Pirate Party Leader: Copyright Laws Ridiculous 543
smitty777 writes "Rick Falkvinge, better known as the leader for Sweden's Pirate Party, recommends doing away with copyright laws since no one is following them anyway. FTA: '...he uses examples from the buttonmakers guild in 1600s France to justify eliminating the five major parts of copyright law today. The first two are cover duplication and public performance, and piracy today has ruined those. The next two cover rights of the creator to get credit and prevent other performances, satires, remixes, etc they don't like. Falkvinge says giving credit is important, but not worthy of a law. Finally, "neighboring rights" are used by the music industry to block duplication, which Falkvinge rejects.'"
GPL (Score:3, Informative)
I have to make the same point I always make in these articles (by the way, isn't this like the third Pirate Party submission in the last month?)--if you do away with copyright laws, you do away with the GPL. The GPL is a copyright license that requires copyright law to have any legal power over what people do with GPL code. Go ahead and take a look at how many times the term copyright appears in the GPL:
- "'The Program' refers to any copyrightable work licensed under this License. Each licensee is addressed as 'you'. 'Licensees' and 'recipients' may be individuals or organizations."
- "All rights granted under this License are granted for the term of copyright on the Program, and are irrevocable provided the stated conditions are met."
- "However, nothing other than this License grants you permission to propagate or modify any covered work. These actions infringe copyright if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by modifying or propagating a covered work, you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so."
And so on. Without copyright laws, the GPL is powerless.
Re:GPL (Score:4, Informative)
So? If you get rid of copyright, the GPL would have no purpose anyway. Like, in a good way.
Re:GPL (Score:4, Informative)
Some years ago, Richard Stallman would have supported that idea. But now, with the changes in the world lately, he sings a rather different tune [gnu.org]. There's that pesky distinction between source and object code to think about and the fact that the copyright licenses for Free Software are also used as a defense against software patents.
Re: (Score:2)
I think there is a statement by RMS somewhere, claiming that the GPL could be done without copyright. But that copyright makes it easier, as it provided as foundation. I suspect that something equivalent of GPL could be done via contract law.
Re: (Score:3)
Er, no.
The purpose of the GPL is to ensure the ongoing distribution of source code licensed under it and any other code derived thereof.
If you take Copyright away, the the GPL can no longer achieve this. That doesn't mean the _requirement_ to do so has disappeared, however.
Or, to use an example, Red Hat would no longer be required to provide the source code for their Linux distribution. Sure, you could copy the bina
Re: (Score:3)
So? If you get rid of copyright, the GPL would have no purpose anyway. Like, in a good way.
That is utter crap.
The purpose of the GPL is to try and force companies who use open source software in their products to make any additions they make for the benefit of their customers also available back to the open source community.
Without copyright law and the GPL my company could take an open source product and use it to build a closed source product that we never published the source code for. I could then simply protect our version of the source using an NDA that all staff had to sign before they cam
Re: (Score:2)
well, without the copyright, you also wouldn't need the GPL, right? you would be free to decompile, copy, distribute whatever source you want. right? anything you release, anyone else could use.
Re: (Score:2)
Powerless to do what exactly? Powerless to force people to give back their changes to the community? In a world without copyright, that's already trivial: any member of the community can just copy anything they like and make changes, then publish the new version, etc. All legally. It's a better world, but until then, we use the GPL *today* to undo some of the damage that copyright does *today*.
Re: (Score:2)
The GPL is intentionally written to match the strength of the copyright monopoly. If the copyright monopoly strengthens, so does the GPL. If it weakens, so does the GPL, too.
In the case of an abolished copyright monopoly, the GPL is also effectively abolished, but this is by its original design.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:GPL (Score:4, Insightful)
Using the GPL does not mean you support copyright as an idea, or support the GPL as an end. Using and supporting the GPL only requires that you think it is currently the best option. Using copyright to remove powers from other copyright holders (and by releasing what you create into the public domain, you are simply feeding them) does not imply any sort of conflict of interest or lack of coherency. It simply means you are being pragmatic.
Copyright will not be abolished or even lessened any time soon; it is going to get worse before it gets better. Until that changes, the GPL is going to be posed as an option as how to try to regain some semblance of sanity. It does not matter if you, Linus, Stallman, etc. seek to apply it that way or not, some people will, and I am behind it. Those you complain about are also behind it. The fact you cannot see that other people might have more nuanced views of the matter than seeing copyright as an end, seeing the GPL as an end, or seeing abolition as an end, and simply acting in the most impulsive way towards whatever end they choose, is not a problem with those you complain about: it is a problem with you.
Original article is on Techdirt (Score:5, Informative)
Use the second link.
The original source of this message is the column on Techdirt [techdirt.com] named It is time to stop pretending to endorse the copyright monopoly. The ITWorld reporter (the first link in the story) muddles the message to some degree, and also introduces heavy bias into the story (see the headers over the comments section, for instance).
The original message is that yes, the copyright monopoly (or four/five monopolies) are ridiculous, but we should stop pretending to support them all while criticizing the draconian laws that are de facto needed to sustain them. IT World muddles this to that we should stop "following" the copyright monopoly laws. That is a different message (which I might have said too, but not in this particular article).
Re:Original article is on Techdirt (Score:5, Informative)
Also, I have not been the leader of the Swedish Pirate Party for a bit over a year. I am its founder and I led it for its first five years. Anna Troberg is the current leader of the Swedish Pirate Party.
Cheers,
Rick
Re: (Score:3)
Widening the Overton Window (Score:3)
Rick, I'm glad you're saying this. We need to widen the Overton Window [wikipedia.org] in this debate.
I tell my friends I simply don't believe in copyright, full stop. I don't have any qualms in ignoring it. I don't believe in trying for 'reasonable reform'. I only believe in the eradication of copyright monopolies of whatever duration.
Re: (Score:3)
Thank you, good sir. Those are very kind words.
Although, I prefer the swarm as an organization rather than a hierarchical structure, so "stand behind a leader" isn't really what happens when I work. When I "lead", in quotes, I say out loud that I'm going to do something to accomplish a goal, and that others are welcome to follow me in that action if they like. Usually, a couple of hundred or thousand do.
Othertimes, other people in the swarm -- or the group as a whole -- decides on a course of action that I
Keep the concept of copyright (Score:2)
Just make it more reasonable and not oppressive. The idea of getting credit isn't bad, its just morphed over the decades into something evil.
Typical Politician (Score:4, Interesting)
He sounds like a typical politician, making big bold lies that are more descriptive of how he sees the world than how it is.
People do, generally, follow copyright. Millions of people buy books or DVDs or music or software. Those that don't often give reasons like "I wanted to try it before buying it" or "It's not available for sale [where I live]/[in a format I want]" or "I can't afford it anyway", suggesting that they would follow the laws given the right circumstances.
It's good that people generally follow these laws, because the core idea of copyright (that creators have a right to be reimbursed for their hard work) is a good one.
Now, the statement that "Copyright laws are ridiculous" is unambiguously true. Any law that suggests the unauthorized download of MP3s causes trillions of dollars worth of damage to the economy is clearly insane. But suggesting that we should have no protection for creators at all is equally insane. It's just a nice fiery soundbite intended to get his supporters all worked up, so that they'll donate more or participate in get out the vote efforts, etc.
We need copyright reform, and hopefully the pirate parties draw attention to that fact. But copyright abolition is a cure worse than the disease.
Re: (Score:2)
But copyright abolition is a cure worse than the disease.
Only for those on the corporate side of the copyright-based industries. Everyone else would be better off, even most creators.
Re:Typical Politician (Score:4, Insightful)
So this has turned into an argument between two straw men?
Strawman #1: People don't follow the copyright laws anyway so what harm can come from simply abolish them?
Well evidence does show that the majority of the public do respect the current copyright laws. They don't do it because they're scared of the movie/record/software industry lawyers; They do it because they think they are paying what the work is worth and support the idea of the creative artist/programmer getting paid for the effort. Sure it looks like a lot of people pirate but that could simply be because the squeaky wheel gets the grease meaning that people who do buy songs from iTunes/Amazon or purchase software don't go around making a big deal out of it.
Let me put it another way. People shoplift. A lot of shop keeps experience revenue loss from "shrinkage" which is the term they use for inventory that left the store without payment. Does this mean that we should abolish our current system of commerce? No. I find the Pirate Party's argument just as ridiculous.
Strawman #2: Copyright are only for those on the corporate side of the copyright-based industries.
This looks like an attempt to engage in a fictional class war where only the wealthy evil corporations have copyrights and the common man is being oppressed by them. Give me a break. There are many independent artists/programmers that depend on copyright laws to protect their interests, and unlike the other forms of intellectual property protections (patents), copyright doesn't require a substantial investment in legal fees just to make your work public. Not to mention, most of our favorite open source licenses depend on copyright laws to give there terms legal protection. What you thought corporations followed the GPL out of the kindness of their hearts and to protect their honor?
If you need something to fight against then please take up the cause to abolish software only patents. Now that does nothing but to serve corporate interests, venture capitalists, and their lawyers.
Re:Typical Politician (Score:5, Interesting)
But copyright abolition is a cure worse than the disease.
The movie industry would bitch and moan for 5-10 years, then get back to business as usual, with movies being played in theaters and on TV, even if DVDs never get released (and likely, DVDs would be released at a $5-$10 price point, rather than the $30 price point most new DVDs list at). Books would stay as is. The result of complete abolition of copyright would be an explosion in music and software the likes of which the planet has never seen. Copyright is holding innovation back more than helping at this point, and doing so by punishing the general public. With it gone, more music would be out there, with no decrease in quality, and app store sized games would be released by the millions. Consoles would probably move back to cartridges and flash-based propriatary storage to maintain a digitial lock on games, and PC games would crash, but the fallout of the abolition would be a huge jump forward in Public knowledge, which was the original point of copyright. The US would be much much better off without copyright. I've visited some places with no software protections, and they are vibrant economies of software creation. You can code whatever you want without worrying that someone else has locked up some feature you thought up. Most software patents are obvious and not novel, and elimination of that hurdle increases programming output.
I can't see any likely future in which we'd be better off with the course we've set vs complete abolition of all IP laws. It would take some getting used to, and some would purposefully sabotage themselves to prove a point, but overall, the world would be a much better place if all I laws (patents as well) were abolished, than to continue the system as done today.
Of course, there is a middle ground, closer to what existed when the Constitution was first ratified where the terms were much shorter and patents could only be of "things" rather than "thoughts" that is better than either extreme. But that was perverted to what we have now, so I'd opt for complete abolition than a middle ground which the content exploiters immediately strive to overthrow, as they have already done once.
Re: (Score:3)
I agree with pretty much everything in your first paragraph. The industries war against the first sale doctrine needs to end, creators need to get to hold on to their copyrights instead of being pushed into selling their souls to publishers (particularly true in the music industry), and the fact that copyright terms have been indefinitely extended is appalling.
But after that, you get into some serious magical thinking.
For movies -- as you say, in a world without copyright, DVDs may die out. If releasing a
Shorter copyright (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's not pretend that copyright doesn't have a good purpose. If I create a new product (w/o a patent), it can take time for other people to copy it. They have to reverse engineer it, and figure out how everything works. And their copy might not be as good as my version.
But with books, music, software... It can be copied the day it's released. And every copy is an exact perfect duplicate. My copy is just as good as another persons copy.
And that difference, means it would be nearly impossible to monetize anything except physical products. So copyrights are needed and are important.
BUT that doesn't mean it should be protected for a 100+ years. Is the phone from 1876 as important today as it was then? Is last decades music listened to as much as music that was released last week? Are books from 100 years ago as popular as today's bestsellers? Copyrighted material becomes worth less as time passes.
After 10 years or so, very few copyrighted works are worth more than a fraction of what they were originally.
So set a 10 year copyright. I would even go for 15 years.. but that's starting to become excessive.
Re:Shorter copyright (Score:4, Interesting)
"Classic" things have had their time, and that time has passed. If those specific works are still around, they should have entered culture and be in the public domain as is the *default* without the government-granted copyright protection.
Exponential Growth (Score:5, Interesting)
Allow any work to be copyrighted for 1 year without paying any fees. Let that be the "copyright from the moment your pen touches the paper".
Beyond Year 1, the cost of extending a copyright should be $0.01 * 2 ^ (Year #).
So, renewing the copyright for Year 2 costs $0.04.
Year 10 is $10.24
Copyright protection for a decade is affordable for anyone, and sometimes cheaper than coffee.
Year 20 is $10,485.76
Year 30 is $10,737,418.24
Year 40 is $10,995,116,277.76
So it provides everybody with a reasonable measure of copyright protection.
It provides corporate entities a way to keep copyrights on things that are very profitable.
It ensures that all works will eventually fall to the public domain.
Why not?
Re:Exponential Growth (Score:5, Insightful)
Because you don't want Disney causing runaway inflation just to keep Mickey out of the public domain.
Re: (Score:3)
Because you don't want Disney causing runaway inflation just to keep Mickey out of the public domain.
If Disney can cause runaway inflation, you have bigger problems. This is like saying that you can't upgrade the network connection, because then the malware would spread faster than it could be removed - something is fundamentally wrong.
copyright laws are worthless (Score:2)
not totally ridiculous, just too much (Score:4, Insightful)
The assumption that no one respects copyright laws is wishful thinking, extrapolating from "none of my friends" or "no one I know" to assume that everyone thinks that way. It's incorrect.
I respect copyright, for one. So do many people I know, including - not coincidentally - a lot of musicians, writers, artists, and actors. Not just as it applies to their own work, but as it applies to others' work. It isn't just faceless corporations on one side of the debate, and people on the other.
I used to ignore copyright... until I started producing works of my own, and realized that the effort that goes into creating a really great song, an entertaining movie, a well-crafted story, or a well-rendered illustration deserves compensation. I also happen to think that copyright terms are ridiculously long, and often too restrictive. But those problems don't negate the worthwhile goal outlined in the US Constitution: to promote the arts by giving creators temporary control over their work.
Re: (Score:3)
You touch on another flaw in the original article's reasoning: By eliminating copyright protection of all kind, you make it harder for people to reward the original artist.
Right now, people who want to get a copy of a work for free know what they're doing. They're going to Pirate Bay or some other website instead of Amazon, while people who are happy with paying artists can do so relatively easy (how much publishers are taking is another issue). If you were to eliminate attribution requirements, I'd be free
Re:not totally ridiculous, just too much (Score:5, Insightful)
As for 'deserving' compensation, that's a laughable idea. Effort itself doesn't deserve compensation. In order for me to make money, I have to be doing something that something is willing to pay me for. Even copyright doesn't give direct compensation for effort, and the sensible principles of US law demonstrated in Feist v. Rural mean that even for getting the copyright monopoly must provide something besides just effort, namely originality.
There's Not Enough Lawyers! (Score:5, Interesting)
I was just reading about this in Lessig's book, "Free Culture" [amazon.com] today. I can't recommend the book enough!
I never knew Walt Disney's Steamboat Mickey [wikipedia.org] infringed on Steamboat Bill, Jr [wikipedia.org] which infringed on the song Steamboat Bill [wikipedia.org]. Ironic, isn't it? Too bad the madness isn't stopping anytime soon...
To those who answer "not totally ridiculous"... (Score:4, Interesting)
Please, I'm begging you: stop trying to negotiate as though the other side was rational and honorable, and would honor any agreement for the long term.
That's how they get us, every time. They pretend that they'll act like human beings, and then they push for more. Every time. Because that's what sociopaths do: they see the pie and they want it all. And they're willing to be patient if it gets them what they want. And make no mistake: what they want is the whole thing, forever, and every one of us paying them, regardless of how much we use or enjoy.
The only way to counter that is to act as irrationally, and in the other direction. It's not that there can't be a sane middle ground; it's that as long as we advocated for a sane middle ground, we got extended and renegotiated into the current situation. If we keep trying to negotiate for a sane middle ground, we're the ones to blame when the next Mickey Mouse preservation act passes. We're the ones to blame when the public domain starts to shrink. We're the ones to blame, until we start acting as sociopathic as corporations, including being so utterly charming that our point of view seems as reasonable as theirs, so the sane middle ground must be the right compromise.
It All Boils Down To This: Abolish I.P. (Score:3, Interesting)
There is no such thing is intellectual property.
I repeat: There is no such thing as intellectual property.
Information ceases to be your sole property the second that it leaves your head, and since the invention of language, once broadcast in any way a piece of information becomes infinitely reproducible, and by their very nature all recordings of any kind, be it written words, pictures, or sounds, are also infinitely reproducible. Improvements in recording and publishing technologies, from woodblock printing, to the phonograph and typewriters, all the way to cassette tapes and networked computers, have made producing and duplicating information increasingly trivial. No form of information is technically scarce.
However, copyright laws and patents achieve their desired ends by attempting to create an artificial scarcity of information through legislative fiat. They in effect commoditize information which is inherently unlike a commodity, giving it scarcity and therefore market value. In the process of doing this however, much of the information's value is lost because its maximum potential utility is curtailed by limiting the number of parties which can use it, and by giving exclusive rights to a certain party over who can retain, utilize, and duplicate a piece of information, information access is effectively monopolized.
This is harmful to the value of information and those who use it, the creation of privileged monopolies over pieces of information practically ensures that they will be abused, and it fails to address the original problem of compensating authors. On the other hand, it confers extraordinary rights and privileges to rights holders who own copyrights and patents, frequently for information which was never created by them personally. Additionally, how is it just that someone should continue receiving compensation for work that they are no longer performing? How is it just that someone should be compensated for work that they never did? The absurdities of patent and copyright law immediately begin compounding on one another after even cursory examination.
Having said that, the act of producing original information and original records of that information can be readily commoditized. It is scarce - only so many people can produce a desired piece of information or a desired record, and from them only so many hours of work can be extracted. It is valuable - the production of new information benefits society, and maximally benefits society when information can be freely utilized by any party. Intellectual property is imaginary, but intellectual labor is a very real service which is the sole property of the intellectual laborer. Its value can be decided, it can be quantified, and it can be sold. Ensuring that intellectual laborers are adequately compensated for their work is of paramount importance to society.
In the case of patentable products which can be produced by industry, or for the processes used to create those products, wherever a patent is applicable, the intellectual laborers working for an industrial company or consortium of companies should negotiate their own pay. If they don't get paid enough, they don't produce work. Auctioning of services, prize competitions, and so on could be used to compensate the inventors for the production of inventions alongside regular contracts. As for the companies themselves, which use the monopolization of inventions to protect themselves from competition, any one industrial company does not have unlimited resources and is therefore incapable of using or producing every available invention. Those companies will still be tasked with producing products as efficiently and effectively as possible, without the purely artificial constraint of copyrights and patents applying to them. They will still have to decide how to best reach the market. The competition will simply be more fierce, and this is entirely desirable.
In the case of cultural artifacts and the recorded arts which can be copyrighted, the above still applies, and
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Informative)
The purposes of the copyright monpoly vary between legislations, so there is not "one" purpose.
In the United States, it is "to promote the progress and the useful arts", nothing more, nothing less. That is a direct quote from the constitution.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Informative)
(Nitpicky edit)
"To promote the Progress of Science and the useful Arts..."
(/Nitpicky edit)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Right you are, sir.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
This is one thing that confuses me: at what point did casual entertainment become a useful art?
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Interesting)
"Useful Arts" actually refers to patentable handicraft; the consitution's motivation for the patent monopolies. This is the same word as you see in "artisan".
"Progress of Science" refers to knowledge subject to the copyright monopolies.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Interesting)
Has this even the slightest relation to the things copyright holders go to court these days? (ie: digital copies of of movies)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Informative)
Copyright law has been largely unified via the Bern convention (USA signed on in the 1980s) and later WIPO.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Informative)
Well, record labels do provide many services to artists, starting from financing them when they're starting up, their professional help, their experience and their marketing channels. This isn't exactly free either. Here is a list of costs for advertising related stuff:
Optional mailing labor for CD $1.00 each
Optional mailing labor for CD+vinyl $1.50 each
Optional BDS tracking $1000
Optional Mediabase tracking $1000
Optional R&R Indicator tracking $1000
Optional Quarterbacking $100 00
College Radio (8 weeks) .$ 2500 .$ 2500 .$ 6000 .$ 2000
Jazz, Blues, Folk, Americana, Piano (up to 100 stations)
CMJ charting for URBAN, metal, electronic, jazz, world, AAA, (250 stations), or non-
charting for alternative
CMJ Top200 Charting (up to 500 stns; incl extra phones) $ 4000
CMJ Top200 Charting (up to 700 stns; incl extra phones
and CMJ core stations)
Regional (non charting, any genre) (50 stations)
Commercial Specialty Mixshow (8 weeks)
National Mixshow (BDS Level - 100 stations) $15,000
Mixshow (up to 70 stations, college & commercial) $ 6000
Dance Mixshow Charting (100 stations) $ 4000
Regional (non-charting) (10 stations) $ 6000
Commercial Regular Rotation for AC, Pop, R&B (8 weeks) .$ 7000 .$20000 .$ 1500/station
75 stations (small markets) $ 4000
150 stations (small markets)
R&R indicator stage 1 (small markets - 10 stations) $15000
R&R indicator stage 2 (medium & small markets - 25 stations).$30000
BDS Promotion (7-10 stations) $15000
FMQB charting (100+ stations, medium and small) $20000
R&R CHR/Pop Indicator (medium and small markets - 50 stations) $40000
Regional (non-charting) (10-15 stations) $8000
FMQB AC tracking (optional) $ 400/mo
High-Level AC Promotion (includes field staff)
(additional)
High-Level Pop/Urban Promotion (includes field staff) $40000
(additional)
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (unrated mkt) $ 200/station
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (small mkt) $ 500/station
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (medium mkt)
Commercial Regular Rotation for Rock, Alt, Urban (8 weeks) .$ 15000 .$ 1500/station
R&R indicator stage 1 (small markets - 10 stations)
R&R indicator stage 2 (medium & small markets - 25 stations) $ 30000
Regional (non-charting) (10-15 stations) $8000
BDS Promotion (7-10 stations) $15000
High-Level Promotion Urban (includes field staff) $40000
(additional)
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (unrated mkt) $ 200/station
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (small mkt) $ 500/station
High-Level station giveaways or commercials (medium mkt)
Commercial Regular Rotation for AAA or Smooth Jazz (8 weeks) .$20,000 .$ 200/mo
50 station special (medium and small) $ 8,000
FMQB / R&R charting (75 stations, all sizes)
Regional (non-charting) (20 stations) $ 2500
FMQB AAA tracking (optional)
High-Level Promotion (includes field staff) $10000
(additional)
Commercial Regular Rotation for Country (8 weeks)
Small market non-charting (50 small stations)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
So....our civil rights are being forfeited so the music and movie industries to subsidise musicians/movies?
What was the ratio between cost and profit on Avatar again? Somehow I don't think cost comes in to it - they are rolling in it.
Re: (Score:3)
Your civil rights? Really, you have a civil right to enjoy someone else's works without paying them?
Methinks your diluting the term a bit...
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Suppose a person had memorized a book or a passage from it, or learned to play a song on their own instrument. Copyright can prevent a person from being free to speak or otherwise offer their own knowledge to a willing listener. There's no more important right a person can have than that.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
Your civil rights? Really, you have a civil right to enjoy someone else's works without paying them?
I assume the GP meant that our rights to privacy, free speech and a fair trial are being sacrificed in the name of hunting "pirates".
The DMCA can be (and is) used to suppress free speech. A corporation can issue a take-down notice to a third-party hosting provider such as YouTube, and since the third party has no interest in contesting the take-down notice in court, the corporation gets its way even if the material is legal.
The proposed SOPA bill is even worse, since it'll allow courts to shut down entire sites if one of their users upload infringning content. Since it's impossible for a site such as YouTube to check every clip users upload, the RIAA and MPAA will have the legal right to shut them down any time the want. The hosting providers will survive only as long as they please the copyright holders and do everything they say, including banning perfectly legal content.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Informative)
I'm not sure Avatar is a very good example: I thought I read that it was largely financed by James Cameron himself, so it probably would never have been made if it weren't for him ponying up his own money, and he instead had tried to rely on getting some studio to finance it entirely.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
All completely unnecessary. Look at the punk scene for a practical demonstration of a modern distribution network. Dozens of small labels each supporting a handful of bands feed into a few larger distros focused on a few similar subgenres (Robotic Empire, Plan-It-X, etc.). More popular albums hit shops like Interpunk or All That's Heavy, and the biggest sellers are available on mainstream shops like Amazon or CDUniverse.
If advertising money is all the big labels bring to the table, then they can be readi
Ahem, FCC? Yeah, could you read this.... (Score:5, Interesting)
This looks like it was cut and paste from some sort of official spreadsheet or list. Wasn't there a massive antitrust lawsuit back in the 1970s where the government came down down hard on Pay for Play radio stations? The snippet I pasted above looks to my untrained eye like prices for playing singles. Could you expand on where you got this info, DCTech?
Re:Ahem, FCC? Yeah, could you read this.... (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3)
Wait a minute? What about all the 'small' radio stations that are always getting pressed for 'royalty' money because they are playing these songs? We hear it all the time, "These stations need to pay for the right to play this music." and they keep asking for MORE money. However, this list is the opposite. The artist is paying for the right to be on the radio.
Who the crap is getting all the money? How can they take money from one side saying 'get us on the radio', and take money from the other side saying '
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Informative)
Well, record labels do provide many services to artists
That's a hell of a way to spin it. Who do you think ultimately pays for the advertising, the studio time, the costs of live shows, etc.?
The customer, like in every business? Of course, record labels also take risk of the band not succeeding and them making a loss.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Informative)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, this comes off the royalties paid to Artists. No wonder many of them do not see a cent of royalties because they are still "in the red".
For the record company it is easy to get a better price than what you see here, but the artist will not see it, the record company lives off the arbitrage.
In the end, many successful modern artist go direct to the Internet and bypass this sinkhole.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean many modern artists who have used previous record company contracts to build a substantial nation-/worldwide fan base. Although there are a few counterexamples (the exceptions that prove the rule), they are fairly few in number.
Does this mean that artists get screwed? Yes and no. The artists may not make a lot (if any) money, but their expenses can be covered and it's a good opportunity, due to the nationwide promotion and touring, even if the recording doesn't pan out. If you are in the right place at the right time with the right amount of business savvy and right mindset, you can parlay this promotion into a successful music career, even if you don't make a lot of money on the record company deal itself.
Even better, the record company may drop you after the first couple albums, freeing you with your (now) national contacts to make decent money afterward (at least more money faster than if you played struggling regional artist for years).
The main issue is to go into the process with your eyes wide open - they will try to screw you. But you can screw back and take any advantages you get. Chances are you won't make money on the record contract, but you can use the contacts and fan base gained in the process to promote your career long afterward and, if you're smart enough, "fail successfully".
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Interesting)
The publicity given by the record label has certainly not reached me
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
That's the one thing remaining that the labels actually do, they front the band money much like an angel investor would for a company, but unlike the angel, they demand 100% ownership.
The rest of it isn't actually things the label contributes since 100% of it is charged against the band's paltry royalties. That's how a band can have an album go double platinum and never get a check from the label.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
An "angel" offering fame and fortune but demanding complete ownership of the artist sounds more like a deal with the devil to me.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, the Devil is supposed to be a fallen angel...
Wrong (Score:5, Informative)
Copyright laws are to preserve the right of copying the work for the copyright holder.
The point of copyrights (and patents) is to promote the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for a limited time the exclusive right to use the work(s) to the person(s) who created them as they see fit.
Re:Wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
It is a limited time. Pirate people just seem to want that limit to be about zero seconds, producers want as much as possible. Obviously both sides are foaming retards who shouldn't get what they want.
Re:Wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
It might be a "limited time" if they didn't keep extending it whenever the material of large companies starts to get close said limit. I'm pretty sure the Founding Fathers didn't put this provision in the Constitution so that Mickey Mouse was still "a protected work of art" 200 years from now...
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Timeframes measured in single-digit years would be a good start. Ideally it would be inversely related to the popularity of the work (so more popular works went out of copyright sooner). It also shouldn't persist past the death of the copyright holder.
Re:Wrong (Score:5, Funny)
That gives incentive for pirates to kill successful artists.
Of course that would create bodyguard jobs!
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Right. Because obviously there's a tidal wave of people ready to commit pre-meditated murder, but for their fear of prosecution for Copyright infringement.
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authors and inventors (Score:4, Insightful)
There's the problem. The copyright section from the U.S. Constitution [archives.gov] has been quoted many times in this discussion and on others with emphasis added but here's a new emphasis: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
Most of today's "rights holders" are not the creators. Instead of quibbling over duration of copyright, just make the rights non-transferable. That would really get fought tooth and nail by big media, but it strikes at the heart of the matter.
Re:Wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
they wont change anything. even if 99,999% of the society wants it. and there is no way to elect those who will change it. as evidenced by how the very basic first rule of the modern society, habeas corpus - that was there since magna carta - has gone to cinders with the recent legislation those people have produced. let me stress this again :
they dont give shit about what you think and they wont change that law of the land. and you cant elect or be elected without being filthy rich. only 1-3% of society is filthy rich. system works for them regardless of what you desire or wish
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
People don't make art just because they need a quick buck.
Any artist of any form worth their salt is doing it because they geinuinely like the artform, and would do so pay or no pay.
This coming from a musician who uploads his music for free download on the internet.
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But having art also function as a profession that feeds you gets a lot more young artists into it. Alternatively, they would either go into STEM, one of the service fields, the military, or find no purpose in life. Most of the artistic people I know have no scientific inclination, and now this is my opinion, but I feel (personally) that if you are not making something useful (and art is useful, from a cultural perspective) you have diminished purpose.
So when the artist could have made a minimum wage livin
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"dude, you're a barista" comes to mind...
there are more part time artists than there ever will be full time ones.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Interesting)
Strange.. it has always been my take that this is waht usually deters budding artists, and it isn't the issue of being paid.
First: many kids in school start learning to draw all on their own. They cover the insides of their binders and notebooks in cute, sometimes inventive gaphiti. Teachers get angry with them for "wasting their time", when in reality the teachers want them to do homework rather than draw.
This denouncement of the activity sends a destructive message that these activities are not worthwhile, at a particularly important point in neural development. Specifically, the creation of neurons for skills honed later in life happens during childhood, with aggressive pruning happening in teenage to young adult years. "Motor memory" and other intrinsic manipulation abilities develop at this time. By distracting from artistic development and interest in childhood, we literally program people to avoid becoming artists, and sabotage the ones that still persist, despite this message and even being penalised for their persistence.
Second: people believe nobody will want their art. Since art supplies are expensive, lessons to "properly" use those supplies are expensive, and the prospect of producing crap that they can't even give away, people avoid dabbling with artwork.
Third: if they produce art, how do they share it? (Art is impotent unless shared with others.) Recent trends with things like deviant art and other internet art communities have made this easier, but so far only a handful of artforms are able to be shared this way. For example, sculpture is particularly hard to share online, unless created in a purely digital form.
So, if you want people to make art, the better way to incentivize them is to stop telling kids that they need to stop seeking artistic output, show people that even horrible dross has aesthetic followings, and to help artists find those followings.
Notice that nowhere was any money involved.
The best thing that money does, is provide a tangible measure of demand for a genre of artwork. That's all.
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Most of the well known musicians, artists, Writers etc had a job, struggled, took any work they could, got paid nothing or next to nothing for their art for years before they got lucky and got noticed ...copyright made no difference ....
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
The best, most unique art I've seen was painted by community college students with good grades and recognition in the gallery being their only motivation.
Being paid for the work only encourages pandering to the preferred styles of those who have enough money to pay $100 or more for a small painting. Most digital graphic designers are almost always slaves to their customers' requirements.
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But then, that gets right at the heart at the problem. There's way too much supply and not enough demand. Lots of people are expecting to spend 40+ hours a week "making art" and get paid a sufficient wage to live on it.
See the thing is, your art is only worth what some generous (that's right) individual is willing to pay for it. No one needs your particular works. Whatever it is, someone else is almost certainly creating very similar works from their own creativity for a much lower price, and likely for fre
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Proper attribution is a part of the moral rights [wikipedia.org] due to an author (and is the only unquestionably valid and supportable aspect of Copyright, IMHO).
Yes.
Your implication is that without public funding or Copyright, creative works would no longer be produced. History demonstrates how ridiculous this is.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Your implication is that without public funding or Copyright, creative works would no longer be produced. History demonstrates how ridiculous this is.
You need a history lesson.
Most of our great works were produced under a system of patronage or direct performance before there existed means of coping.
Even Shakespeare worked for money.
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Means of coping? Do you mean means of copying?
There have always been means of copying. Long before Shakespeare's time, the primary enterprise of monks was the duplication of written works. It's just that back in the day, copying was less efficient and less accurate. (You could watch Hamlet and copy it, but you would only get an exact copy of the text if you happened to secure a written copy of it.)
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
These sorts of "great works" or "direct performances" remain uncopyable today. You can bring up a picture of the Sistine Chapel on a great big TV if you want, but it pales to insignificance when compared with standing inside it.
Non-sequitur. I never suggested anyone should work for free.
The simple fact is vast quantities of creative works were produced before Copyright existed, and increasing quantities have been (and continue to be) created since without any thought given to Copyright. The implication that Copyright is an essential part of creative works doesn't stand up to even a cursory examination.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
The simple fact is vast quantities of creative works were produced before Copyright existed, and increasing quantities have been (and continue to be) created since without any thought given to Copyright. The implication that Copyright is an essential part of creative works doesn't stand up to even a cursory examination.
The big difference is that historically the larger the effort and cost of the work, the larger the effort and cost to copy it. No one is going to pay to copy the Sistine Chapel. And to copy a painting required a skilled artist and almost as much effort as making the original. Even a book would have to be copied by hand with a fountain pen or typeset by hand with a primitive printing press.
Today, whether it's a book or song written by one person or a $200M movie, they are trivially easy and cheap to copy, and if the creators are not given at least some window of time before copying it were freely allowed, there is no way many of these works (especially movies) would make back the initial expense. Then again, that limitation could probably be more like 2-3 years (at which point most movies have made 95%+ of what they will ever make) instead of 120!
The original purpose of Copyright law was very fair - to allow someone to cover their production expenses and make a living before becoming part of the public domain. Now it's been perverted to allow giant media corporations a near permanent dynastic protection to anything they do...
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before there existed means of coping.
Xanax is a relatively new invention. Good thing its available as a generic
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And patronage and admissions for a performance are not copyright and are not public funding. So what was wrong with GP's comment?
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You are right, at least as the US is involved, Copyright laws have nothing to do with giving credit. (That is the realm of trademark). Nevertheless, the introduction by Europe, specially the french, of so called "moral rights", have introduced "giving credit" into the equation.
Therefore Falkvinge is right when you look at the modern laws of copyright as written in Europe.
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Using your analogy, the people the current media barons are breaking into our homes and stealing our great grandmother's wedding rings. They are then swapping the diamonds between the bands, and declaring it their own.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, copyright laws GRANT, not preserve, the exclusive right of copying the work to the copyright holder. More correctly, the copyright laws curtail the rights of everyone but the copyright holder to make copies for a limited time.
This is a considerably different from laws against theft which simply prescribe legal penalties for violating the rights of property that exist independently of those laws.
That is, copyright legislates against a right for a limited time as part of a bargain to cause more works to exist. Property laws support rights that exist independently of the laws.
Given that, the looters are doing a very different thing than the copiers.
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Artistic works DO for the most part enter the world ready to be copied. Stories have always been told and retold. Artists have always copied others. If you tell me a story and I tell someone else, you don't suddenly become unable to tell it.
Physical objects have never had that characteristic, no matter how hard we wish. If I take an object from you, you don't have it any more.
That fundamental difference has always been there and that's why they have always been treated distinctly. It's why it's two entirely
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Copyright laws are to preserve the right of copying the work for the copyright holder. Period.
Laws balance the rights of individuals to the rights of societies. You can't solely argue for the rights of the individual (in many cases, not even the actual author) without weighing the pros and cons to society. Otherwise, laws are meaningless and will ultimately fail. Current copyright law does not take into consideration the benefit of public domain and thus has become meaningless and will ultimately fail.
I'm not saying we should abolish copyright but extending it beyond the life span of most peopl
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After all, if you can't sell enough in ten years to feed your family while you work on the next creation, you should probably take
up farming instead.
But that is not what the Pirate Party is proposing. They are proposing total abolition of copyright, (and by logical extension, patents too).
They are essentially saying that If I get a peek at your great manuscript, I can rush it out before you even get a chance to sell the leatherbound first editions.
No, the Pirate Party wants to reduce the copyright term to five years, while allowing non-commercial copying for private use, and retaining the creator's right to attribution.
The term five years is based on the fact that most commercial culture collects most of its revenue within five years of publication.
It's all on their web page.
Re:He seems to confuse the purpose of copyright (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, the copyright monopoly is a balance between the public's interest in availability of culture, and the SAME public's interest in having new culture created.
Individuals and creators and the copyright industry are not stakeholders in that balance, but beneficiaries of the monopoly (just like Blackwater Security or whatever their name is this week is a beneficiary of United States foreign policy, without that meaning that they get a seat at the drafting table).
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In the reality where I live, GNU/Linux and Wikipedia have been proven to exist despite explicitly renouncing the copyright monopoly and encouraging copying.
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Unless you reach a level of popularity that borders on lottery-winning luck, you will not see millions from your label contract. The labels may steal from the consumer's pockets, but they are also throttling the money out of the artists naive enough to sign to them.
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I own a copy of some music. You like it? Let me MAKE you a copy! :-)
BTW, ideas are explicitly NOT granted any sort of legal protection.
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Now, if we could only get people to trade the pictures of said child rapes on the Internet, the profit would go out of the industry, and all child pornography producers would be forced to shut down, thus eliminating child pornography.
Or at least, that's how it works according to the proponents of copyright.