Copyrights, protesters, and those in their 20s.
on
At The Crossroads
·
· Score: 1
First, like a lot of other people who have already posted, I personally feel that I have a bit at stake with copyrights. I am a writer, and at the moment a work of mine is finished, it is technically under US copyright. I've only registered for copyright once (which doesn't mean much, only that a copy is in the Library of Congress and you paid $20 to get it there), but everything else goes under "unregistered copyright." Now, I can understand why an *individual* deserves copyright. However, I fail to understand why, if I go to a publisher and want my book/poetry printed for the masses, the *publisher* gets copyright advantages. What ends up happening is that the publisher can give me, say, a 10% cut of what gets sold, even though I was the intellectual backing behind the whole thing and without me, there'd be no business for the publisher. (And yes, I do understand that much work goes into making the actual, physical books). Similar things happen in the recording industry, I would imagine.
In other words, I've got no problems with copyrights themselves. What I have a problem with is those copyrights going to someone other than the creator. (I also have a problem with patents going to people who "create" things that existed for millions of years, e.g. plants/natural pharmeceuticals). And quite simply, the advantage in the internet, and much of the new desktop publishing software available is that the creators become the distributors as well. We can skip the intermediary and keep our copyrights to ourselves. *Now* if someone wants to rip off a couple of copies of what I make, it's not such a big deal, because I'm getting 100% of what is sold instead of 10%. If I could live on 10% before, I can still make a living even if only 1/10 of the people buy what I wrote and then make copies for nine other friends.
Hmm. And I'm in my early twenties, too.
On that note, "college age protesters whose arguments don't make any sense" is rather harsh. A friend of mine was in D.C. in April and I have been impressed with how much she knows on the IMF, World Bank, etc. If you sit down and talk with some protesters, they actually make a great deal of sense, because many of them are spending their college careers studying the very things they are protesting. The problem is that many think they need to dumb down their message for the masses (which they don't), and then the DC police chief is able to dismiss these folks by calling them "kids with a cause." And as for not seeing AARP members at protests, may I remind you that Ralph Nader, the AFL-CIO, and the "Raging Grannies" were all at DC (Okay, they're not *all* retirement age). These people impress me the most, because they have the most to lose!
Slashdot Mirror
In other words, I've got no problems with copyrights themselves. What I have a problem with is those copyrights going to someone other than the creator. (I also have a problem with patents going to people who "create" things that existed for millions of years, e.g. plants/natural pharmeceuticals). And quite simply, the advantage in the internet, and much of the new desktop publishing software available is that the creators become the distributors as well. We can skip the intermediary and keep our copyrights to ourselves. *Now* if someone wants to rip off a couple of copies of what I make, it's not such a big deal, because I'm getting 100% of what is sold instead of 10%. If I could live on 10% before, I can still make a living even if only 1/10 of the people buy what I wrote and then make copies for nine other friends.
Hmm. And I'm in my early twenties, too.
On that note, "college age protesters whose arguments don't make any sense" is rather harsh. A friend of mine was in D.C. in April and I have been impressed with how much she knows on the IMF, World Bank, etc. If you sit down and talk with some protesters, they actually make a great deal of sense, because many of them are spending their college careers studying the very things they are protesting. The problem is that many think they need to dumb down their message for the masses (which they don't), and then the DC police chief is able to dismiss these folks by calling them "kids with a cause." And as for not seeing AARP members at protests, may I remind you that Ralph Nader, the AFL-CIO, and the "Raging Grannies" were all at DC (Okay, they're not *all* retirement age). These people impress me the most, because they have the most to lose!