Statistical Analysis of Copyright Registrations 337
linuxizer writes "I've been poking around in Penn's Library for most of my Freshman year, looking up copyright statistics. What I found is basically what many suspected all along: extending and strengthening copyright terms has little effect on actual innovation. Perhaps most fascinating is the strong 40-year upward trend in registrations which is sharply broken in 1991 with a precipitous decline. Also included are some interesting observations about the RIAA's data. The numerous graphics should be well-enough explained that you don't need to go to the data files, but they are included if needed."
Innovation? (Score:4, Insightful)
innovation (Score:3, Insightful)
Well you have to also analyze the quality of the those extensions. A well thought out extension to the copyright terms could certainly have a positive effect on innovation, but sadly the viewpoint of the bodies making those extensions is only to protect. Little thought is given as to how it could be used to effect innovation positively.
Where does innovation come from? (Score:3, Insightful)
Innovation isn't always completely tied to copyright terms. Take the GNU/BSD licenses (copyright terms) of the recent decade. They're successfull and at least a part of their success comes from people being not satisfied with other copyright terms.
Indirect the innovation comes from the strengthening of other copyright terms, but you cant say it doesn't have any effect. It does, people are searching for other ways in order to not infringe other stupid copyrights (MS EULA).
are registrations a useful metric? (Score:4, Insightful)
I would venture to guess that most mainstream works are.
It's a big jump to innovation (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Statistics are B.S. (Score:4, Insightful)
Although statistics might have their place somewhere I've yet to find that place...
...100% of polls are misleading and only serve the purpose or ideology of the entities invloved...
The place you have yet to find is where proper data is gathered for the situation under investigation and no inferences are drawn from the statistics other than the strictly limited ones a given statistical method is designed to permit. Sadly, your statement about polls or other methods of gauging public opinion is correct since every effort is made under those circumstances to force the analysis into a path that supports a predetermined agenda. In this article, however, the author goes to some lengths to avoid these pitfalls. He clearly describes his source data, being careful to show where its shortcomings are and to illustrate his reasons for choosing that particular set of input data. He is honest about the conclusions he draws too - There are only two valid conclusions for most analytical statistics applied to seeking a corellation between apparently distinct data series, you can either say "We are n% confident that a relationship exists" and then go on to analyse it further or you can say "We cannot show a relationship between X and Y." Unlike most bad analysis this author does not take that latter case and claim it proves there is no relationship. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence and this author should be applauded for not falling into this trap.
In short, it appears that an effort has been made here to apply statistics properly and under such circumstances the conclusions drawn are less likely to be BS. Just because a statistical calculation is involved doesnt make the answer wrong or the analyst dishonest.
Re:Most of your freshman year? (Score:5, Insightful)
As for the
The mentality is what is causing the sharp decreases in students going into mathematics, the sciences and engineering fields, because they are viewed as being only for "nerds". A recent article posted on yahoo news stated that it is believe by 2010 that 90% of all physical scientists will be Asian, and that over 50% of them will be working in Asia. What's America going to do with a society comprised largely of business students and other "soft" degrees?
Re:Crappy article (Score:4, Insightful)
*sigh*
Re:Correlation between copyrights and compositions (Score:3, Insightful)
Ceteris paribus, ceteris paribus (Score:3, Insightful)
Did he adjust for inflation? I assume not. I don't know whether that would affect the outcome because he didn't show that data, only data derived from that data.
RIAA...has a nasty tendency to only release data which they can put a proper spin on...
The author knows this...how? Or the author has a strong gut feeling this way? Tendency?
If anyone disputes my figures, please give me a better set.
Uh, sorry, that's not the way science works. You're the claimant.
Constitution proscribes
Picking nits here, but proscribe means to forbid. Everybody misuses this word.
However, given that hundreds of thousands of works are produced each year, one must assume that the sheer numbers involved evens out the effects of differing quality. So the premise remains valid.
Here is the fatal flaw of it all: with less copyright protection, we would tend to less a lesser diminution of lower-expense copyrights (music in particular). If works are being produced irrespective of a minimal investment, copyright protection won't generally affect them, and indeed copyright may be an afterthought. So the quality of the patents is an overwhelmingly important question; if protection changes the character of the innovation, then the actual amount of it is irrelevant.
What it will affect is the willingness of creators to spend money to develop an article, since reduced copyright protection diminishes their ability to recapture those funds later. Perhaps a more pertinent question would be the correlation between R&D funds and copyright protection. That would seem to be an even more hellish proposition in getting the data.
CDs are a luxury item. (Score:4, Insightful)
I quote from the article:
What, is this guy crazy? Of course CDs are luxury items! When I was flush with my phat geek paycheck, I was buying CDs like there was no tomorrow. When I got laid off last year, what do you think one of the first things I stopped buying was? CDs, of course! I can live without the latest White Stripes CD, I can't live without making my mortgage payment and buying food.
Re:piracy fatal to creation of films worth preserv (Score:3, Insightful)
Traditional retirement plans (Score:2, Insightful)
it doesn't allow creative people to retire.
How does any self-employed person retire? Why would an IRA or 401(k) be different for an author than for anybody else?
I'd like to see 14+14 years, the same copyright term provided by the Copyright Act of 1790. If it worked in 1803, I don't see what's wrong with it in 2003.