I'm OK with the 20 year term if it is necessary, but I object to the term "exploit" if it is meant to be pejorative. It wouldn't be a negative exploitation, it would be a positive exploitation - using public domain stories to make a new art form. Many of Disney's successes in animation did exactly this, but I don't feel that they "exploited" anyone. I do, however, think that the fact that their derivative arts from the 30s are still covered by copyright is ridiculous.
I think I agree, although ostensibly the IP laws are implemented for the good of society. In practice, I think they benefit content creators and media companies more than society at large. If you believe that they are in place for the good of society, then it is more of a socialist concept (or at least populist). If you believe that they are in place to benefit a certain class of people, then it is pretty clearly plutocratic. I hear both motivations cited, so it's probably a fuzzy blend of the two.:)
I mean, it's pretty clear that a 90+ year term cannot be justified based on socialist principles!
Yes, but Netflix only has the money to produce these new shows because of the money they make renting out their massive back catalogue, much of which is over 5 years old.
Let me preface this by saying that it is very hard to imagine what no copyright or short copyright would look like, since it has been so long. That said, I can certainly see services like Netflix prospering by offering their back catalog - whether it is copyrighted or not. Not too many people are interested in keeping a huge personal catalog if someone will do it for them. In fact, we might get more new content as the streaming services sought to differentiate themselves. Remember that while I think 5 years is probably sufficient to get new content, I allowed that 20 years was a slam-dunk, so don't pin me down to 5 years:) In any event, if we tried 5 years for a while and it looked like it was going to be a disaster, we could always extend it. God forbid we have too little new entertainment content for a while... the peasants may riot! I'm being sarcastic, of course...
so why would anyone ever pay for film rights again?
The only reason I would care is if it stops novels from being written in the first place. I don't care if a bunch of Harry Potter movies come out from various studios 5 years after the book that has already brought the author 5 years of salary. Besides, I assume trademarks would still be valid, so you probably wouldn't be able to label them as "Harry Potter" movies.
Copyright that short would seriously limit the author's potential earnings
I'm fine with that, so long as it is enough of an incentive to get them to make more stuff.
I agree that life+70 and life+90 are too long
Yup. Ridiculous. 5 may indeed be too short. I can see as long as 15 or 20 being optimal, but honestly it is very hard to conjecture. I think we should try an experiment with one area of copyright that doesn't really matter so much - say TV or movies - and then go from there. Some of the greatest books ever written were authored when copyrights were much shorter though.
Don't we already know the answer to this? BitTorrenters.
So then, the same situation we are in right now?
My whole thesis is that things would change very little from where they are right now, where we have sites in other jurisdictions (Pirate Bay) indexing torrents. If you can close them down today, you could close them down under a commercial only application of copyright law.
I wouldn't disagree. At least, not if the goal is universal care. The system we had before Obamacare was terrible... an unfunded mandate to provide emergency care without any funding to do so. I may not be in love with Obamacare, but actually funding the care is a huge improvement.
Finally, the compromise between socialism and capitalism is generally recognised as something called social democracy,
Yeah, agreed. While I definitely have libertarian leanings, I'm pragmatic to a fault. I think that IP law is probably valuable, but like most things that government gets involved with, the scope has grown and special interests have trumped society's interests. That said, I just want a reset, a reform - not a repeal. I think it is fine for software to be covered under copyright, I just think the 90 year coverage is senseless. I don't see the need to cover it with both copyright and patents, though.
I suppose that would make things simpler. At least then the entire population wouldn't have to be taught the intricacies of the BitTorrent protocol and other computer protocols in addition to the intricacies of copyright law.
When you put what would formerly have been in the public domain under government control in the name of benefiting society, yeah, I'd call that a form of socialism. That they implement the mechanism through a quasi-property ownership model is irrelevant to me. In fact, they don't always use the market model - they also utilize ASCAP for proportional distribution of income.
We have Spirit Air here in the US that is similar to RyanAir. The last time I flew it, the steward actually said, "Look out the window, folks, because that is the ONLY thing on this plane that is free." They charge for luggage AND carry-on luggage. They charge for seat assignments. And, of course, the seats do not recline. My brother does get those $10 fares because he takes these little short trips down to Florida and only travels with a small "personal item" sized pack and cares not where he sits.
It doesn't seem clear to me that it was referring to elective surgery, as you just wrote "for a surgery" and you mentioned health insurance, which normally doesn't cover elective surgery.
It rather depends on your health insurance. Most would cover prostate cancer treatments, though the course he chose may or may not have been covered - it's all academic since he didn't have coverage.
because even a discounted rate is unaffordable
Well, it certainly dinged his retirement savings, but it was affordable. He ended up moving into a much smaller house (condo, actually) in a much more modest place. But you can bet he went after every dollar that he could. Hell, he had nothing else to do all day.
Note that I'm not holding this up as some ideal - just pointing out that there is in fact room for negotiation.
The Intellectual Property you own is part of your capital, just as much as the physical property you own.
So when the government interferes with the free market, but they use words like "property" in the law, it is capitalist? OK.
I'll grant you that they piggyback on the real property system that is already in place, but come on... government granted monopolies for the benefit of society?
and without government regulation called copyright, nobody would ever spend money developing software
I would point to the Linux kernel as a direct counter-point. Companies spend all sorts of money on that, and while it technically does rely on copyright for the "copy left" provision, I don't see how that helps a company's bottom line. The BSDs also mostly have corporate sponsors.
In a socialist society, all software would be owned by the state and made available for everybody to use
And a compromise between the wild-west of free market capitalism and the pure socialism would look like copyright: exclusive rights for a period of time, followed by a release into the public domain. You know, for the benefit of society.
That this ill-informed libertarian rant
I'll give you "Libertarian", but ill-informed? How is it ill-informed? What factual error have I made? We are having a semantic argument about the word "socialism", which is kind of fuzzy to begin with.
Maybe government interference in the free market isn't "socialism", but it is certainly not "capitalism".
No, he's right - there is no way to discern the races using a scientific methodology. Example: define Barack Obama's race using the scientific method. Even in society, you'll hear him referred to sometimes as black, other times as mixed.
Yes, complex. If I click on a link and download something made available for free, might I be liable? How do I check? What if it kicks of a torrent instead of a straight http download? Then am I more liable? What if the person represented themselves as having permission to distribute? What if I have permission to download but not distribute, but I click on a torrent link somewhere? What if I pay for something that was not legally licensed to the seller and then download it? Torrent it?
What if I tape something off of the radio? What if I make an entire mix tape from radio songs? What if I give the tape to my girlfriend? What if she asks me to tape the stuff off of the radio for her? Can I copy a CD that I own and give it to my mom? What about a tape of a live concert that I made? Can I give it away? What if I make a video while at a friend's house and there happens to be some song playing faintly in the background? Can I put that on YouTube? What if it took place in a public place? Do I own the rights to the video? Am I violating copyright when I give the video away?
Which of these offenses is "ooo, bad boy" slap on the wrist speeding type of offense and which ones are "lose your house and all future earnings"? Which are civil and which are criminal?
It's obtuse and confusing. Even IP lawyers can't answer some of these questions without hedging. And furthermore, it probably adds very little to the bottom line of the rights holders. If you want to go into business, then it is your responsibility to learn about applicable IP laws... otherwise, leave the common man alone.
I think AmiMoJo would say that you should buy a bigger seat or fly a different airline. Good points, but I just don't give a shit about the morality of it - whether you think I'm selfish or not it is what I do:)
It's not some death penalty case, where justice really matters. It's a pissing contest over a miserable extra inch of space. Not a big deal. If he gets all indignant over it, I imagine driving is very antagonizing to him.
Fair point, but you've not responded to my central argument: one cannot simply allow personal consumption to be exempt from copyright law without demolishing whole industries
I disagree. How will people get content if not through commercial distribution? Who is going to run a free server at their own expense, with no expectation of reimbursement? YouTube spent an estimated $300,000 just to stream "Gangnum Style".What selfless person is going to do this for free? Even completely free and open source P2P software would be limited by the same types of agreements that Comcast and Verizon and friends have today - what company wants to risk being sued for contributory copyright infringement?
I'm not a copyright opponent. I think (though I cannot prove) that there is probably some value in letting people have a temporary monopoly on an idea as an incentive to create new content. I just think the current copyright duration is ridiculous, and in practice I think the laws are too complex to burden the common man with. I'm amenable to simplifying the rules, but I'm not sure it is possible to invent a whole class of property without complex rules.
Just look at any of the minor channels on your TV, and you'll see a looooooooooot of repeats.
Well, of course. If they still own the rights to the shows, they should be expected to make money from them for as long as possible.
I contend that networks would still have made "Seinfeld" even if it only made money from it's initial run, perhaps also figuring in DVD sales and maybe a few years worth of re-runs. Certainly they aren't going to count on 20 years or more of re-runs in their initial calculations. And 90 years? Please... not a single person in that room gives a crap about what happens when they are dead.
#1 Having illegitimate parents is not some random 1/30 curse that befalls you because you're now part of a western culture, stop making it sound like you'll never know if your grandparents are your grandparents b/c your parents cheated on each other. Based on demographics, wealth, culture, education... the numbers change dramatically.
So you have better data for Mr. Anonymous Coward? I have no data on the faithfulness of his parents, and in fact was even guessing that he was from a Western culture.
#2 The term "illegitimate" doesn't only cover parents practicing infidelity in hidden closets, it covers children who belong to parents that aren't married. So yes, that includes divorce, "whoops", adoption, and modern family who never planned on getting married.
I was specifically referring to "paternity fraud", though using a poor choice of words. You are correct that "illegitimate" is the wrong terminology here. My numbers, however, seem to be about right:
I used 1/30, but you can make the same argument with the median given of around 1/27. Then the math works out to 1/9 instead of my 1/10. Whatever. Even the low of 2.0% gives a pretty good chance that your grandparents aren't who you think they are. Add people who were adopted but never told to the mix and I think the odds get even better.
#3 Knowing who your real parents/grandparents are and having them tested instead of your "foster" parents, doesn't stop you from being illegitimate child but lets you continue the test for your sake.
That is exactly my point - you can't necessarily rely on family history. If one of your grandparents has Alzheimer's, that may or may not mean anything for you at all, especially if it is the men who have the Alzheimer's.
For example, no individual would write a novel if he or she had only 5 years to make money with it.
First of all, are you sure about that? Second, how about 20 years, which is what I suggested as a "slam dunk"?
I'm on board with your plan. I don't really see the benefit to society of the extension, but your proposal is a lot more reasonable than what we have now.
What are you referring to here? I think most people know torrenting Hollywood movies and video games is against the law.
A lot of people don't realize that torrenting involves sharing. Downloading is not going to get you in trouble, but uploading will. People can justifiably get confused when torrenting. It is actually a perfect example of what I am talking about. I could ask a question on a message board about software for calculating golf handicaps. Another user could link me to a torrent for some software that calculates said handicaps. I click the torrent and get the software and begin to calculate my handicaps. I now have to know the details of how torrent works and the licensing conditions - explicit or statutory - of the software. You know what? That is too burdensome, and the fact that I can have my economic life basically ruined by this single act is unconscionable.
Another example: I record a song from the radio. Legal? Probably, according to what I've read. Then I record a few more songs and make a "mix tape". Probably still OK as far as I can tell. Then I hand the mix tape to my girlfriend as a gift. Probably not OK, as far as I can tell. But again, I'm not really sure despite trying to become educated. As a practical matter, I know no one will come after me for sharing a mix tape, but the fact that I have violated law with such a common act is just plain stupid. Literally every person in my age demographic has violated copyright law in such a way. I cannot think of a better measure of the illegitimacy of a law.
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I'm OK with the 20 year term if it is necessary, but I object to the term "exploit" if it is meant to be pejorative. It wouldn't be a negative exploitation, it would be a positive exploitation - using public domain stories to make a new art form. Many of Disney's successes in animation did exactly this, but I don't feel that they "exploited" anyone. I do, however, think that the fact that their derivative arts from the 30s are still covered by copyright is ridiculous.
I think I agree, although ostensibly the IP laws are implemented for the good of society. In practice, I think they benefit content creators and media companies more than society at large. If you believe that they are in place for the good of society, then it is more of a socialist concept (or at least populist). If you believe that they are in place to benefit a certain class of people, then it is pretty clearly plutocratic. I hear both motivations cited, so it's probably a fuzzy blend of the two. :)
I mean, it's pretty clear that a 90+ year term cannot be justified based on socialist principles!
Yes, but Netflix only has the money to produce these new shows because of the money they make renting out their massive back catalogue, much of which is over 5 years old.
Let me preface this by saying that it is very hard to imagine what no copyright or short copyright would look like, since it has been so long. That said, I can certainly see services like Netflix prospering by offering their back catalog - whether it is copyrighted or not. Not too many people are interested in keeping a huge personal catalog if someone will do it for them. In fact, we might get more new content as the streaming services sought to differentiate themselves. Remember that while I think 5 years is probably sufficient to get new content, I allowed that 20 years was a slam-dunk, so don't pin me down to 5 years :) In any event, if we tried 5 years for a while and it looked like it was going to be a disaster, we could always extend it. God forbid we have too little new entertainment content for a while... the peasants may riot! I'm being sarcastic, of course...
so why would anyone ever pay for film rights again?
The only reason I would care is if it stops novels from being written in the first place. I don't care if a bunch of Harry Potter movies come out from various studios 5 years after the book that has already brought the author 5 years of salary. Besides, I assume trademarks would still be valid, so you probably wouldn't be able to label them as "Harry Potter" movies.
Copyright that short would seriously limit the author's potential earnings
I'm fine with that, so long as it is enough of an incentive to get them to make more stuff.
I agree that life+70 and life+90 are too long
Yup. Ridiculous. 5 may indeed be too short. I can see as long as 15 or 20 being optimal, but honestly it is very hard to conjecture. I think we should try an experiment with one area of copyright that doesn't really matter so much - say TV or movies - and then go from there. Some of the greatest books ever written were authored when copyrights were much shorter though.
Don't we already know the answer to this? BitTorrenters.
So then, the same situation we are in right now?
My whole thesis is that things would change very little from where they are right now, where we have sites in other jurisdictions (Pirate Bay) indexing torrents. If you can close them down today, you could close them down under a commercial only application of copyright law.
I wouldn't disagree. At least, not if the goal is universal care. The system we had before Obamacare was terrible... an unfunded mandate to provide emergency care without any funding to do so. I may not be in love with Obamacare, but actually funding the care is a huge improvement.
Finally, the compromise between socialism and capitalism is generally recognised as something called social democracy,
Yeah, agreed. While I definitely have libertarian leanings, I'm pragmatic to a fault. I think that IP law is probably valuable, but like most things that government gets involved with, the scope has grown and special interests have trumped society's interests. That said, I just want a reset, a reform - not a repeal. I think it is fine for software to be covered under copyright, I just think the 90 year coverage is senseless. I don't see the need to cover it with both copyright and patents, though.
I suppose that would make things simpler. At least then the entire population wouldn't have to be taught the intricacies of the BitTorrent protocol and other computer protocols in addition to the intricacies of copyright law.
When you put what would formerly have been in the public domain under government control in the name of benefiting society, yeah, I'd call that a form of socialism. That they implement the mechanism through a quasi-property ownership model is irrelevant to me. In fact, they don't always use the market model - they also utilize ASCAP for proportional distribution of income.
I see some high quality stuff coming from for-pay services like HBO and Netflix. No one says the free model has to be dominant.
But surely it would fall off of the edge of the earth! Dragons!
Appeal to emotion?
Boy, sure am glad I typed all that for you. Have a nice day.
We have Spirit Air here in the US that is similar to RyanAir. The last time I flew it, the steward actually said, "Look out the window, folks, because that is the ONLY thing on this plane that is free." They charge for luggage AND carry-on luggage. They charge for seat assignments. And, of course, the seats do not recline. My brother does get those $10 fares because he takes these little short trips down to Florida and only travels with a small "personal item" sized pack and cares not where he sits.
It doesn't seem clear to me that it was referring to elective surgery, as you just wrote "for a surgery" and you mentioned health insurance, which normally doesn't cover elective surgery.
It rather depends on your health insurance. Most would cover prostate cancer treatments, though the course he chose may or may not have been covered - it's all academic since he didn't have coverage.
because even a discounted rate is unaffordable
Well, it certainly dinged his retirement savings, but it was affordable. He ended up moving into a much smaller house (condo, actually) in a much more modest place. But you can bet he went after every dollar that he could. Hell, he had nothing else to do all day.
Note that I'm not holding this up as some ideal - just pointing out that there is in fact room for negotiation.
The Intellectual Property you own is part of your capital, just as much as the physical property you own.
So when the government interferes with the free market, but they use words like "property" in the law, it is capitalist? OK.
I'll grant you that they piggyback on the real property system that is already in place, but come on... government granted monopolies for the benefit of society?
and without government regulation called copyright, nobody would ever spend money developing software
I would point to the Linux kernel as a direct counter-point. Companies spend all sorts of money on that, and while it technically does rely on copyright for the "copy left" provision, I don't see how that helps a company's bottom line. The BSDs also mostly have corporate sponsors.
In a socialist society, all software would be owned by the state and made available for everybody to use
And a compromise between the wild-west of free market capitalism and the pure socialism would look like copyright: exclusive rights for a period of time, followed by a release into the public domain. You know, for the benefit of society.
That this ill-informed libertarian rant
I'll give you "Libertarian", but ill-informed? How is it ill-informed? What factual error have I made? We are having a semantic argument about the word "socialism", which is kind of fuzzy to begin with.
Maybe government interference in the free market isn't "socialism", but it is certainly not "capitalism".
Not... a... typographical error!!!
No, he's right - there is no way to discern the races using a scientific methodology. Example: define Barack Obama's race using the scientific method. Even in society, you'll hear him referred to sometimes as black, other times as mixed.
Yes, complex. If I click on a link and download something made available for free, might I be liable? How do I check? What if it kicks of a torrent instead of a straight http download? Then am I more liable? What if the person represented themselves as having permission to distribute? What if I have permission to download but not distribute, but I click on a torrent link somewhere? What if I pay for something that was not legally licensed to the seller and then download it? Torrent it?
What if I tape something off of the radio? What if I make an entire mix tape from radio songs? What if I give the tape to my girlfriend? What if she asks me to tape the stuff off of the radio for her? Can I copy a CD that I own and give it to my mom? What about a tape of a live concert that I made? Can I give it away? What if I make a video while at a friend's house and there happens to be some song playing faintly in the background? Can I put that on YouTube? What if it took place in a public place? Do I own the rights to the video? Am I violating copyright when I give the video away?
Which of these offenses is "ooo, bad boy" slap on the wrist speeding type of offense and which ones are "lose your house and all future earnings"? Which are civil and which are criminal?
It's obtuse and confusing. Even IP lawyers can't answer some of these questions without hedging. And furthermore, it probably adds very little to the bottom line of the rights holders. If you want to go into business, then it is your responsibility to learn about applicable IP laws... otherwise, leave the common man alone.
I think AmiMoJo would say that you should buy a bigger seat or fly a different airline. Good points, but I just don't give a shit about the morality of it - whether you think I'm selfish or not it is what I do :)
It's not some death penalty case, where justice really matters. It's a pissing contest over a miserable extra inch of space. Not a big deal. If he gets all indignant over it, I imagine driving is very antagonizing to him.
Fair point, but you've not responded to my central argument: one cannot simply allow personal consumption to be exempt from copyright law without demolishing whole industries
I disagree. How will people get content if not through commercial distribution? Who is going to run a free server at their own expense, with no expectation of reimbursement? YouTube spent an estimated $300,000 just to stream "Gangnum Style".What selfless person is going to do this for free? Even completely free and open source P2P software would be limited by the same types of agreements that Comcast and Verizon and friends have today - what company wants to risk being sued for contributory copyright infringement?
I'm not a copyright opponent. I think (though I cannot prove) that there is probably some value in letting people have a temporary monopoly on an idea as an incentive to create new content. I just think the current copyright duration is ridiculous, and in practice I think the laws are too complex to burden the common man with. I'm amenable to simplifying the rules, but I'm not sure it is possible to invent a whole class of property without complex rules.
Just look at any of the minor channels on your TV, and you'll see a looooooooooot of repeats.
Well, of course. If they still own the rights to the shows, they should be expected to make money from them for as long as possible.
I contend that networks would still have made "Seinfeld" even if it only made money from it's initial run, perhaps also figuring in DVD sales and maybe a few years worth of re-runs. Certainly they aren't going to count on 20 years or more of re-runs in their initial calculations. And 90 years? Please... not a single person in that room gives a crap about what happens when they are dead.
#1 Having illegitimate parents is not some random 1/30 curse that befalls you because you're now part of a western culture, stop making it sound like you'll never know if your grandparents are your grandparents b/c your parents cheated on each other. Based on demographics, wealth, culture, education... the numbers change dramatically.
So you have better data for Mr. Anonymous Coward? I have no data on the faithfulness of his parents, and in fact was even guessing that he was from a Western culture.
#2 The term "illegitimate" doesn't only cover parents practicing infidelity in hidden closets, it covers children who belong to parents that aren't married. So yes, that includes divorce, "whoops", adoption, and modern family who never planned on getting married.
I was specifically referring to "paternity fraud", though using a poor choice of words. You are correct that "illegitimate" is the wrong terminology here. My numbers, however, seem to be about right:
I used 1/30, but you can make the same argument with the median given of around 1/27. Then the math works out to 1/9 instead of my 1/10. Whatever. Even the low of 2.0% gives a pretty good chance that your grandparents aren't who you think they are. Add people who were adopted but never told to the mix and I think the odds get even better.
#3 Knowing who your real parents/grandparents are and having them tested instead of your "foster" parents, doesn't stop you from being illegitimate child but lets you continue the test for your sake.
That is exactly my point - you can't necessarily rely on family history. If one of your grandparents has Alzheimer's, that may or may not mean anything for you at all, especially if it is the men who have the Alzheimer's.
For example, no individual would write a novel if he or she had only 5 years to make money with it.
First of all, are you sure about that? Second, how about 20 years, which is what I suggested as a "slam dunk"?
I'm on board with your plan. I don't really see the benefit to society of the extension, but your proposal is a lot more reasonable than what we have now.
What race will kill us? This is important because we are different races and so it might only affect one of us.
What are you referring to here? I think most people know torrenting Hollywood movies and video games is against the law.
A lot of people don't realize that torrenting involves sharing. Downloading is not going to get you in trouble, but uploading will. People can justifiably get confused when torrenting. It is actually a perfect example of what I am talking about. I could ask a question on a message board about software for calculating golf handicaps. Another user could link me to a torrent for some software that calculates said handicaps. I click the torrent and get the software and begin to calculate my handicaps. I now have to know the details of how torrent works and the licensing conditions - explicit or statutory - of the software. You know what? That is too burdensome, and the fact that I can have my economic life basically ruined by this single act is unconscionable.
Another example: I record a song from the radio. Legal? Probably, according to what I've read. Then I record a few more songs and make a "mix tape". Probably still OK as far as I can tell. Then I hand the mix tape to my girlfriend as a gift. Probably not OK, as far as I can tell. But again, I'm not really sure despite trying to become educated. As a practical matter, I know no one will come after me for sharing a mix tape, but the fact that I have violated law with such a common act is just plain stupid. Literally every person in my age demographic has violated copyright law in such a way. I cannot think of a better measure of the illegitimacy of a law.