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Post by gillianren on Oct 24, 2010 16:00:39 GMT -4
We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. Why not?
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Post by echnaton on Oct 24, 2010 19:37:32 GMT -4
We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. Why not? Business must get revenues and profits from satisfying customers. That is a reflection of the value they add to the economy. Business that have government protected revenues are usually called rent seekers or monopolies. While there are a few "natural monopolies" business models, they are the exception. In the public utility area operating the wires to bring electricity to you home is one such business while power generation is not. Specifically to intangible and creative intellectual property, the purpose of the copyright is not to guaranty revenues, but to secure property rights. The owner has the right to profit from the creation not the right to profits. Government protection of revenue and profits from intellectual property creates a business monopoly. BTW gillianren, what is your opinion on the proper usage between "revenue" and "revenues" in the above sentence?
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Post by gillianren on Oct 24, 2010 19:55:49 GMT -4
First, I'm unclear as to how you distinguish between the right to profit over the right to profits. If people are, yes, stealing your work by distributing it without your permission or, in more than a few cases, even acknowledgment that it's yours, where do you profit? Not financially; no one's sending you any money. Not in name recognition; as I said, the name has often been removed. (On file-sharing sites, it rapidly becomes clear that people didn't realize anyone other than Weird Al has ever done a parody. Or, indeed, humorous songs of any kind.) Satisfaction? I would imagine it's contradicted by frustration and probably even anger.
Surely the purpose of property rights is to prevent infringement on your property. Having it distributed without compensation is an infringement on your rights to your property. Yes, the right to loan my copy of Iron Man 2 to a friend is implicit in my purchase. I can even transfer ownership of that physical copy, such as having purchased it for a friend as a present. However, I have no right to distribute ripped copies of it. Leaving aside the rather prominent FBI warning at the beginning, the intellectual property isn't mine. No, Robert Downey, Jr., doesn't exactly need the few cents he probably got from my purchase. On the other hand, there are a lot of people working on that movie who do need the work, and the associated income, they get from doing their job. Similarly, when I bought a copy of a friend's album, he got that much closer to, oh, making rent that month. If I then pirated the thing and sent copies to everyone I knew who was even remotely interested in it, I would be depriving him of the income from some of those people who might otherwise have bought it. Yes, given the choice, a lot of people would put their interest in having a free album over not listening to it at all. However, there are also plenty of people out there who might have bought it but now won't; I had a friend who went from spending $50 or more a month in CDs to spending pretty much nothing, because he could just download. And in cases of major studio releases, be it music or movies, he was making it that much harder for, say, the sound guy. When demand decreases, people lose jobs. If the studios are losing profit--which analysis suggests strongly that they are--they have less interest in putting out product, especially if it has a lower interest level. Iron Man 3 will get made. Minor films which won't attract hundreds of millions of dollars won't.
As to "revenue" over "revenues," in a situation like that, I tend to assume that there's a jargon difference I don't know. Failing that, my instinct is that "revenue" is the income from a single thing and "revenues" is overall income.
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Post by Data Cable on Oct 24, 2010 22:47:41 GMT -4
Theft of a tangible widget deprives its owner of possession of that particular widget. Copying information, by definition, does not. Ergo, the two actions are not equal. I have advanced no such argument. Which results in only one royalty payment to the author, no different than any other initial public sale. Which, as I am informed by Al and Phantomwolf (thanks, guys, I wasn't aware of this), in certain countries (though apparently not the US), also results in a (smaller) royalty payment to the author. However, patrons may also read books in the library, without removing them from the premises. Are these instances of derived benefit also cataloged and royalties remitted? If not, is this robbing authors of their income? But they do get to keep the copy neurologically encoded in their brains. In which case you would be liable for trademark infringement on both the manufacturer and product line names, possibly patent (if only design patent) infringement, though not if you restricted your manufacture to replicas of pre-1993 models, on which any applicable patents have already expired. Trade dress, however, may also apply. I offer a downscaled counter-scenario: My neighbor owns a Ford Mustang. I take meticulous measurements of each component and build my own identical replica from scratch. Have I stolen his car? ...but still all authors are paid for the library to carry their work at least once. Granted. But if they are only compensated once for multiple instances of derived benefit, are they being "robbed of their income?" But then again, maybe we would be better off if Justin Bieber had to get a real job. Fortunately for him, he lives in a society which grants him an unlimited de jure monopoly on the distribution of infinite reproductions of the fruits of finite labor. The data is still there , and it's all the same data, so you can't really complain because the correct arrangement is intangible, isn't it?. The fidelity of data reproduction is irrelevant to its inherently intangible nature. If information is conveyed in a manner such that the original sequence can in no way be determined, then the original information has not been conveyed at all. The tangible equivalent would be in expecting a car and instead receiving a randomized mass of metal, plastic, glass and rubber which, in another physical configuration, would constitute a car. The point of distinguishing tangible from intangible which you seem to be missing is this: A particular car is tangible. It would be impossible to give you my car without relinquishing my possession of it. The information which is contained in that car, its physical design specs, is intangible. It is entirely possible to give you (that is, make a copy of) its design specs, and still retain possession of that information. Unless my own memory of that information is somehow selectively erased and any other tangible media in my possession containing that information is also erased, corrupted, destroyed, or simply taken, that information has not been stolen from me. The Mona Lisa painted by Da Vinci is a specific, tangible item. Removing it from its owner's possession without permission would constitute theft, regardless of whether or not the appropriator left behind what they considered suitable compensation. I will assume by your characterization of the hypothetical replacement as " rubbish" that it would not be a passable replica of da Vinci's piece, if even an attempted one. Now, what if someone did in fact paint a replica of the Mona Lisa indistinguishable from da Vinci's? I'll even go one better, what if someone used a Star Trek-style replicator and produced an absolutely physically identical copy of the item. In either case, without actually swapping the replica for the original, has the Mona Lisa been stolen? If the shopkeeper did not complete a willing transfer-of-ownership transaction with you for the item in question (which, one would expect in a predominantly non-haggling society, would involve you paying the shopkeeper's asking price), and you removed it from the shopkeeper's possession, you would be liable for theft of said item. It would seem that my question "What if someone downloads one of your pieces and doesn't use it without paying?" has been misinterpreted, so I will rephrase: Which is the offending action, that a copy of your piece has been made for which you did not receive compensation, or that someone has derived benefit from your piece for which you did not receive compensation? We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. That's funny, the media publishing industry would have us believe otherwise.
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Post by PhantomWolf on Oct 24, 2010 23:05:57 GMT -4
[Granted. But if they are only compensated once for multiple instances of derived benefit, are they being "robbed of their income?" It doesn't have to do with "instances of derived benefit" it has to be with physical copies. Even if something is burnt onto a disk or written on a HDD, it is a still a physical copy. The library has a single copy for each book it pays for, that doesn't change no matter how many people read it (and no, unless you have a photographic memory, what you remember of it doesn't count as a copy, or even if you do as memory of a work is not at issue.) In the same way if I buy a DVD I can show it to as many of my friends as I like, but I can't burn it and give them all copies. It comes down to this. If you want to physically posess a copy of a work, you need to pay for it. If you don't pay for it, then you have something that is someone else's property without their permission. That is theft.
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Post by PhantomWolf on Oct 24, 2010 23:10:51 GMT -4
On top of everything else, as the creator of a work, should it not be your right to determine how and when that work is distributed?
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Post by echnaton on Oct 24, 2010 23:26:23 GMT -4
First, I'm unclear as to how you distinguish between the right to profit over the right to profit s. Lets look at an example from the entertainment industry. With the introduction of the VCR, people started recording TV and time shifting to avoid commercials a perfectly legal activity that undermined advertising revenue. People also started copying movies an unlawful activity that hurt sales. The entertainment industry responded by asking the government to collect a tax on blank VCR tapes that would be passed through to them as a compensation for lost revenue. Charging everyone who purchased a tape whether they copied tapes or not. That is what I mean by guaranteeing profit. The right to profit is more of a concept. Each of us is able to apply our time talents and capital (with in bounds) without intervention by the government or competitors. However there is no guarantee that you will be able to earn revenue or profit by using those assets. As to "revenue" over "revenues," in a situation like that, I tend to assume that there's a jargon difference I don't know. Failing that, my instinct is that "revenue" is the income from a single thing and "revenues" is overall income. There doesn't seem to be a consistent use within business. Although some companies differentiate between merchandise and service income by using the terms sales and revenues. We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. That's funny, the media publishing industry would have us believe otherwise. Hollywood seems to feel they are especially deserving.
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Post by echnaton on Oct 24, 2010 23:49:08 GMT -4
On top of everything else, as the creator of a work, should it not be your right to determine how and when that work is distributed? It is a right that can, and usually is, assigned to a publisher or distributor. In retrospect this is not always a good thing, as Jay's story attests, but sometimes a creator has little bargaining power. In the case of libraries, creators and businesses often come to some sort of compromise on price differentiation in an effort to broaden their customer base to maximize revenue. This is especially important for goods that have high upfront expenses but low marginal costs. Think of hardback vs paperback books where the words are the same but the book has a lower time value when it reaches paperback. There is also the need not to alienate customers who feel entitled, those that feel books are partly a public good. Sometimes these things just have to work out rather than have the law step in to assign property rights. Libraries seem to be one of those cases where everyone gets some of what they want. While digital file sharing is firmly one sided against the creator.
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Post by Obviousman on Oct 25, 2010 3:33:22 GMT -4
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Post by drewid on Oct 25, 2010 4:14:07 GMT -4
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Post by drewid on Oct 25, 2010 4:20:26 GMT -4
If information is conveyed in a manner such that the original sequence can in no way be determined, then the original information has not been conveyed at all. In other words the arrangement of data is tangible. You can't have it both ways. No, the point is that the car is still tanglible (by your definition) whatever form it is in. My point is that you don't just buy the physical stuff, you also buy the design and skills that went onto putting it together as a car, and the people that provided those skills get paid for providing those skills. If you buy a Mustang you buy a Mustang, not another car, the difference is the design. Which is tangible. There isn't a distinction really. If someone makes a copy of something then either they (or someone they give it to) are deriving benefit from that copy, otherwise they wouldn't do it. I do sometimes release work under various creative commons licenses which allow distribution (with some restrictions) , but that's MY choice, I also make use of standard copyright as well. Some of the companies that I supply goods to make and resell large numbers of copies of those goods for which I don't receive additional compensation, but again that's my choice I signed that contract for that particular job. In some cases I get to keep the copyright, or it reverts back to me after a short period, in which case I can exercise my right to make additional money from my skills and experience. No but you would be liable for trademark infringement on both the manufacturer and product line names, possibly patent (if only design patent) infringement, though not if you restricted your manufacture to replicas of pre-1993 models, on which any applicable patents have already expired. Whether Ford would consider it worth pursuing is another matter. If Leonardo was still around and selling paintings today then I imagine he'd be pretty pissed off unless there was some sort of licensing agreement in place. So as you've already said the arrangement of information IS tangible. whether it's musical notes, words, pixels or bytes. The arrangement is a product of human skill. If you make and distribute copies of something you are directly denying the author (me) income from his skills and experience. Now there are some problems with application of copyright as it stands, for example when it is misapplied to prevent fair comment or free speech, but to lump downloading movies in with that is clearly nonsense.
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Post by drewid on Oct 25, 2010 4:21:35 GMT -4
We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. How about a one man business?
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Post by tedward on Oct 25, 2010 5:12:23 GMT -4
Scuse the snip. That has to be a joke and the smily forgot? No one is....
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Post by echnaton on Oct 25, 2010 7:03:57 GMT -4
We must also remember that entertainment is a business and there is a difference between creative rights and business revenues. The latter does not deserve government protection. How about a one man business? Just the same. A lone creator of intangible art is entitled to legal protection for the right to benefit from his creation, but does not have any right to a specific benefit. He does not have the right to invoke the government to protect him from non-infringing competition. No but you would be liable for trademark infringement on both the manufacturer and product line names, possibly patent (if only design patent) infringement, though not if you restricted your manufacture to replicas of pre-1993 models, on which any applicable patents have already expired. Whether Ford would consider it worth pursuing is another matter. Traditionally, the law does not recognize the design of utilitarian objects to be protectable. Fashion can not be protected. A jacket is a jacket no mater how the fabric is cut or decorated. Similarly, reverse engineering is usually permissible. Although this once straight forward concept has been muddied up by laws in recent years. Any specific case would be have to be determined on its own merits based on the degree of copying, the laws of the particular country and much the creator wished to pursue the violation. Many times it is not worth while to pursue knock off products because the funds used to pay the lawyers could be better used to establish your brand and product development. Logo's on the other hand are trade marked and protected. The protection is a reason practically everyone puts a logo on fashion items. Its the only way to distinguish your polo shirt from all others. The presence of a logo or name is the reason knock off Rolex watches can be seized.
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Post by Daggerstab on Oct 25, 2010 8:32:27 GMT -4
That has to be a joke and the smily forgot? No one is.... Here's Jack White posting a link to "Dark Side of the Moon" ("Operation lune"), without apparently being aware that it is a satire: educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=15024He either is "....", or a fan of the "throw as much mud as possible, something will stick" tactic.
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