Tell me - did you actually READ what I wrote? Because, frankly, you're putting a lot of words in my mouth to spew out your own agenda.
"Since when has popular culture belonged to publishers and advertisers?"
When did I ever say it did? What I said was: "Copyright is a legal framework that can be boiled down to two functions (I'm going to use book terms, as that's what I'm familiar with). The first, most important, and least noticed, is setting rules for the interactions between the author and the publisher. The second sets rules for the interaction between the publisher and the reader. There is a third role - author and reader, but that really doesn't matter a whole lot in the greater scheme of things, regardless of what the RIAA would have you believe."
You said: "Tolkien would have still written fiction, and most likely would have published the stories he liked in the manner he wished to publish them instead of shoehorning them into publisher's models of successful literature."
First of all, I've read Tolkien's collected letters, and it seems to me that he published his work exactly as he wanted. Second, you're giving the publisher credit for a lot of power it doesn't have. A publisher can put a book out on the market, but it cannot strongarm readers into buying it. The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings succeeded on their own merits, and their place was dictated by their success with the readers, not by any publisher's model.
"Arguably, a completely free culture will produce much richer works because they will be produced out of love for and interest in the subject or medium, not as "products" to be "consumed"."
First of all, if you want to see what you would get in a system free of any feeling of obligation to copyright, I suggest you look at the fanfiction scene - and it isn't pretty. In fact, quality fanfiction is a lot rarer than quality professional fiction. Second, again, did you READ what I wrote? Here's a reminder:
"Now, let's say for a moment that copyright law is abolished. Now there's NOTHING stopping a publisher from screwing over an author, or vice versa. But, you need that protection. If showing a manuscript to a publisher means that you're in serious danger of being shafted, you're not going to show the manuscript to a publisher. Same deal for self-publication - you need to be sure that somebody isn't going to scoop you with your own content. Otherwise, you're just not going to bother.
"(Think of it this way - you walk into a pawn shop with some family heirloom and when you put it on the table for appraisal, the shopkeeper just takes it away from you - and you can't do anything about it. How many more times are you going to go to that pawn shop?)
"So, how do you provide some protection to keep yourself in business, either as a publisher or an author? Contract law. If there's a binding contract between the two parties saying that they're not going to shaft each other, the protection is there. Of course, now you have lawyers involved with the submission process itself, and that costs extra money. A LOT of extra money, in fact, because a smart person negotiates the contract, and there are a lot of smart people in this business. So, now the costs of publication just went up a LOT.
"If you're a publisher, and you're smart, you're going to cut those costs out if you can, but this means that you can't take submissions anymore, because those will involve negotiating contracts just to be able to look at the work, regardless of if you publish in the end. So, you'll commission books instead with a core of regular authors. But, because you know that any publisher out there can scoop you unless you have a contract with them to do otherwise, you're going to be very careful about what you commission - you're only going to go with stuff that will make you money. And that's not new, experimental stuff."
And then you wrote: "Self publication is so easy that we're all doing it right now on slashdot. We post our comments, slashdot publishes
"(from the way this drew your ire, I suspected you were in the content business)"
Well, I would hope that the list of publication credits at the end of the post would confirm it...:-)
But, strictly speaking, it was the over-generalization that drew my ire. If you want to deal with copyright in any intelligent way, you really need to look at the nuts and bolts and individual cases.
"books are one of those things where the physical version in much superior to the digital. And do you really need 95 or 70+lifetime years of copyright? There is no reason why we can't have #1 squared away without the excessively long copyright term."
Do I need it? No. Will I take it when it's offered to me? Absolutely. The greater the legacy I can leave my children and grandchildren (once I have them), the better. And frankly, considering how the system works, sales figures are going to take any given work out of print long before an irate literary heir will, so it really doesn't make a difference.
"I might make significantly less money but society as a whole would win from abolition of the copyright law. Copyright has nothing to do with good of society, justice or anything else. Copyright is an impedance to human development (where would we be if patents appears before spoken language? Language would never been invented then)"
This is the problem with extremists on this side of the copyright debate - you honestly have no idea of what copyright is, do you?
Society as a whole would not win from the abolition of copyright law - it would lose quite a lot. In fact, it could very well be a death blow to culture.
Sounds extremist? It actually isn't, if you think about it. But you have to understand what copyright is, first.
Copyright is a legal framework that can be boiled down to two functions (I'm going to use book terms, as that's what I'm familiar with). The first, most important, and least noticed, is setting rules for the interactions between the author and the publisher. The second sets rules for the interaction between the publisher and the reader. There is a third role - author and reader, but that really doesn't matter a whole lot in the greater scheme of things, regardless of what the RIAA would have you believe.
The rules for interaction between the publisher and the author create a situation where an author can create a work and submit it without having to worry about the publisher stealing it and publishing it without permission. Similarly, it protects a publisher from having an author publishing the same work at the same time with several different publishers. This is incredibly important.
Now, let's say for a moment that copyright law is abolished. Now there's NOTHING stopping a publisher from screwing over an author, or vice versa. But, you need that protection. If showing a manuscript to a publisher means that you're in serious danger of being shafted, you're not going to show the manuscript to a publisher. Same deal for self-publication - you need to be sure that somebody isn't going to scoop you with your own content. Otherwise, you're just not going to bother.
(Think of it this way - you walk into a pawn shop with some family heirloom and when you put it on the table for appraisal, the shopkeeper just takes it away from you - and you can't do anything about it. How many more times are you going to go to that pawn shop?)
So, how do you provide some protection to keep yourself in business, either as a publisher or an author? Contract law. If there's a binding contract between the two parties saying that they're not going to shaft each other, the protection is there. Of course, now you have lawyers involved with the submission process itself, and that costs extra money. A LOT of extra money, in fact, because a smart person negotiates the contract, and there are a lot of smart people in this business. So, now the costs of publication just went up a LOT.
If you're a publisher, and you're smart, you're going to cut those costs out if you can, but this means that you can't take submissions anymore, because those will involve negotiating contracts just to be able to look at the work, regardless of if you publish in the end. So, you'll commission books instead with a core of regular authors. But, because you know that any publisher out there can scoop you unless you have a contract with them to do otherwise, you're going to be very careful about what you commission - you're only going to go with stuff that will make you money. And that's not new, experimental stuff.
So, what have you just done by removing copyright? Well:
1. Cultural growth just ground to a crawl, simply because the people who can afford the advertising and infrastructure to get the content out there can't take the risks of bringing out new authors and new material. Think the remake of The Fog was a step in the wrong direction? This is the direction it would go.
2. What's left for innovative creative people is self-publication - now, p
I have to wonder - what part of the words "gross over-generalization" were unclear? I wasn't talking about the RIAA - I was talking about everybody in general - and the only thing I can say in general is the most basic of economic models and the need to eat.
"The more the copyright holders lose business, the more pressure is on them to seek out more reasonable business models."
Define "reasonable." If you want to call me a content creator, then I am a content creator in the field of writing and literature. And, the business model there, with bookstores and magazines, is quite reasonable all around. In music, on the other hand, the RIAA has been shafting the creative artists on one hand, and putting all of its customers under threat of lawsuit with the other. As business models go, that's just DUMB. But, both involve copyright holders. So, who do you shaft? Or, do you prefer to talk about one industry in particular, which is a reasonable DISCUSSION model.
"The way you talk, it's like if the RIAA members go out of business, nobody will be making music any more. In reality, they have such a stranglehold on the market, if they go out of business, that leaves huge opportunities just waiting to be exploited."
Again - "gross over-generalization." I didn't mention the RIAA. Frankly, I'd like to see the RIAA members go out of business - that would allow the creative artists to finally find an equitable system.
I would ask you, however, as I am starting to get really fucking pissed off about this, not to equate all copyright with the RIAA. The music industry is not the be-all and end-all of the creative arts, and just because one industry organization pisses on what copyright stands for, it doesn't make all of the rest of us a bunch of unreasonable, greedy bastards.
"I didn't say 'creators' I said copyright holders, these are very rarely the same people. People produced content for hundreds of years before copyright cartels and any copyright law."
1. In my business (writing), most often the copyright holder is the content creator. And there are plenty of patents that are held by the people who created the invention.
2. Before copyright law, there were wealthy patrons. Copyright law serves an important purpose in a free market economy. This is verbatim from another of my posts today:
"Modern copyright serves a number of purposes, a few of which are absolutely vital to content creation (although a lot of people don't understand what copyright is, and would argue against this). In a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants summary (using book terms, since those are what I know best), they are:
"1. Defining the relationship between the author and the publisher.
"2. Defining the relationship between the holder of the publication rights (which are a subset of copyright) and the reader.
"Of these two, the first is by far the most important, and the one that gets the least amount of press. What it basically provides is a legal framework that allows an author like myself to submit a manuscript to a publisher without having to worry about that publisher taking my manuscript, attaching another name to it, and publishing it behind my back. It also keeps me from worrying about some other publisher getting their hands on a copy of my book and publishing it. So, I can create and deal with publishers in a way that doesn't shaft me. Without this protection, any content creator is likely screwed over the moment they show it to anybody.
"(This was an issue less than 50 years ago in the United States - J.R.R. Tolkien had to make a major revision to the Lord of the Rings in order to regain his copyright in the United States after a pirate edition was published by a major publisher.)"
Modern copyright serves a number of purposes, a few of which are absolutely vital to content creation (although a lot of people don't understand what copyright is, and would argue against this). In a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants summary (using book terms, since those are what I know best), they are:
1. Defining the relationship between the author and the publisher.
2. Defining the relationship between the holder of the publication rights (which are a subset of copyright) and the reader.
Of these two, the first is by far the most important, and the one that gets the least amount of press. What it basically provides is a legal framework that allows an author like myself to submit a manuscript to a publisher without having to worry about that publisher taking my manuscript, attaching another name to it, and publishing it behind my back. It also keeps me from worrying about some other publisher getting their hands on a copy of my book and publishing it. So, I can create and deal with publishers in a way that doesn't shaft me. Without this protection, any content creator is likely screwed over the moment they show it to anybody.
(This was an issue less than 50 years ago in the United States - J.R.R. Tolkien had to make a major revision to the Lord of the Rings in order to regain his copyright in the United States after a pirate edition was published by a major publisher.)
"If anyone realizes that having an economy that is increasingly dependent on "intellectual property" is a bad thing. Nowadays there is no compelling reason to buy things from the copyright holders other than maybe feeling guilty or an affinity for tangible copies. ESPECIALLY since the pirated versions often are much better than the retail versions in functionality and portability."
Wow - now that's a gross over-generalization, and only part of the first sentence is even close to right here...
Going back to front (sort of):
"Nowadays there is no compelling reason to buy things from the copyright holders other than maybe feeling guilty or an affinity for tangible copies."
To meet one gross over-generalization with another, you mean besides keeping the copyright holders in business so that they can continue to produce content? There's a basic economic reality you're missing here - producing any product or content takes time and resources, and to continue to do that requires that money is made to pay for the time and resources.
(And, before somebody bites my head off, yes, I know the internet is a cheap means of distribution, and yes, I know the RIAA treats its content creators horribly - I'm talking in the broadest of strokes here. When it comes down to it, any content creator needs to at least eat.)
But, you know what, you're right - we don't need that pesky literature, movies, and music anyway. If shadow puppets were good enough for our ancestors, they're good enough for us!
"ESPECIALLY since the pirated versions often are much better than the retail versions in functionality and portability."
Um, no, not really. Windows Vista is DRM-happy to the point of stupidity, and the RIAA has done everything it can to drive music fans into the hands of file-sharers, but that doesn't mean that the greater utility lies in files on a computer. Actually, in most cases a physical media tends to have better functionality and portability.
Take movies for example - I can go visit my parents in another city and bring a couple of movies along, and the DVDs are quite light, easy to carry, and all I have to do is put them into any DVD player in North America to have them work. No file copying, no waiting for a download to finish, no taking up space on my hard disk - everything is just on the DVD. When it comes to the DRM stupidity we have been seeing, we have to remember that it's the DRM causing the problems, not the physical format itself.
"If anyone realizes that having an economy that is increasingly dependent on "intellectual property" is a bad thing."
This is the one place where you are at least partially correct. But you shouldn't be saying "intellectual property" here - you should be saying "service-based," because that is what is really there. The United States used to have some of the greatest manufacturing power in the world, and now it seems it actually produces very little. But that's a more complicated argument, and not really relevant to this discussion.
So, by that rationale, if I drive a car into your bay window and up your stairs to see if you've got that new album by Phunk Me in your room, it is your fault that you didn't have concrete instead of glass, and that the steps damaged my suspension?
"Really? Hmm, so I can make a cartoon about Mickey mouse fucking an antelope? Not if I don't want to be sued for copyright infringement."
Depending on how you do it, yes, you can, actually. You do it as a parody - and copyright in the United States explicitly allows for that.
""Explain to me how a work with a copyright notice that is available to the public is theft."
It ISN'T available to the public, it is sold to the public, you can rent it, but it no longer belongs to the public like it used to after copyright expires."
Bullshit. If you can read it in a library, buy it in a bookstore, listen to it on the radio, by definition it is available to the public. And there is a vast difference between being inspired by a work and creating that sort of derivative work and ripping a work off wholesale. What you want is to have it for free. Please don't mince words. And please stop defining copyright in the terms of the RIAA - that organization has spent years abusing the letter and spirit of copyright law.
"No one is going to begrudge you 29.95 for your Diablo guide when it first came out or even 7 years afterwards (like the original way copyright worked) but do you seriously feel entitled to this (in part or entirely) UNTIL YOUR DEATH?!?!"
First of all, do some research - the Diablo book was the fiction e-book that launched the entire Blizzard fiction line, and the EverQuest book was about the history, community, and social issues of the game. Second of all, you are absolutely right I am entitled - a lot of good people fought for those rights, and I will fight to keep them. Why? Because it is MY hard work there. Because if it was anything other than an intellectual right, it would go without saying that I can dictate what will happen with it.
Let me tell you something about rights. There is no such thing as a natural right. Nobody is born into this world with natural rights - you aren't even born with the right to keep breathing. Rights are earned and fought for. People died for us to have the rights we have now. A lot of authors lived in poverty while publishers reprinted their work ad nauseum without paying them a penny. J.R.R. Tolkien had to rewrite the Lord of the Rings because an AMERICAN publisher pirated his book only a couple of years after it was published. And now you have the RIAA abusing both the public and the recording artists, and the grassroots movement they created by doing so. So this battle is far from over, and if you think I am going to give up my rights for a grassroots movement that doesn't have the first clue of what copyright is, and most of whom have never even read the Berne Convention, you are sadly fucking mistaken. I AM entitled to these things under a law that is very fair and equitable when you actually bother to read it, and I am keeping my rights.
"This is what is wrong with current copyright, and what the parent is mad about.. sorry if you can't understand that."
Let me tell you why _I_ am angry. I am angry because the grassroots movement here is very non-nonchalant about wanting to take away my rights. It a group of hippies, in the worst sense of the word. They don't create anything. They don't add anything to our culture. They just consume. They feel that because the Internet allows them to have some things for free, they must have all things for free.
What's even worse is that they have turned this into an ideology, and ideologies are very dangerous things in the wrong hands. And, because I refuse to recognize their sense of entitlement, I and my entire profession are demonized. I'm called a thief, and a parasite. I've been accused of everything from being a lazy bum never contributing more than a single book to being part of an international copyright conspiracy. And I am very tired, and very angry about this. They would have people like me die in poverty so that they can save that $10 on my next book. They may not say it in those terms, but that is what they are talking about.
"Because the public domain is precious and is a formative part of our culture."
Wrong. The WORKS in the public domain are precious and a formative part of our culture. The public domain itself is a construct that makes it so that you don't have to pay creators who passed away over a century ago for reprinting their work. The distinction is important.
"You can rewrite and play with works like Charles Dickens or Washington Irving. You can allegorize the Bible. You can use, pull and reassemble cultural references at your will."
All of which can be done with works in copyright. In fact, most "trendy" pieces of literature and film have a lot of pop culture references to things in copyright. It's called fair use, and it's enshrined in the Berne Convention, on which most international copyright law is based.
I always love this argument. We're drowning in content to the point that publishers can't keep up with the rampant creativity of the creative community, and you're screaming that we have a shortage. Hollywood may be producing a bunch of drivel, but it is not all that culture is - our culture as a whole is extremely healthy, and in better creative shape than has ever been seen in history. So, frankly, I don't think we're stagnating, and the issue of having to pay a creator for the right to use their work in this argument is a red herring.
"If you were a filmmaker you'd also understand what a nightmare intellectual property has become:
Should you be allowed to film an actor standing in front of a building that you didn't design? Should you be able to dress her in clothes that you didn't design? Should you be able to show her wearing headphones? Whose headphones?"
I can't speak to that, because I'm not a filmmaker. But, I looked at your website, and I didn't see a whole lot of evidence that you are. So, are you a filmmaker? Have you dealt with these issues yourself?
I am an author. I have dealt with the publishing world in some detail, and I know what the creative process is like, as well as its limitations, all from personal experience. And, unless you're a filmmaker and can provide some concrete examples, you have failed to make your argument on all counts.
"Secondly, how do you feel about being robbed? Because you were robbed. Something was taken away from you that is worth an enormous amount of money and it was taken away from you by the RIAA. When copyrights are extended indefinitely, instead of entering the public domain as they were originally deemed by law -- what is actually happening is that the RIAA is stealing from the public for their own interests."
That tears it - I want some justificiation of this bullshit, and it is bullshit. You wouldn't know the definition of theft if it came up and bit you.
I've got news for you - creative artists have this tendency of trying to keep their work in the public eye. When something is in copyright, it not only tends to be available to the public, but copyright law specifically allows for a lot of derivative works to be created. You CANNOT copyright an idea, only the exact implementation of one.
So, what theft is there? I want to know. In fact, I want some justification of that statement. Explain to me how a work with a copyright notice that is available to the public is theft. Explain to me how acting to take control of that publicly available work away from its creator isn't theft. There is such a thing as tyranny of the masses you know. You may want to look that up.
I am an author, I will keep my copyrights until the day I day, and you just called me a thief for that. You have some serious explaining to do.
1. The Act of Queen Anne pre-dates the US Constitution by 60-70 years, so if you want original intent, you have to go to it (or the Stationer's Log, but while it's part of the history of intellectual rights, it isn't considered actual copyright by most).
2. The US Constitution is an 18th century document, and we do not live in the 18th century anymore. Times have changed, and society has changed. Copyright right now may be informed by its past, but it is not dictated by it.
Well, here I've got to theorize, because you've just raised the exact core of the issue.
But, I don't think P2P networks will render copyright obsolete - in fact, I'd argue that the basic principles behind copyright are sound enough to be proof against it, and that they can be applied very easily to the P2P world.
My personal theory is that the entire argument has actually been drastically overthought. People are looking at the Internet, being wowed by the technology and how different it makes things look, but not realizing just how much they are staying the same.
Think of it this way: Fifteen years ago (if I've got my math right - it might be closer to 20), the Internet was not released to the public. But, there were plenty of photocopiers, which could be used to reproduce books illegally. There were plenty of tape recorders, which could be used to reproduce LPs, tapes, and CDs illegally, and there were plenty of video cassettes, which could be used to reproduce movies illegally. The ability to share copyrighted materials existed, and everybody in the western world had access to it one way or the other. And yet, the main way that people got their books was still in bookstores, movies were still being watched from video stores and in theatres, and music was still being bought legitimately and listened to on the radio. If history teaches us anything, it is that just because people can do a thing, it does not mean that they will do that thing.
Now we have the internet. But, most people don't actually like reading books on computers, so the main place to find books is still on paper. CD sales are dropping (and that could be due to any number of factors), but it seems to me that iPods are all over the place, and it's legitimate music being sold on there. And, I vaguely remember a news story somewhere about digital transmission being used to get films into the theatres. The RIAA and the MPAA may be kicking and screaming along their way to exploring these new distribution streams, but they are exploring them. Creators are still creators, and consumers are still consumers.
As a creator, copyright law provides me with a way of protecting myself, and it is not dependent on any particular manner of distribution. If one day all books are electronic, then all books will become electronic (I seriously doubt it, since even in this age of new technology, there is still no serious competition for the ease of use and the intuitiveness of the codex). But, that won't change the fact that I am the creator of my words, that I will choose the distribution channel that I like, and if I find that somebody is setting themselves up as a bootleg publisher of my work, that I will be able to sue them for it. The technology may one day be different, but the situation is the same. And, quite frankly, I really don't think that bashing the consumers over the head with DRM will actually make a difference one way or the other. I think something is needed, perhaps just a marker to be able to say that "This book is official, and was bought by X on date Y," but I don't think much more than that is necessary.
But, like everybody else, I don't know. There is a balance to be struck, and the future is not here yet. None of us know what it will bring, and we'll all find out together when it arrives.
(Besides, I'm still miffed about not getting my rocket car.)
I'm replying to this post because of this statement (the rest of the parent spends its time either misinterpreting what I said in my last post or putting words in my mouth, and I think my original post speaks for itself). The article that it's linked to is a very interesting one, it expands on the role of the Stationer's Log (which is a form of copyright protection predating the Act of Queen Anne), but it has a certain tunnel vision and spin that often appears in the extremist grass-roots anti-copyright movement, and I think that it's worth looking at it critically.
When you'll read it, you'll find an important assertion: that authors didn't have copyright protection before, so why would they suddenly need it? This is very misleading for a couple of reasons:
1. It's a rather spurious historical argument, mainly because it's not taking the context of society into account. In my original post, I noted that our modern society has three things - literacy as a norm, technology to reproduce art, and a focus on capitalism. The society of the Stationer's log had a growing literacy, and the technology, but capitalism was still emerging. Creative artists made their living not through proceeds of publication, but instead through a system of patronage where a noble patron would pay the artist a stipend to compose work in his/her honour. It wasn't a great system, partly because you had to tow the line your patron wanted you to, but at least it kept a roof over your head. Society is not a static system, however. By the time the first proper copyright act was written in 1709, a capitalist system was emerging, and by the end of the 19th century, the patronage system was completely gone - it was now all capitalist. So, creators may not have needed a copyright system at the very beginning, but there are no wealthy patrons around today, and an author's income is derived from royalties.
2. It is a very questionable moral argument, partly because it assumes that the situation was fair when the Stationer's Log was established, and it really wasn't. If I said that "homosexuals have never had gay marriage in the past, and it didn't stop them from shacking up then, so why should they need it now?" everybody would immediately see the injustice. The argument the article makes is very much the same. Correcting an injustice is always good.
And there is this: "Authors, having never had copyright, saw no reason now to suddenly demand the rather paradoxical power to prevent the spread of their own works, and did not do so."
This is one of the most common arguments put into play for the abolition of copyright, and it reverses the very idea of modern copyright. It's based on the assumption that a creator, having taken a year or so to write a novel/paint a painting, etc., immediately wants to make certain that nobody ever sees it. What copyright does is allow the creator to set the terms by which the work is distributed, so that a publisher doesn't shaft him/her, and if a third party circumvents those terms, to be able to take some reasonable action against them. It isn't prevention - it's creator's rights. It's also spin along the sames lines as "marriage is a terrible thing because it keeps you from dating other people" - basically, focusing on one negative while ignoring the context and all of the positives.
So, when you read the linked article, please keep in mind that part of it is rhetoric, and facts are taken out of context. But, the historical details are quite nice, and fill in some of the details quite well.
Well, while some of Lehman's comments are interesting (and promising), and I certainly believe that a lot of this current situation is very much the fault of the RIAA, I'm seeing a pendulum effect here. Having failed to control copyright using extreme measures on one end, he's now talking about the end of copyright, which is basically the extreme on the other end. The truth, like so many truths, is somewhere inbetween.
I'm speaking as a published and agented author here - I need to know what copyright is, and how it works. My livelihood depends on it, partly when dealing with publishers (knowing what rights I'm signing away) and partly when it comes to dealing with agents (making sure that they know what rights of my work to keep from being signed away). A bad contract can nail an author to the wall, and there are very bad contracts out there. So I am very much aware of what copyright is, what it does, and how it works.
And here is the problem - most people in the grass-roots movement don't. And the fault for this lies very firmly in the hands of the RIAA. Frankly, our society needs copyright - it is the single most important tool our culture and society has to advance itself. And, I'll explain why (even though it will take a while, and probably put a few readers to sleep).
We have a society that is very unique in many ways. First of all, literacy is the norm, not the exception. Secondly, we have the technology (and have had it since about the 15th century) to efficiently reproduce the work of creative artists (first literature and visual art, now music and film). Third, we have a capitalist system where the success of an artist is based on the sales of his/her work (rather than a system of patronage). It is, broadly put, a literate meritocracy.
What this means is that there are a lot of creative people out there, and they are able to distribute what they create through a variety of means. We are drowning in content, which is good - the more content there is, the healthier our culture is, and we have a very healthy culture, make no mistake. But, how is this content to be dealt with? Many of these creative artists want to do different things with their creations. Some want to sell it, others want to share it. Some want to keep their characters to themselves, and others want to create shared worlds that anybody can write in. Even in software development, there is a disparity. And there needs to be protection for all of these creative artists, so that they can do what they need to. And that is where copyright comes in.
Copyright is the broad tool that allows the various creative artists to do what they want with their work. It really is amazing in its simplicity - if you don't believe me, look at the Berne Convention. The creative artist owns the copyright to their work until such time as they die and it runs out, or they sign it away. And that copyright simply allows them to say "this work and what is in it will be copied in X way." It provides protection for the specific implementation of an idea, but not for the idea itself. And, it requires reasonability from the creators - hence fair use and the public domain. It's this tool that allows the Creative Commons to exist, that allows the Open Source movement to fight against SCO, and that allows an author to receive royalties on his work from a publisher for copies sold. And the success of the created work is determined by the market, and nothing else.
And this is where the RIAA is so troublesome - they have spent quite a long time abusing both the letter and the spirit of copyright law, and doing it very publicly. So, while I've just described the literal truth of what copyright is, there are a lot of people who just won't believe what I've written. Why won't they? Because while copyright law is about balanced rights of the creator, the RIAA is using it to sue dead grandmothers, students, and welfare moms for copying insignificant amounts of music. And actions do speak louder than words. The irony is
I've been writing professionally now for about nine years (wow - it really has been that long), and I hate to say it, but there are no shortage of scammers who want to take advantage of fresh young writers. And, since a lot of people want to be writers, there are no shortage of marks for these scammers.
As the f'ing article says, the fact of the matter is artificial sales are not sales, and simply won't help. The best way for an author to maximize the sales of his/her book is to write a really good book, and then once it's in print, write another one. That's how you build an audience, and that helps a lot towards propelling your sales up. And, for most of us authors, it's not a short process. You have to love this craft to try to make a living at it, and that's probably as it should be.
"This is mildly amusing for me, 'cause last thread I commented in I was accused of being a RIAA Shill (presumably that poster believes anyone who criticises Apple is a RIAA shill)."
Hey, if you think that's bad, you should try being a creative artist. I'm a published author, and I certainly believe that copyright should be respected - and that pretty much goes against every single action of the RIAA that has made it into the news. They abuse copyright on both sides, suing their customers, and stripping away the rights of the artists (http://cdbaby.net/courtney). But, while they're doing this, they're claiming to be doing it on behalf of the artists (http://www.riaa.com/about/default.asp). And, so who also gets smeared with the bad PR these jackals are generating?
Authors, actors, people like me.
Almost every time I get into a discussion on here, I, and my entire profession, end up being accused of something. Most of the time, it's something along the lines of "greedy evil artist," and a lot of the time it has nothing whatsoever to do with reality. Here's my list of favorites (and I am not making any of these up):
1. Being a lazy bum who writes a single book and lives off it for the rest of his life.
(Um, no - seeing as the average first book will bring an author around $3-5,000 over its entire publication lifetime, this is pretty much fiscally impossible - and it's both sad and laughable when you're struggling under the poverty line to be told that if you lose your intellectual rights to your writing that you're going to have to start working at being a writer for a change.)
2. Using copyright to keep my creative work from the public.
(Sort of goes against the entire idea of publishing, doesn't it?)
3. Holding an evil monopoly over my writing so that nobody can create a derivative work.
(Well, sorry folks, but copyright doesn't work that way. You cannot copyright an idea - only an exact implementation of an idea. If my story inspires somebody to write something similar, unless they're using my exact characters, there is absolutely nothing I can, or would want to, do about it. Nor can I put a hit out on somebody using a similar plot or theme.)
4. Being guaranteed an income because of the evil copyright laws.
(Yes, there are some people who honestly seem to believe that somewhere in copyright law is a clause that says that if I write something, everybody is required to buy it. Perhaps that explains those armed guards around the bookstores..."Buy the book or ELSE!")
5. Lobbying for unreasonable copyright extensions.
(You know what? I'll freely admit that like anybody, I'd like to leave something to my children and grandchildren, when I have them. But seriously, that whole Sonny Bono thing - I had nothing to do with it. And neither did most of the creative artists out there. We just want to create, and have our wishes in regards to our work respected.)
And my personal favourite...
6. Being part of a copyright conspiracy (I'm not making this up) to create an underclass of people who have no access to any content.
(Seriously, I'm not making this one up. I find it amazing that when our society is drowning in content, there are people out there who honestly think that not only is there a shortage, but that creative artists are behind it. I mean, come on - the creative artist is the artistic version of an exhibitionist - we like to keep a roof over our heads, but we also want as many people to see and enjoy our work as possible.)
The big problem, I think, is that there really isn't a whole lot of education about what copyright law is, and when I try to inform people about it, they don't believe me. They seem to figure that I'm some sort of RIAA shill, and lying through my teeth. They see copyright in terms of what the RIAA is doing, and the RIAA is abusing both the letter and the spirit of the law. And frankly, this is the sort of place where the grass roots movements start. We creative artists didn't ask for the RIAA to be doing what it's doing. Most of us (myself included) find the organization reprehensible. But we're getting demonized by it through association all the same.
I find it very interesting that while you're putting words in my mouth, you came out with this statement: "What most authors, including you, don't understand, is that the whole copyright idea is bogus, that it's founded on a lack of understanding on what authoring actually is." I'm afraid I'm not the one with a lack of understanding here, although from your rhetoric, I doubt you really want to understand. So, I'm going to rebut this, but only once. If you don't like the truth, that's your problem.
"Copyright and patent laws are means by which a 3rd party, namely you, is granted power (and by that I mean power to inflict pain and suffering) over other people's private property, so that their private property isn't entirely theirs anymore."
What is this pain and suffering? First of all, a book is an inanimate object, and cannot feel pain. Secondly, aside from ripping the book in half, how would you inflict any suffering on it? This part of the rhetoric is empty.
What is not empty is that there is power granted, but it is not power over the physical object - it is power over the text. That is what intellectual property is - an understanding that somebody's hard work can transcend the physical object in certain circumstances. And, the power I have over the contents of the text itself are quite limited. I can say that the reader may not turn himself (I am using "him" and "he" here just for simplicity of prose) into a distributer of the text by posting an electronic copy online, which is perfectly reasonable, as I have already given the rights for publication to a specific publisher under contract. I cannot, nor should not, tell him not to sell the book to a used bookstore. The physical book the reader can use however he likes - he can build a fort with it, if he wants. I cannot prevent a reader from quoting a reasonable amount of the book in his own work - that is fair use.
Copyright allows me control over my intellectual property with derivative works, to a small degree. I can prevent somebody from using my specific characters or imagined settings. I cannot, however, prevent another writer from using names I used, or prevent a writer from writing a book with a similar plot and characters. You cannot copyright an idea - you can only copyright the specific implementation of an idea, and even there some of it is subject to fair use. The power you give me credit for is far greater than any power I actually have.
"Then you say: "Oh! But if we were to strongly protect private property, I would lose money! My job wouldn't be respected!", to which I answer that no, you are not losing a single penny." This is wrong on both counts. First of all, I never said that my job wouldn't be respected - frankly, around Slashdot, it's not respected right now anyway, as your post quite aptly shows - I said my WISHES wouldn't be respected. My profession is losing respect because a bunch of litigious jackasses are using copyright for a racketeering scam. Undercutting my wishes in regards to publication, when I have signed a contract stating that publisher X has sole publication rights, is quite a different thing.
And frankly, you are wrong about me not losing money. By your argument, I could hire a secretary or office assistant and then refuse to pay him, and it's all right because they haven't lost any money. But they have - they've worked hard, and they were not given the compensation they earned, and any labour lawyer will tell you that it does constitute lost income. When dealing with piracy of intellectual property, the same model applies.
Let's do some math. Let's say I've written book X, and 1,000 copies are distributed and being read (I'm trying to keep this simple - real numbers in any case WILL vary). Each copy sold by my publisher generates $5.00 of royalties to me. Of these 1,000 copies, 100 are distributed by some online book pirate via his website. People read books based on the merit of the book - every copy distributed is being read because somebody liked wh
Okay, I've got to say this about the RIAA - I well and truly hope that somebody puts them down for good. A class action suit, SOMETHING.
I am a published author, and assuming nothing falls through with my publisher, I've got a book coming out later this year that should be quite interesting - and, I want my copyright protected. I don't want people pirating the year and a half of hard work of myself and my co-author. I'm not greedy, I'm not evil - I just worked (and am still working) hard on this, and I want what is reasonable - that my, and my co-author's, wishes in regards to how it is distributed be respected. That's all.
What are these wishes? That the students who buy it (it's a textbook on ancient Greek and Roman humour) buy it as it is published - as a printed book. We're even looking at having an electronic copy attached on CD that they can use on their laptop during class. If they want to sell it to a friend when they're done with it, that's fine. If they want to buy it from a used bookstore, that's fine too. It's if they take the book and post it on a newsgroup or website for anybody and everybody to download, undercutting my publisher - that's when I object. All of this is reasonable, and none of this takes away from the rights of the purchaser to do what is reasonable with their copy of the book.
But the RIAA - they're being completely unreasonable. The problem isn't the people who are downloading music, it's the people who are uploading it. And, in the process of filing lawsuit after lawsuit against people who are doing so little damage as to not even be worth the time, they're painting the entire artistic field in this litigious light. I'm tired of seeing my profession demonized as being greedy and evil, when most of us writers barely make enough to survive, because of these bastards.
It's one of those moments where I really wish I lived in the United States, just so I could have a chance to fight them. But, as a Canadian, I can't do that without it being meddling. Sigh.
Wow...I honestly can't believe what I'm reading on this forum.
Seriously, for a forum that is filled with anti-copyright people who scream at the top of their lungs every time somebody even mentions protecting intellectual rights, this just takes the cake. George Lucas has not only moved to encourage and develop the amateur film community, but has pretty much given them carte blanche to use his own Star Wars intellectual property to do it (up to what would be a PG rating), and people are complaining.
If you want to bash this contest because you don't like Lucas or Star Wars, put your money where your mouth is - make a film and outdo him. Because, right now, he's actually doing something really positive here with his intellectual property. Frankly, I don't exactly see too many commentators in this subject so far who can claim to be doing anything creative at all...
Well, I'm sorry, but you've come too close to the truth. You're right - the Society for the Preservation of Intellectual Rights, in association with the Freemasons, Illuminati, and the Jews, have conspired for some time to take over the world and make it safe for all those who want extra apple pie - and you've discovered us.
The men in black will be at your door in the next few minutes to see to your disappearance. Do be co-operative - they hate it when people resist...and we WILL have our extra apple pie...
Well, you've certainly given me a lot to think about - thank you for stating your case so well. You'll forgive me for hoping that you're wrong about the severity of the impact, since I did believe, and I still hope, that this will be a boon for independent artists (and frankly, as an author, I am horrified by the conditions I've heard reported from the music industry).
I do, however, have to wonder if the Copyright Royalty Board will be able to collect from stations outside of the United States. I'm not going to claim to know the answer, and frankly, I've got to admit that I am a bit out of my depth on this one (and how often do you hear THAT on Slashdot?).
But, anyway, thank you for pointing these things out. I hope that your comment gets modded up for it.
Slashdot Mirror
Tell me - did you actually READ what I wrote? Because, frankly, you're putting a lot of words in my mouth to spew out your own agenda.
"Since when has popular culture belonged to publishers and advertisers?"
When did I ever say it did? What I said was: "Copyright is a legal framework that can be boiled down to two functions (I'm going to use book terms, as that's what I'm familiar with). The first, most important, and least noticed, is setting rules for the interactions between the author and the publisher. The second sets rules for the interaction between the publisher and the reader. There is a third role - author and reader, but that really doesn't matter a whole lot in the greater scheme of things, regardless of what the RIAA would have you believe."
You said: "Tolkien would have still written fiction, and most likely would have published the stories he liked in the manner he wished to publish them instead of shoehorning them into publisher's models of successful literature."
First of all, I've read Tolkien's collected letters, and it seems to me that he published his work exactly as he wanted. Second, you're giving the publisher credit for a lot of power it doesn't have. A publisher can put a book out on the market, but it cannot strongarm readers into buying it. The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings succeeded on their own merits, and their place was dictated by their success with the readers, not by any publisher's model.
"Arguably, a completely free culture will produce much richer works because they will be produced out of love for and interest in the subject or medium, not as "products" to be "consumed"."
First of all, if you want to see what you would get in a system free of any feeling of obligation to copyright, I suggest you look at the fanfiction scene - and it isn't pretty. In fact, quality fanfiction is a lot rarer than quality professional fiction. Second, again, did you READ what I wrote? Here's a reminder:
"Now, let's say for a moment that copyright law is abolished. Now there's NOTHING stopping a publisher from screwing over an author, or vice versa. But, you need that protection. If showing a manuscript to a publisher means that you're in serious danger of being shafted, you're not going to show the manuscript to a publisher. Same deal for self-publication - you need to be sure that somebody isn't going to scoop you with your own content. Otherwise, you're just not going to bother.
"(Think of it this way - you walk into a pawn shop with some family heirloom and when you put it on the table for appraisal, the shopkeeper just takes it away from you - and you can't do anything about it. How many more times are you going to go to that pawn shop?)
"So, how do you provide some protection to keep yourself in business, either as a publisher or an author? Contract law. If there's a binding contract between the two parties saying that they're not going to shaft each other, the protection is there. Of course, now you have lawyers involved with the submission process itself, and that costs extra money. A LOT of extra money, in fact, because a smart person negotiates the contract, and there are a lot of smart people in this business. So, now the costs of publication just went up a LOT.
"If you're a publisher, and you're smart, you're going to cut those costs out if you can, but this means that you can't take submissions anymore, because those will involve negotiating contracts just to be able to look at the work, regardless of if you publish in the end. So, you'll commission books instead with a core of regular authors. But, because you know that any publisher out there can scoop you unless you have a contract with them to do otherwise, you're going to be very careful about what you commission - you're only going to go with stuff that will make you money. And that's not new, experimental stuff."
And then you wrote: "Self publication is so easy that we're all doing it right now on slashdot. We post our comments, slashdot publishes
"(from the way this drew your ire, I suspected you were in the content business)"
:-)
Well, I would hope that the list of publication credits at the end of the post would confirm it...
But, strictly speaking, it was the over-generalization that drew my ire. If you want to deal with copyright in any intelligent way, you really need to look at the nuts and bolts and individual cases.
"books are one of those things where the physical version in much superior to the digital. And do you really need 95 or 70+lifetime years of copyright? There is no reason why we can't have #1 squared away without the excessively long copyright term."
Do I need it? No. Will I take it when it's offered to me? Absolutely. The greater the legacy I can leave my children and grandchildren (once I have them), the better. And frankly, considering how the system works, sales figures are going to take any given work out of print long before an irate literary heir will, so it really doesn't make a difference.
"I might make significantly less money but society as a whole would win from abolition of the copyright law. Copyright has nothing to do with good of society, justice or anything else. Copyright is an impedance to human development (where would we be if patents appears before spoken language? Language would never been invented then)"
This is the problem with extremists on this side of the copyright debate - you honestly have no idea of what copyright is, do you?
Society as a whole would not win from the abolition of copyright law - it would lose quite a lot. In fact, it could very well be a death blow to culture.
Sounds extremist? It actually isn't, if you think about it. But you have to understand what copyright is, first.
Copyright is a legal framework that can be boiled down to two functions (I'm going to use book terms, as that's what I'm familiar with). The first, most important, and least noticed, is setting rules for the interactions between the author and the publisher. The second sets rules for the interaction between the publisher and the reader. There is a third role - author and reader, but that really doesn't matter a whole lot in the greater scheme of things, regardless of what the RIAA would have you believe.
The rules for interaction between the publisher and the author create a situation where an author can create a work and submit it without having to worry about the publisher stealing it and publishing it without permission. Similarly, it protects a publisher from having an author publishing the same work at the same time with several different publishers. This is incredibly important.
Now, let's say for a moment that copyright law is abolished. Now there's NOTHING stopping a publisher from screwing over an author, or vice versa. But, you need that protection. If showing a manuscript to a publisher means that you're in serious danger of being shafted, you're not going to show the manuscript to a publisher. Same deal for self-publication - you need to be sure that somebody isn't going to scoop you with your own content. Otherwise, you're just not going to bother.
(Think of it this way - you walk into a pawn shop with some family heirloom and when you put it on the table for appraisal, the shopkeeper just takes it away from you - and you can't do anything about it. How many more times are you going to go to that pawn shop?)
So, how do you provide some protection to keep yourself in business, either as a publisher or an author? Contract law. If there's a binding contract between the two parties saying that they're not going to shaft each other, the protection is there. Of course, now you have lawyers involved with the submission process itself, and that costs extra money. A LOT of extra money, in fact, because a smart person negotiates the contract, and there are a lot of smart people in this business. So, now the costs of publication just went up a LOT.
If you're a publisher, and you're smart, you're going to cut those costs out if you can, but this means that you can't take submissions anymore, because those will involve negotiating contracts just to be able to look at the work, regardless of if you publish in the end. So, you'll commission books instead with a core of regular authors. But, because you know that any publisher out there can scoop you unless you have a contract with them to do otherwise, you're going to be very careful about what you commission - you're only going to go with stuff that will make you money. And that's not new, experimental stuff.
So, what have you just done by removing copyright? Well:
1. Cultural growth just ground to a crawl, simply because the people who can afford the advertising and infrastructure to get the content out there can't take the risks of bringing out new authors and new material. Think the remake of The Fog was a step in the wrong direction? This is the direction it would go.
2. What's left for innovative creative people is self-publication - now, p
I have to wonder - what part of the words "gross over-generalization" were unclear? I wasn't talking about the RIAA - I was talking about everybody in general - and the only thing I can say in general is the most basic of economic models and the need to eat.
"The more the copyright holders lose business, the more pressure is on them to seek out more reasonable business models."
Define "reasonable." If you want to call me a content creator, then I am a content creator in the field of writing and literature. And, the business model there, with bookstores and magazines, is quite reasonable all around. In music, on the other hand, the RIAA has been shafting the creative artists on one hand, and putting all of its customers under threat of lawsuit with the other. As business models go, that's just DUMB. But, both involve copyright holders. So, who do you shaft? Or, do you prefer to talk about one industry in particular, which is a reasonable DISCUSSION model.
"The way you talk, it's like if the RIAA members go out of business, nobody will be making music any more. In reality, they have such a stranglehold on the market, if they go out of business, that leaves huge opportunities just waiting to be exploited."
Again - "gross over-generalization." I didn't mention the RIAA. Frankly, I'd like to see the RIAA members go out of business - that would allow the creative artists to finally find an equitable system.
I would ask you, however, as I am starting to get really fucking pissed off about this, not to equate all copyright with the RIAA. The music industry is not the be-all and end-all of the creative arts, and just because one industry organization pisses on what copyright stands for, it doesn't make all of the rest of us a bunch of unreasonable, greedy bastards.
Actually, I hate to say it, but you were right the first time...and it's my fault.
I was time traveling to ancient Egypt and I just had to check my email, so I set it up. Sorry about that...
On the plus side, I accidentally ran over that Hitler chap on the way back, so it isn't all bad...
(One of these days, I have to learn how to resist jokes like this.)
"I didn't say 'creators' I said copyright holders, these are very rarely the same people. People produced content for hundreds of years before copyright cartels and any copyright law."
1. In my business (writing), most often the copyright holder is the content creator. And there are plenty of patents that are held by the people who created the invention.
2. Before copyright law, there were wealthy patrons. Copyright law serves an important purpose in a free market economy. This is verbatim from another of my posts today:
"Modern copyright serves a number of purposes, a few of which are absolutely vital to content creation (although a lot of people don't understand what copyright is, and would argue against this). In a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants summary (using book terms, since those are what I know best), they are:
"1. Defining the relationship between the author and the publisher.
"2. Defining the relationship between the holder of the publication rights (which are a subset of copyright) and the reader.
"Of these two, the first is by far the most important, and the one that gets the least amount of press. What it basically provides is a legal framework that allows an author like myself to submit a manuscript to a publisher without having to worry about that publisher taking my manuscript, attaching another name to it, and publishing it behind my back. It also keeps me from worrying about some other publisher getting their hands on a copy of my book and publishing it. So, I can create and deal with publishers in a way that doesn't shaft me. Without this protection, any content creator is likely screwed over the moment they show it to anybody.
"(This was an issue less than 50 years ago in the United States - J.R.R. Tolkien had to make a major revision to the Lord of the Rings in order to regain his copyright in the United States after a pirate edition was published by a major publisher.)"
Well, that's close, but there's a lot more to it.
Modern copyright serves a number of purposes, a few of which are absolutely vital to content creation (although a lot of people don't understand what copyright is, and would argue against this). In a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants summary (using book terms, since those are what I know best), they are:
1. Defining the relationship between the author and the publisher.
2. Defining the relationship between the holder of the publication rights (which are a subset of copyright) and the reader.
Of these two, the first is by far the most important, and the one that gets the least amount of press. What it basically provides is a legal framework that allows an author like myself to submit a manuscript to a publisher without having to worry about that publisher taking my manuscript, attaching another name to it, and publishing it behind my back. It also keeps me from worrying about some other publisher getting their hands on a copy of my book and publishing it. So, I can create and deal with publishers in a way that doesn't shaft me. Without this protection, any content creator is likely screwed over the moment they show it to anybody.
(This was an issue less than 50 years ago in the United States - J.R.R. Tolkien had to make a major revision to the Lord of the Rings in order to regain his copyright in the United States after a pirate edition was published by a major publisher.)
"If anyone realizes that having an economy that is increasingly dependent on "intellectual property" is a bad thing. Nowadays there is no compelling reason to buy things from the copyright holders other than maybe feeling guilty or an affinity for tangible copies. ESPECIALLY since the pirated versions often are much better than the retail versions in functionality and portability."
Wow - now that's a gross over-generalization, and only part of the first sentence is even close to right here...
Going back to front (sort of):
"Nowadays there is no compelling reason to buy things from the copyright holders other than maybe feeling guilty or an affinity for tangible copies."
To meet one gross over-generalization with another, you mean besides keeping the copyright holders in business so that they can continue to produce content? There's a basic economic reality you're missing here - producing any product or content takes time and resources, and to continue to do that requires that money is made to pay for the time and resources.
(And, before somebody bites my head off, yes, I know the internet is a cheap means of distribution, and yes, I know the RIAA treats its content creators horribly - I'm talking in the broadest of strokes here. When it comes down to it, any content creator needs to at least eat.)
But, you know what, you're right - we don't need that pesky literature, movies, and music anyway. If shadow puppets were good enough for our ancestors, they're good enough for us!
"ESPECIALLY since the pirated versions often are much better than the retail versions in functionality and portability."
Um, no, not really. Windows Vista is DRM-happy to the point of stupidity, and the RIAA has done everything it can to drive music fans into the hands of file-sharers, but that doesn't mean that the greater utility lies in files on a computer. Actually, in most cases a physical media tends to have better functionality and portability.
Take movies for example - I can go visit my parents in another city and bring a couple of movies along, and the DVDs are quite light, easy to carry, and all I have to do is put them into any DVD player in North America to have them work. No file copying, no waiting for a download to finish, no taking up space on my hard disk - everything is just on the DVD. When it comes to the DRM stupidity we have been seeing, we have to remember that it's the DRM causing the problems, not the physical format itself.
"If anyone realizes that having an economy that is increasingly dependent on "intellectual property" is a bad thing."
This is the one place where you are at least partially correct. But you shouldn't be saying "intellectual property" here - you should be saying "service-based," because that is what is really there. The United States used to have some of the greatest manufacturing power in the world, and now it seems it actually produces very little. But that's a more complicated argument, and not really relevant to this discussion.
So, by that rationale, if I drive a car into your bay window and up your stairs to see if you've got that new album by Phunk Me in your room, it is your fault that you didn't have concrete instead of glass, and that the steps damaged my suspension?
"Really? Hmm, so I can make a cartoon about Mickey mouse fucking an antelope? Not if I don't want to be sued for copyright infringement."
Depending on how you do it, yes, you can, actually. You do it as a parody - and copyright in the United States explicitly allows for that.
""Explain to me how a work with a copyright notice that is available to the public is theft."
It ISN'T available to the public, it is sold to the public, you can rent it, but it no longer belongs to the public like it used to after copyright expires."
Bullshit. If you can read it in a library, buy it in a bookstore, listen to it on the radio, by definition it is available to the public. And there is a vast difference between being inspired by a work and creating that sort of derivative work and ripping a work off wholesale. What you want is to have it for free. Please don't mince words. And please stop defining copyright in the terms of the RIAA - that organization has spent years abusing the letter and spirit of copyright law.
"No one is going to begrudge you 29.95 for your Diablo guide when it first came out or even 7 years afterwards (like the original way copyright worked) but do you seriously feel entitled to this (in part or entirely) UNTIL YOUR DEATH?!?!"
First of all, do some research - the Diablo book was the fiction e-book that launched the entire Blizzard fiction line, and the EverQuest book was about the history, community, and social issues of the game. Second of all, you are absolutely right I am entitled - a lot of good people fought for those rights, and I will fight to keep them. Why? Because it is MY hard work there. Because if it was anything other than an intellectual right, it would go without saying that I can dictate what will happen with it.
Let me tell you something about rights. There is no such thing as a natural right. Nobody is born into this world with natural rights - you aren't even born with the right to keep breathing. Rights are earned and fought for. People died for us to have the rights we have now. A lot of authors lived in poverty while publishers reprinted their work ad nauseum without paying them a penny. J.R.R. Tolkien had to rewrite the Lord of the Rings because an AMERICAN publisher pirated his book only a couple of years after it was published. And now you have the RIAA abusing both the public and the recording artists, and the grassroots movement they created by doing so. So this battle is far from over, and if you think I am going to give up my rights for a grassroots movement that doesn't have the first clue of what copyright is, and most of whom have never even read the Berne Convention, you are sadly fucking mistaken. I AM entitled to these things under a law that is very fair and equitable when you actually bother to read it, and I am keeping my rights.
"This is what is wrong with current copyright, and what the parent is mad about.. sorry if you can't understand that."
Let me tell you why _I_ am angry. I am angry because the grassroots movement here is very non-nonchalant about wanting to take away my rights. It a group of hippies, in the worst sense of the word. They don't create anything. They don't add anything to our culture. They just consume. They feel that because the Internet allows them to have some things for free, they must have all things for free.
What's even worse is that they have turned this into an ideology, and ideologies are very dangerous things in the wrong hands. And, because I refuse to recognize their sense of entitlement, I and my entire profession are demonized. I'm called a thief, and a parasite. I've been accused of everything from being a lazy bum never contributing more than a single book to being part of an international copyright conspiracy. And I am very tired, and very angry about this. They would have people like me die in poverty so that they can save that $10 on my next book. They may not say it in those terms, but that is what they are talking about.
Let
"Because the public domain is precious and is a formative part of our culture."
Wrong. The WORKS in the public domain are precious and a formative part of our culture. The public domain itself is a construct that makes it so that you don't have to pay creators who passed away over a century ago for reprinting their work. The distinction is important.
"You can rewrite and play with works like Charles Dickens or Washington Irving.
You can allegorize the Bible.
You can use, pull and reassemble cultural references at your will."
All of which can be done with works in copyright. In fact, most "trendy" pieces of literature and film have a lot of pop culture references to things in copyright. It's called fair use, and it's enshrined in the Berne Convention, on which most international copyright law is based.
"When culture becomes owned our culture stagnates."
I always love this argument. We're drowning in content to the point that publishers can't keep up with the rampant creativity of the creative community, and you're screaming that we have a shortage. Hollywood may be producing a bunch of drivel, but it is not all that culture is - our culture as a whole is extremely healthy, and in better creative shape than has ever been seen in history. So, frankly, I don't think we're stagnating, and the issue of having to pay a creator for the right to use their work in this argument is a red herring.
"If you were a filmmaker you'd also understand what a nightmare intellectual property
has become:
Should you be allowed to film an actor standing in front of a building that you didn't design?
Should you be able to dress her in clothes that you didn't design?
Should you be able to show her wearing headphones? Whose headphones?"
I can't speak to that, because I'm not a filmmaker. But, I looked at your website, and I didn't see a whole lot of evidence that you are. So, are you a filmmaker? Have you dealt with these issues yourself?
I am an author. I have dealt with the publishing world in some detail, and I know what the creative process is like, as well as its limitations, all from personal experience. And, unless you're a filmmaker and can provide some concrete examples, you have failed to make your argument on all counts.
"Secondly, how do you feel about being robbed? Because you were robbed. Something
was taken away from you that is worth an enormous amount of money and it was taken
away from you by the RIAA. When copyrights are extended indefinitely, instead of
entering the public domain as they were originally deemed by law -- what is actually
happening is that the RIAA is stealing from the public for their own interests."
That tears it - I want some justificiation of this bullshit, and it is bullshit. You wouldn't know the definition of theft if it came up and bit you.
I've got news for you - creative artists have this tendency of trying to keep their work in the public eye. When something is in copyright, it not only tends to be available to the public, but copyright law specifically allows for a lot of derivative works to be created. You CANNOT copyright an idea, only the exact implementation of one.
So, what theft is there? I want to know. In fact, I want some justification of that statement. Explain to me how a work with a copyright notice that is available to the public is theft. Explain to me how acting to take control of that publicly available work away from its creator isn't theft. There is such a thing as tyranny of the masses you know. You may want to look that up.
I am an author, I will keep my copyrights until the day I day, and you just called me a thief for that. You have some serious explaining to do.
Two points to consider:
1. The Act of Queen Anne pre-dates the US Constitution by 60-70 years, so if you want original intent, you have to go to it (or the Stationer's Log, but while it's part of the history of intellectual rights, it isn't considered actual copyright by most).
2. The US Constitution is an 18th century document, and we do not live in the 18th century anymore. Times have changed, and society has changed. Copyright right now may be informed by its past, but it is not dictated by it.
Well, here I've got to theorize, because you've just raised the exact core of the issue.
But, I don't think P2P networks will render copyright obsolete - in fact, I'd argue that the basic principles behind copyright are sound enough to be proof against it, and that they can be applied very easily to the P2P world.
My personal theory is that the entire argument has actually been drastically overthought. People are looking at the Internet, being wowed by the technology and how different it makes things look, but not realizing just how much they are staying the same.
Think of it this way: Fifteen years ago (if I've got my math right - it might be closer to 20), the Internet was not released to the public. But, there were plenty of photocopiers, which could be used to reproduce books illegally. There were plenty of tape recorders, which could be used to reproduce LPs, tapes, and CDs illegally, and there were plenty of video cassettes, which could be used to reproduce movies illegally. The ability to share copyrighted materials existed, and everybody in the western world had access to it one way or the other. And yet, the main way that people got their books was still in bookstores, movies were still being watched from video stores and in theatres, and music was still being bought legitimately and listened to on the radio. If history teaches us anything, it is that just because people can do a thing, it does not mean that they will do that thing.
Now we have the internet. But, most people don't actually like reading books on computers, so the main place to find books is still on paper. CD sales are dropping (and that could be due to any number of factors), but it seems to me that iPods are all over the place, and it's legitimate music being sold on there. And, I vaguely remember a news story somewhere about digital transmission being used to get films into the theatres. The RIAA and the MPAA may be kicking and screaming along their way to exploring these new distribution streams, but they are exploring them. Creators are still creators, and consumers are still consumers.
As a creator, copyright law provides me with a way of protecting myself, and it is not dependent on any particular manner of distribution. If one day all books are electronic, then all books will become electronic (I seriously doubt it, since even in this age of new technology, there is still no serious competition for the ease of use and the intuitiveness of the codex). But, that won't change the fact that I am the creator of my words, that I will choose the distribution channel that I like, and if I find that somebody is setting themselves up as a bootleg publisher of my work, that I will be able to sue them for it. The technology may one day be different, but the situation is the same. And, quite frankly, I really don't think that bashing the consumers over the head with DRM will actually make a difference one way or the other. I think something is needed, perhaps just a marker to be able to say that "This book is official, and was bought by X on date Y," but I don't think much more than that is necessary.
But, like everybody else, I don't know. There is a balance to be struck, and the future is not here yet. None of us know what it will bring, and we'll all find out together when it arrives.
(Besides, I'm still miffed about not getting my rocket car.)
"Copyright was invented by _publishers_
http://www.questioncopyright.org/promise"
I'm replying to this post because of this statement (the rest of the parent spends its time either misinterpreting what I said in my last post or putting words in my mouth, and I think my original post speaks for itself). The article that it's linked to is a very interesting one, it expands on the role of the Stationer's Log (which is a form of copyright protection predating the Act of Queen Anne), but it has a certain tunnel vision and spin that often appears in the extremist grass-roots anti-copyright movement, and I think that it's worth looking at it critically.
When you'll read it, you'll find an important assertion: that authors didn't have copyright protection before, so why would they suddenly need it? This is very misleading for a couple of reasons:
1. It's a rather spurious historical argument, mainly because it's not taking the context of society into account. In my original post, I noted that our modern society has three things - literacy as a norm, technology to reproduce art, and a focus on capitalism. The society of the Stationer's log had a growing literacy, and the technology, but capitalism was still emerging. Creative artists made their living not through proceeds of publication, but instead through a system of patronage where a noble patron would pay the artist a stipend to compose work in his/her honour. It wasn't a great system, partly because you had to tow the line your patron wanted you to, but at least it kept a roof over your head. Society is not a static system, however. By the time the first proper copyright act was written in 1709, a capitalist system was emerging, and by the end of the 19th century, the patronage system was completely gone - it was now all capitalist. So, creators may not have needed a copyright system at the very beginning, but there are no wealthy patrons around today, and an author's income is derived from royalties.
2. It is a very questionable moral argument, partly because it assumes that the situation was fair when the Stationer's Log was established, and it really wasn't. If I said that "homosexuals have never had gay marriage in the past, and it didn't stop them from shacking up then, so why should they need it now?" everybody would immediately see the injustice. The argument the article makes is very much the same. Correcting an injustice is always good.
And there is this: "Authors, having never had copyright, saw no reason now to suddenly demand the rather paradoxical power to prevent the spread of their own works, and did not do so."
This is one of the most common arguments put into play for the abolition of copyright, and it reverses the very idea of modern copyright. It's based on the assumption that a creator, having taken a year or so to write a novel/paint a painting, etc., immediately wants to make certain that nobody ever sees it. What copyright does is allow the creator to set the terms by which the work is distributed, so that a publisher doesn't shaft him/her, and if a third party circumvents those terms, to be able to take some reasonable action against them. It isn't prevention - it's creator's rights. It's also spin along the sames lines as "marriage is a terrible thing because it keeps you from dating other people" - basically, focusing on one negative while ignoring the context and all of the positives.
So, when you read the linked article, please keep in mind that part of it is rhetoric, and facts are taken out of context. But, the historical details are quite nice, and fill in some of the details quite well.
Well, while some of Lehman's comments are interesting (and promising), and I certainly believe that a lot of this current situation is very much the fault of the RIAA, I'm seeing a pendulum effect here. Having failed to control copyright using extreme measures on one end, he's now talking about the end of copyright, which is basically the extreme on the other end. The truth, like so many truths, is somewhere inbetween.
I'm speaking as a published and agented author here - I need to know what copyright is, and how it works. My livelihood depends on it, partly when dealing with publishers (knowing what rights I'm signing away) and partly when it comes to dealing with agents (making sure that they know what rights of my work to keep from being signed away). A bad contract can nail an author to the wall, and there are very bad contracts out there. So I am very much aware of what copyright is, what it does, and how it works.
And here is the problem - most people in the grass-roots movement don't. And the fault for this lies very firmly in the hands of the RIAA. Frankly, our society needs copyright - it is the single most important tool our culture and society has to advance itself. And, I'll explain why (even though it will take a while, and probably put a few readers to sleep).
We have a society that is very unique in many ways. First of all, literacy is the norm, not the exception. Secondly, we have the technology (and have had it since about the 15th century) to efficiently reproduce the work of creative artists (first literature and visual art, now music and film). Third, we have a capitalist system where the success of an artist is based on the sales of his/her work (rather than a system of patronage). It is, broadly put, a literate meritocracy.
What this means is that there are a lot of creative people out there, and they are able to distribute what they create through a variety of means. We are drowning in content, which is good - the more content there is, the healthier our culture is, and we have a very healthy culture, make no mistake. But, how is this content to be dealt with? Many of these creative artists want to do different things with their creations. Some want to sell it, others want to share it. Some want to keep their characters to themselves, and others want to create shared worlds that anybody can write in. Even in software development, there is a disparity. And there needs to be protection for all of these creative artists, so that they can do what they need to. And that is where copyright comes in.
Copyright is the broad tool that allows the various creative artists to do what they want with their work. It really is amazing in its simplicity - if you don't believe me, look at the Berne Convention. The creative artist owns the copyright to their work until such time as they die and it runs out, or they sign it away. And that copyright simply allows them to say "this work and what is in it will be copied in X way." It provides protection for the specific implementation of an idea, but not for the idea itself. And, it requires reasonability from the creators - hence fair use and the public domain. It's this tool that allows the Creative Commons to exist, that allows the Open Source movement to fight against SCO, and that allows an author to receive royalties on his work from a publisher for copies sold. And the success of the created work is determined by the market, and nothing else.
And this is where the RIAA is so troublesome - they have spent quite a long time abusing both the letter and the spirit of copyright law, and doing it very publicly. So, while I've just described the literal truth of what copyright is, there are a lot of people who just won't believe what I've written. Why won't they? Because while copyright law is about balanced rights of the creator, the RIAA is using it to sue dead grandmothers, students, and welfare moms for copying insignificant amounts of music. And actions do speak louder than words. The irony is
I've been writing professionally now for about nine years (wow - it really has been that long), and I hate to say it, but there are no shortage of scammers who want to take advantage of fresh young writers. And, since a lot of people want to be writers, there are no shortage of marks for these scammers.
As the f'ing article says, the fact of the matter is artificial sales are not sales, and simply won't help. The best way for an author to maximize the sales of his/her book is to write a really good book, and then once it's in print, write another one. That's how you build an audience, and that helps a lot towards propelling your sales up. And, for most of us authors, it's not a short process. You have to love this craft to try to make a living at it, and that's probably as it should be.
"This is mildly amusing for me, 'cause last thread I commented in I was accused of being a RIAA Shill (presumably that poster believes anyone who criticises Apple is a RIAA shill)."
Hey, if you think that's bad, you should try being a creative artist. I'm a published author, and I certainly believe that copyright should be respected - and that pretty much goes against every single action of the RIAA that has made it into the news. They abuse copyright on both sides, suing their customers, and stripping away the rights of the artists (http://cdbaby.net/courtney). But, while they're doing this, they're claiming to be doing it on behalf of the artists (http://www.riaa.com/about/default.asp). And, so who also gets smeared with the bad PR these jackals are generating?
Authors, actors, people like me.
Almost every time I get into a discussion on here, I, and my entire profession, end up being accused of something. Most of the time, it's something along the lines of "greedy evil artist," and a lot of the time it has nothing whatsoever to do with reality. Here's my list of favorites (and I am not making any of these up):
1. Being a lazy bum who writes a single book and lives off it for the rest of his life.
(Um, no - seeing as the average first book will bring an author around $3-5,000 over its entire publication lifetime, this is pretty much fiscally impossible - and it's both sad and laughable when you're struggling under the poverty line to be told that if you lose your intellectual rights to your writing that you're going to have to start working at being a writer for a change.)
2. Using copyright to keep my creative work from the public.
(Sort of goes against the entire idea of publishing, doesn't it?)
3. Holding an evil monopoly over my writing so that nobody can create a derivative work.
(Well, sorry folks, but copyright doesn't work that way. You cannot copyright an idea - only an exact implementation of an idea. If my story inspires somebody to write something similar, unless they're using my exact characters, there is absolutely nothing I can, or would want to, do about it. Nor can I put a hit out on somebody using a similar plot or theme.)
4. Being guaranteed an income because of the evil copyright laws.
(Yes, there are some people who honestly seem to believe that somewhere in copyright law is a clause that says that if I write something, everybody is required to buy it. Perhaps that explains those armed guards around the bookstores..."Buy the book or ELSE!")
5. Lobbying for unreasonable copyright extensions.
(You know what? I'll freely admit that like anybody, I'd like to leave something to my children and grandchildren, when I have them. But seriously, that whole Sonny Bono thing - I had nothing to do with it. And neither did most of the creative artists out there. We just want to create, and have our wishes in regards to our work respected.)
And my personal favourite...
6. Being part of a copyright conspiracy (I'm not making this up) to create an underclass of people who have no access to any content.
(Seriously, I'm not making this one up. I find it amazing that when our society is drowning in content, there are people out there who honestly think that not only is there a shortage, but that creative artists are behind it. I mean, come on - the creative artist is the artistic version of an exhibitionist - we like to keep a roof over our heads, but we also want as many people to see and enjoy our work as possible.)
The big problem, I think, is that there really isn't a whole lot of education about what copyright law is, and when I try to inform people about it, they don't believe me. They seem to figure that I'm some sort of RIAA shill, and lying through my teeth. They see copyright in terms of what the RIAA is doing, and the RIAA is abusing both the letter and the spirit of the law. And frankly, this is the sort of place where the grass roots movements start. We creative artists didn't ask for the RIAA to be doing what it's doing. Most of us (myself included) find the organization reprehensible. But we're getting demonized by it through association all the same.
Very, very well said! I hope everybody in this discussion reads it.
Somebody, please mod the man up...
I find it very interesting that while you're putting words in my mouth, you came out with this statement: "What most authors, including you, don't understand, is that the whole copyright idea is bogus, that it's founded on a lack of understanding on what authoring actually is." I'm afraid I'm not the one with a lack of understanding here, although from your rhetoric, I doubt you really want to understand. So, I'm going to rebut this, but only once. If you don't like the truth, that's your problem.
"Copyright and patent laws are means by which a 3rd party, namely you, is granted power (and by that I mean power to inflict pain and suffering) over other people's private property, so that their private property isn't entirely theirs anymore."
What is this pain and suffering? First of all, a book is an inanimate object, and cannot feel pain. Secondly, aside from ripping the book in half, how would you inflict any suffering on it? This part of the rhetoric is empty.
What is not empty is that there is power granted, but it is not power over the physical object - it is power over the text. That is what intellectual property is - an understanding that somebody's hard work can transcend the physical object in certain circumstances. And, the power I have over the contents of the text itself are quite limited. I can say that the reader may not turn himself (I am using "him" and "he" here just for simplicity of prose) into a distributer of the text by posting an electronic copy online, which is perfectly reasonable, as I have already given the rights for publication to a specific publisher under contract. I cannot, nor should not, tell him not to sell the book to a used bookstore. The physical book the reader can use however he likes - he can build a fort with it, if he wants. I cannot prevent a reader from quoting a reasonable amount of the book in his own work - that is fair use.
Copyright allows me control over my intellectual property with derivative works, to a small degree. I can prevent somebody from using my specific characters or imagined settings. I cannot, however, prevent another writer from using names I used, or prevent a writer from writing a book with a similar plot and characters. You cannot copyright an idea - you can only copyright the specific implementation of an idea, and even there some of it is subject to fair use. The power you give me credit for is far greater than any power I actually have.
"Then you say: "Oh! But if we were to strongly protect private property, I would lose money! My job wouldn't be respected!", to which I answer that no, you are not losing a single penny." This is wrong on both counts. First of all, I never said that my job wouldn't be respected - frankly, around Slashdot, it's not respected right now anyway, as your post quite aptly shows - I said my WISHES wouldn't be respected. My profession is losing respect because a bunch of litigious jackasses are using copyright for a racketeering scam. Undercutting my wishes in regards to publication, when I have signed a contract stating that publisher X has sole publication rights, is quite a different thing.
And frankly, you are wrong about me not losing money. By your argument, I could hire a secretary or office assistant and then refuse to pay him, and it's all right because they haven't lost any money. But they have - they've worked hard, and they were not given the compensation they earned, and any labour lawyer will tell you that it does constitute lost income. When dealing with piracy of intellectual property, the same model applies.
Let's do some math. Let's say I've written book X, and 1,000 copies are distributed and being read (I'm trying to keep this simple - real numbers in any case WILL vary). Each copy sold by my publisher generates $5.00 of royalties to me. Of these 1,000 copies, 100 are distributed by some online book pirate via his website. People read books based on the merit of the book - every copy distributed is being read because somebody liked wh
Okay, I've got to say this about the RIAA - I well and truly hope that somebody puts them down for good. A class action suit, SOMETHING.
I am a published author, and assuming nothing falls through with my publisher, I've got a book coming out later this year that should be quite interesting - and, I want my copyright protected. I don't want people pirating the year and a half of hard work of myself and my co-author. I'm not greedy, I'm not evil - I just worked (and am still working) hard on this, and I want what is reasonable - that my, and my co-author's, wishes in regards to how it is distributed be respected. That's all.
What are these wishes? That the students who buy it (it's a textbook on ancient Greek and Roman humour) buy it as it is published - as a printed book. We're even looking at having an electronic copy attached on CD that they can use on their laptop during class. If they want to sell it to a friend when they're done with it, that's fine. If they want to buy it from a used bookstore, that's fine too. It's if they take the book and post it on a newsgroup or website for anybody and everybody to download, undercutting my publisher - that's when I object. All of this is reasonable, and none of this takes away from the rights of the purchaser to do what is reasonable with their copy of the book.
But the RIAA - they're being completely unreasonable. The problem isn't the people who are downloading music, it's the people who are uploading it. And, in the process of filing lawsuit after lawsuit against people who are doing so little damage as to not even be worth the time, they're painting the entire artistic field in this litigious light. I'm tired of seeing my profession demonized as being greedy and evil, when most of us writers barely make enough to survive, because of these bastards.
It's one of those moments where I really wish I lived in the United States, just so I could have a chance to fight them. But, as a Canadian, I can't do that without it being meddling. Sigh.
Wow...I honestly can't believe what I'm reading on this forum.
Seriously, for a forum that is filled with anti-copyright people who scream at the top of their lungs every time somebody even mentions protecting intellectual rights, this just takes the cake. George Lucas has not only moved to encourage and develop the amateur film community, but has pretty much given them carte blanche to use his own Star Wars intellectual property to do it (up to what would be a PG rating), and people are complaining.
If you want to bash this contest because you don't like Lucas or Star Wars, put your money where your mouth is - make a film and outdo him. Because, right now, he's actually doing something really positive here with his intellectual property. Frankly, I don't exactly see too many commentators in this subject so far who can claim to be doing anything creative at all...
I'm afraid that when you're breeding giant ants to take over New York in a reign of anthill-shaped terror, conspiracy is necessary.
But, as I said, you already know too much. And the giant ants will be very pleased to meet you once the men in black arrive.
Well, I'm sorry, but you've come too close to the truth. You're right - the Society for the Preservation of Intellectual Rights, in association with the Freemasons, Illuminati, and the Jews, have conspired for some time to take over the world and make it safe for all those who want extra apple pie - and you've discovered us.
The men in black will be at your door in the next few minutes to see to your disappearance. Do be co-operative - they hate it when people resist...and we WILL have our extra apple pie...
Well, you've certainly given me a lot to think about - thank you for stating your case so well. You'll forgive me for hoping that you're wrong about the severity of the impact, since I did believe, and I still hope, that this will be a boon for independent artists (and frankly, as an author, I am horrified by the conditions I've heard reported from the music industry).
I do, however, have to wonder if the Copyright Royalty Board will be able to collect from stations outside of the United States. I'm not going to claim to know the answer, and frankly, I've got to admit that I am a bit out of my depth on this one (and how often do you hear THAT on Slashdot?).
But, anyway, thank you for pointing these things out. I hope that your comment gets modded up for it.