Of course it doesn't. But societies opinions are complex, hard to measure, harder to explain how you measured, and impossible to measure with receiving accusations that how you measured was biased.
This provides an interesting insight in an a simple quantifiable way that provides some interesting information.
I registered copyrights for software I wrote when I was a 12 y/o kid (a kid who was interested in intellectual property law, to be sure, but still a kid). It wasn't that difficult.
That would get expensive fast for anyone remotely prolific. Not every work needs protection, and it's impossible to know which does before it becomes commercially interesting.
I can't imagine, under a hypothetical copyright regime requiring registration that enacted today, anyone would be mailing in paper copies of "Form TX" like I did in 1989. There would absolutely be a more streamlined method of registration.
I would feel a lot better, morally, availing myself of the "protections" of copyright if we went back to the original regime. The duration in the current regime is vastly too long. It's robbing the present of all the exciting derivative works that could be created based on existing works, and it's robbing the future of access to current works because they'll end up lost to time when their storage formats rot out from under them as they languish in their "protected" state for more than a human lifetime, unable to be effectively archived and propagated long after their commercial lifetime has ended.
You're welcome to license the things you work hard to create under permissive terms. I like knowing I can send a C&D to a billion dollar corporation and generally expect action. As it is, plenty of people find their art in department stores sent in by people who didn't have permission. A simple notice deals with it.
What do creators do when those billion-dollar corporations have no risk from selling their art, which has an opportunity cost to make, without permission or compensation? It may cost little or nothing to reproduce, but it's not free to create. Control over reproduction makes the creation viable. Otherwise, they have to spend finite time and energy on other things to survive.
I don't think creators are morally entitled to any compensation or consent to use works they disclosed publicly, personally.
I would be willing to accept a legal regime that grants creators "protections" in exchange for the works reverting to the public domain in a reasonable period of time. Copyright is a social contract and, at the present, the consideration given to the public is too little. It's not enough for me to license works I create myself permissively to satisfy me. I want the playing-field leveled for everyone.
I try to live this opinion, personally, by paying for as much "media" as I can created by those who utilize patronage models or who license their work less restrictively than copyright permits. I find that I can't discuss popular music, movies, televison, and many books with other people but I'm not particularly sad that I can't. I don't willfully infringe copyright-- I just choose to ignore as many of the things that aren't permissively licensed as I can.
If you can, I'd suggest you edit your options to "no copyright" and "current copyright." The double negative is confusing. Does "no" mean "no copyright" or "no, I don't prefer no copyright?" (I assume the latter, but still.)
What if you write a great novel? Should whoever is best able to publish and market it be allowed to get all the profits from it and leave you with nothing? I agree that the current intellectual property system has lots of problems and it favors wealthy companies that can navigate the legal system, but that doesn't mean we should get rid of all protections.
There exist a class of people who absolutely do believe that the creator of a work doesn't "own" that work and has no entitlement to the profits of duplicating and distributing that work.
I've applied the "free-est" license that I can to every bit of "intellectual property" I've ever made-- be that the Perl Artistic License for software or a Creative Commons public domain dedication for music, photos, and non-software writing. I don't believe I'm "owed" anything by anyone for the ideas I've chosen to publicly express.
One could argue that the things I've produced are "worthless", since I'm a rank amateur at everything I do, and that the gesture is meaningless on that basis. I don't think that changes the nature of the gesture, personally-- I worked as hard on the works I've created than anyone else, and I don't feel at all entitled to "protections".
One could also argue that it would be different if I "made my living" from creating "intellectual property". I have specifically avoided that in my life because I don't believe that's a morally right way to "make a living". I can't tell you how I'd feel if I couldn't "make a living" exploiting copyright protections because I'd never do it to begin with.
Edit: My attitude does mean that some business models simply wouldn't exist. I'm not saddened by that, and I don't think humanity is any the poorer for it. Artists will still express themselves, whether they're paid for it or not. Patronage models existed before copyright and drove the creation of many great works. There are other ways that works can be created besides a royalty-based model.
> I've applied the "free-est" license that I can to every bit of "intellectual property" I've ever made-- be that the Perl Artistic License for software or a Creative Commons public domain dedication for music, photos, and non-software writing. I don't believe I'm "owed" anything by anyone for the ideas I've chosen to publicly express.
Good for you, but why should you be able to force everyone else to give away their work as you have done?
I am alright with copyright existing if the terms were actually limited in duration. The current term is vastly too long. The "consideration" portion of the social contract is currently stilted too far in the favor of the creator of the work.
Since I disagree with the system, as it is, I don't feel like I exploit any of its "protections" w/o being a hypocrite. Even if the terms were made more reasonable (by decreasing the duration) I still don't think I'd avail myself, but I'd be alright if others did.
IMO, copyright needs to be much shorter. Once you share something with society, which is the mechanism through which your thing becomes successful, you give up control.
If you publish a great novel, I don't see why I shouldn't be able to write a sequel or short story, as long as I'm not passing myself off as you. For that matter, I don't see why people shouldn't be able to rewrite parts of a story. The original doesn't suddenly go away, it's just been forked. Maybe the fork is better and people enjoy it more. Let the best story win.
Cool. I have no idea what you do for a living... but imagine you write a blog, or you write books, or you are composing some music. Are you happy being hungry all days just because everyone can just copy you work and sell it on their own?
So when you will have an idea to pay your rent with the money you will get from your new book, just remember what you wrote: "Knowledge isn't a property. Copying is not theft.". So I assume it's fine that you will get nothing. So the choice is simple: you will be either a hungry homeless writer or you will find some other job.
And we will end with little books, little knowledge, little art.
Anti-copyright people seem to exist in a world where the only people who make things do so at big C&D-happy corporations. They mistake the cost of reproduction with the cost of creating and think the creating will happen with no control over reproduction.
There a billion books, songs, blogs, software projects, paintings, photos, and other copyrightable things no one ever made a dime off and most of the creators aren't homeless. It can be made while working another job, raising a family, dealing with life. The only people making money off this stuff are the very few you hear about. And the people that "dedicate all their time" to it will, of course, tell you it's the only way to make stuff as great as theirs (via twitter, from a private island, while doing anything but creating), and enough people believe that is true to keep the money machine churning. Creativity isn't going to dwindle away with no laws "protecting" it.
> The only people making money off this stuff are the very few you hear about. And the people that "dedicate all their time" to it will, of course, tell you it's the only way to make stuff as great as theirs
That's absolutely wrong IMO. In almost every nice subject I'm interested in, there are a bunch of people creating wonderful content. This is in topics that most people have never heard of and wouldn't care about even if they did.
These people can have a career or a decent second income creating works that few people will ever hear of, and funny enough, there's a good chance that they need that extra money more than the few names everyone's heard of, since they don't have alternatives like e.g. concerts, selling signed copies, etc.
So first off, your question is irrelevant to my original question. I asked specifically if something is never enforced why should it be a law. None of the replies to my question has even addressed that :(
Fourthly, IP is not copyright. If you took a selfie with some top secret tech you signed an NDA not to reveal was in there you will probably get in big trouble
I think it may be impossible, as a professional software engineer, to not violate copyright/patent law. I am fuzzy on copyright versus patent, as IANAL, but as example, have you ever used Quicksort?
"Though Patent #5175,857, "System for Sorting Records Having Sorted Strings Each Having a Plurality of Linked Elements Each Element Next Recording Address," has a highly specific title, it actually protects a brought process of sorting that is frequently used by different members of the computer science community— a linked-list implemented well-known algorithm Quicksort."
Without any forms of copyright, there would be an explosion in art, science and business... but mostly small firms/independend people would benefit from it. so, lobby does whatever it can to make people belief that only BigCorp with billions of theoretical research budget can save us.
I think the first western country (with enough economic power) that trashes the concept of copyright will dominate everything in art/science/entrepreneurship within few years. There will ne less super rich popstars or „winner Takes it all“-monopolistic companies, since the field is much more accessible for everyone - a net positive in my book.
> Without any forms of copyright, there would be an explosion in art, science and business... but mostly small firms/independend people would benefit from it. so, lobby does whatever it can to make people belief that only BigCorp with billions of theoretical research budget can save us.
I think it would. A lot of people on Patreon have a very simple model: you pay to get access to the highest quality version of the thing and you get access before everyone else.
To give an example, I support a singer that puts out a few songs every month. When she publishes something she includes the wav and a link to the unlisted YouTube video. Then a few weeks later she makes the video public and she puts up her song everywhere.
After following her for a while on YouTube I eventually became a supporter because I want her to continue making great music.
>
Without any forms of copyright, there would be an explosion in art, science and business... but mostly small firms/independend people would benefit from it.
Where did you get that idea? That seems to me to be the opposite of the truth.
In most cases of media (music, books, video games) there's an extreme exponential notion of success. So if copyright vanished, the studio making Angry Birds will probably be fine - after all, Angry Birds sold like a bazillion copies. If only some small percentage of those actually earned them money (because people say downloaded copies), they'd still be fine.
However the studio that has dozens of small successes, each of which sold a tiny number of copies, really can't afford to only make a small percentage of the money they really made.
Similarly, authors who aren't Stephen King, but rely on a steady stream of mildly-successful works, would no longer be able to be authors for a living.
The notion of intellectual property is socially beneficial, but only insofar as it accomplishes its original goal "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..."
Copyright dynasties that expand generations beyond the publication of a work or the death of the author, IP rights held by corporations as works for hire under extortionate terms without any further compensation of the original authors, perpetual trademark rights eclipsing fair use of aspects of works that have long since entered the public domain, the potential prevention of a digital public domain at all through DRM that is illegal to crack, a scientific journal's exclusive rights to publicly funded research... None of these things promote the progress of science and the useful arts, nor are they for a limited time. Copyright reform is long overdue.
Current copyright laws, of course. Or else no one would write a book, sell software, make movies, write music.
No sharing wouldn't be possible, unless in a very controlled environment like watching a movie in the cinema or using software that only connects to a 3rd party service, that does all the computing.
I would most prefer copyright that lasted 10-20 years, too. However, with this poll I was specifically interested in what HNers would choose in an all-or-nothing situation.
Obviously I prefer sane limited copyright. But given the choice between the current copyright system and none, I choose none.
The current copyright system is nothing but a money grab by mostly greedy middle men and descendent leeches.
Copyright is supposed to reward creators and also foster creativity. The current system rewards parasitic multinational companies and lawyers and stifles creativity.
Without copyright everyone would be able to use what the big corporations make as well. For example, anyone could make sure there's always an original copy of Star Wars that never gets enhanced.
The current system, while horribly broken, is better than nothing. Copyright, as originally envisioned, would serve to protect authors of creative works. I think the best world would have separate and different copyright laws for different types of works, while also encouraging and protecting the contribution of original works to the public domain (tax breaks, etc.). I do think the current laws for software are completely busted though. Did you know the doubly-linked list is copyrighted?
What does it mean for the doubly-linked list to be copyrighted? Do you mean the technique is patented? Or is a particular implementation (say, written in C) copyrighted?
There’s a lot of hand-wringing in these comments about “But how will artists get paid? Who will bother to make art if they can’t make a living by their art?”
Spoilers: Most artists don’t get paid. Most artists can’t make a living by their art. If you go around announcing your intentions to become a professional artist, in any medium, nobody will assure you that you’ll make good money for it. Thousands of people write novels for fun or their own satisfaction, and then post them online for free, because that’s the only way they can be read.
And for those that get paid, in most cases that is not due to copyright. They get paid by selling, directly or through middlemen, hard or digital copies of their work, or simply get paid to create in the first place, via services like Patreon or by commission.
> They get paid by selling, directly or through middlemen, hard or digital copies of their work
Yes, but if other copies of this were essentially free, they wouldn't be able to sell these copies! (Or at least, probably only a small fraction).
> or simply get paid to create in the first place, via services like Patreon or by commission.
I'm a big Patreon fan and the rise of Patreon makes me very happy. However, it's worth noting that there are some problems with this model - for example, only art that pleases wealthy people will tend to get made under this model - it's better economics to target people living in rich Western countries over people living anywhere else. Also, only art that is kind of "acceptable" will tend to get made.
Art that is more experimental, less likely to be immediately popular, less likely to immediately catch the eyes of the rich audience - that kind of art will become less prevalent.
Really? What about commercial art? As an animator, I'm surrounded by artists who are all making a great living. We create huge teams of artists and we create magnificent, profitable art.
You can't just drop a bomb on creative professionals.
If your takeaway is that without copyright laws, there'd be no Disney, I take that as a pretty strong advocacy of copyright laws, since I'm a huge Disney fan :)
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[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 148 ms ] threadThis provides an interesting insight in an a simple quantifiable way that provides some interesting information.
What do creators do when those billion-dollar corporations have no risk from selling their art, which has an opportunity cost to make, without permission or compensation? It may cost little or nothing to reproduce, but it's not free to create. Control over reproduction makes the creation viable. Otherwise, they have to spend finite time and energy on other things to survive.
I would be willing to accept a legal regime that grants creators "protections" in exchange for the works reverting to the public domain in a reasonable period of time. Copyright is a social contract and, at the present, the consideration given to the public is too little. It's not enough for me to license works I create myself permissively to satisfy me. I want the playing-field leveled for everyone.
I try to live this opinion, personally, by paying for as much "media" as I can created by those who utilize patronage models or who license their work less restrictively than copyright permits. I find that I can't discuss popular music, movies, televison, and many books with other people but I'm not particularly sad that I can't. I don't willfully infringe copyright-- I just choose to ignore as many of the things that aren't permissively licensed as I can.
He wrote a good book, The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind (2008), which makes the case for radically shorter copyright terms.
I've applied the "free-est" license that I can to every bit of "intellectual property" I've ever made-- be that the Perl Artistic License for software or a Creative Commons public domain dedication for music, photos, and non-software writing. I don't believe I'm "owed" anything by anyone for the ideas I've chosen to publicly express.
One could argue that the things I've produced are "worthless", since I'm a rank amateur at everything I do, and that the gesture is meaningless on that basis. I don't think that changes the nature of the gesture, personally-- I worked as hard on the works I've created than anyone else, and I don't feel at all entitled to "protections".
One could also argue that it would be different if I "made my living" from creating "intellectual property". I have specifically avoided that in my life because I don't believe that's a morally right way to "make a living". I can't tell you how I'd feel if I couldn't "make a living" exploiting copyright protections because I'd never do it to begin with.
Edit: My attitude does mean that some business models simply wouldn't exist. I'm not saddened by that, and I don't think humanity is any the poorer for it. Artists will still express themselves, whether they're paid for it or not. Patronage models existed before copyright and drove the creation of many great works. There are other ways that works can be created besides a royalty-based model.
Good for you, but why should you be able to force everyone else to give away their work as you have done?
Since I disagree with the system, as it is, I don't feel like I exploit any of its "protections" w/o being a hypocrite. Even if the terms were made more reasonable (by decreasing the duration) I still don't think I'd avail myself, but I'd be alright if others did.
If you publish a great novel, I don't see why I shouldn't be able to write a sequel or short story, as long as I'm not passing myself off as you. For that matter, I don't see why people shouldn't be able to rewrite parts of a story. The original doesn't suddenly go away, it's just been forked. Maybe the fork is better and people enjoy it more. Let the best story win.
So when you will have an idea to pay your rent with the money you will get from your new book, just remember what you wrote: "Knowledge isn't a property. Copying is not theft.". So I assume it's fine that you will get nothing. So the choice is simple: you will be either a hungry homeless writer or you will find some other job.
And we will end with little books, little knowledge, little art.
Removing copyright may let a better system be out in place
That's absolutely wrong IMO. In almost every nice subject I'm interested in, there are a bunch of people creating wonderful content. This is in topics that most people have never heard of and wouldn't care about even if they did.
These people can have a career or a decent second income creating works that few people will ever hear of, and funny enough, there's a good chance that they need that extra money more than the few names everyone's heard of, since they don't have alternatives like e.g. concerts, selling signed copies, etc.
How do you live modern life without violating copyright law, or do you think it should stay the way it is but not be enforced?
Taking photos of things without the correct permissions (freedom of panorama) sharing copyright protected things on social media
I don't know anyone who doesn't violate some aspect of the law.
Secondly, that is not what freedom of panorama means, it means you are allowed to take pictures of anything in the public space. See: https://expertphotography.com/freedom-of-panorama-photograph...
Thirdly, wikipedia has examples of litigations.
Fourthly, IP is not copyright. If you took a selfie with some top secret tech you signed an NDA not to reveal was in there you will probably get in big trouble
\/ yes probably
That's always a good sign the question wasn't clear.
From coursework created by P. Brooks of Duke University, https://www2.cs.duke.edu/courses/fall03/cps182s/oldproj/pwb_...:
"Though Patent #5175,857, "System for Sorting Records Having Sorted Strings Each Having a Plurality of Linked Elements Each Element Next Recording Address," has a highly specific title, it actually protects a brought process of sorting that is frequently used by different members of the computer science community— a linked-list implemented well-known algorithm Quicksort."
I think the first western country (with enough economic power) that trashes the concept of copyright will dominate everything in art/science/entrepreneurship within few years. There will ne less super rich popstars or „winner Takes it all“-monopolistic companies, since the field is much more accessible for everyone - a net positive in my book.
Would companies like Patreon benefit?
- Providing an easy way to setup a recurring donation to an artist. This would probably benefit.
- Providing an easy way for artists to sell a stream of digital works. This would probably not benefit.
I'm not sure how much of patreon's income comes from each business, and the answer depends on that.
To give an example, I support a singer that puts out a few songs every month. When she publishes something she includes the wav and a link to the unlisted YouTube video. Then a few weeks later she makes the video public and she puts up her song everywhere.
After following her for a while on YouTube I eventually became a supporter because I want her to continue making great music.
Where did you get that idea? That seems to me to be the opposite of the truth.
In most cases of media (music, books, video games) there's an extreme exponential notion of success. So if copyright vanished, the studio making Angry Birds will probably be fine - after all, Angry Birds sold like a bazillion copies. If only some small percentage of those actually earned them money (because people say downloaded copies), they'd still be fine.
However the studio that has dozens of small successes, each of which sold a tiny number of copies, really can't afford to only make a small percentage of the money they really made.
Similarly, authors who aren't Stephen King, but rely on a steady stream of mildly-successful works, would no longer be able to be authors for a living.
The notion of intellectual property is socially beneficial, but only insofar as it accomplishes its original goal "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..."
Copyright dynasties that expand generations beyond the publication of a work or the death of the author, IP rights held by corporations as works for hire under extortionate terms without any further compensation of the original authors, perpetual trademark rights eclipsing fair use of aspects of works that have long since entered the public domain, the potential prevention of a digital public domain at all through DRM that is illegal to crack, a scientific journal's exclusive rights to publicly funded research... None of these things promote the progress of science and the useful arts, nor are they for a limited time. Copyright reform is long overdue.
No sharing wouldn't be possible, unless in a very controlled environment like watching a movie in the cinema or using software that only connects to a 3rd party service, that does all the computing.
I know this is extremely generic but can we have an OS/browser/editor poll like we used to twice a year or so?
The current copyright system is nothing but a money grab by mostly greedy middle men and descendent leeches.
Copyright is supposed to reward creators and also foster creativity. The current system rewards parasitic multinational companies and lawyers and stifles creativity.
"Copyright is a complex issue that cannot easily be summed up in a binary choice of good/bad, however i really enjoy voting in polls"
Somewhat counter-intuitively without copyright we might also start seeing even more hostile and aggressive DRM style systems
Spoilers: Most artists don’t get paid. Most artists can’t make a living by their art. If you go around announcing your intentions to become a professional artist, in any medium, nobody will assure you that you’ll make good money for it. Thousands of people write novels for fun or their own satisfaction, and then post them online for free, because that’s the only way they can be read.
Yes, but if other copies of this were essentially free, they wouldn't be able to sell these copies! (Or at least, probably only a small fraction).
> or simply get paid to create in the first place, via services like Patreon or by commission.
I'm a big Patreon fan and the rise of Patreon makes me very happy. However, it's worth noting that there are some problems with this model - for example, only art that pleases wealthy people will tend to get made under this model - it's better economics to target people living in rich Western countries over people living anywhere else. Also, only art that is kind of "acceptable" will tend to get made.
Art that is more experimental, less likely to be immediately popular, less likely to immediately catch the eyes of the rich audience - that kind of art will become less prevalent.
You can't just drop a bomb on creative professionals.