful troll.
Wow, how rude. I'm thinking all the time you supposedly spent reading about economics could have been more productively used to learn some subtlety, at the least.
Do I need to point out the obvious? If you don't buy their car and make a copy instead then they're damaged in that they're not getting a sale. I'm familiar with the way you morons think so in your feeble mind it won't register as anything obvious, so scale things up if you're even capable of it and think, think of how many car sales if EVERYBODY duplicated their cars. Then how many cars would they sell? 0? 1? Do you see now how they would be damaged, or are you too much of a cretin to see how that works out? Or are you going to argue that they should have seen this coming and moved on to something different, which is just as retarded? You can't destroy an industry and act like it's fair game. I wish you to live in a world where duplicating everything is possible and legal, and see how you like never getting any new computers or telephones because everyone just copies what's already out there and won't pay a dime and ruined all these industries. See how that works out.
I rather doubt that most tech companies are as blind as you are to the possibilities so I'd be happy to take my chances.
No it's okay, if I keep trolling you libertardians there must be a good reason. I think the reason is that I get a kick out of seeing you suckers struggle with your pathetic and nearly non-existent grasp of how the economy and to a larger extent how reality works. No wonder no one listens to your laughable opinions but yourselves.
Wow. What was that supposed to achieve? Actually, don't answer that.. I'm not inclined to read any more of your wanton abuse, not least of all because you're so bad at it.