Comment by doctor_eval | Hacker News Reader

Comment by doctor_eval | Hacker News Reader

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Plenty of 100 million dollar movies have been entirely funded by the people [0]. They pay using a thing called “tickets”, or sometimes by paying a small fee to download it to their homes.

To your point, the vast majority of media and software is proprietary, though much of it is supporting in nature and not directly for sale. Nevertheless, shouldn’t publishers be free to choose how they fund their creations?

If we take away the option of artificial scarcity then an entire highly trained professional class will be out of work. While I don’t think Jonny Depp, for example, is worth $650M [1], I don’t personally think that’s a great option for the editors, writers, extras, gaffers, and many other professionals that work together to make great media.

Companies are motivated to maximise the revenue from making this stuff. If they could make more money without copyright, they would have done this already. (And radio is a terrible example: commercial radio simply plays advertising for artists, called “songs”, 24x7)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/jul/13/johnny-depp-tel...

> Nevertheless, shouldn’t publishers be free to choose how they fund their creations?

Of course. The problem is when they demand that goverments take away their ciziten's natural rights to copy and share information in order to support their chosen business model. If publishers want society to make their business model possible by being given special "rights" and having public institudions enforce those "rights" then it is very much up to all of society to choose if that is acceptable.

Remember copyright is an entirely artificial construct meant to benefit society by encouraging creators to produce content. It is my and many others opinion that the current state of copyright is a very one sided affair that benefits mainly big corporations while having numerous negative effects on society.

> If we take away the option of artificial scarcity then an entire highly trained professional class will be out of work.

Unlikely. There will always be a demand for entertainment and people interested in filling that demand will find a way to make it worthwile.

But even if the entire entertainment industry would instantly disappear then that would still not be an argument to uphold unjust laws. Professions becoming obsolete with progress is entirely natural. People can adapt.

While I agree in spirit with some of what you say, the law is as it is and producers invest in content with the expectation that those laws will be enforced. You want copyright to go away? Then get enough people to agree, and get the law changed.

> copyright is an entirely artificial construct meant to benefit society by encouraging creators to produce content

The problem with this line of reasoning is that all property is an artificial construct. Just because it’s an artificial concept doesn’t, on its own, make it wrong.

> It is my and many others opinion that the current state of copyright is a very one sided affair that benefits mainly big corporations while having numerous negative effects on society.

That may be true, but last I looked we live in a democracy, which means that we have a process for changing the law, which does not include doing whatever you want.

And honestly, while there is plenty about modern copyright that I find repulsive, especially the constant extension, nevertheless the wholesale removal of copyright would have many consequences that you probably don’t want. For starters, the GPL, CC, Apache and many other free licenses rely on copyright to work.

> There will always be a demand for entertainment and people interested in filling that demand will find a way to make it worthwile

Copyright supports far more than just entertainment. The wholesale destruction of journalism, for example, has clearly damaged society. Part of the damage has been caused because Google and Facebook have subverted copyright to their own causes.

It really is not black and white.

> … the law is as it is and producers invest in content with the expectation that those laws will be enforced.

The law can change tomorrow with the stroke of a pen and society won't owe them anything for these past "investments" no matter what their expectations were. Which, of course, is why they invest so much in politics and astroturf campaigns to head off any attempt to actually change the law to something more in line with what most people actually think is right. (If you applied the principle of estoppel and required anyone who had ever violated copyright law to suit words to actions and vote against it then you probably couldn't even get a quorum in favor, much less a majority.)

> The problem with this line of reasoning is that all property is an artificial construct.

Property rights arise naturally as a result of scarcity. Someone has to have the right to decide how the scarce resource will be used or it might as well not exist.

"Property" rights in things that are not scarce are a purely artificial construct.

> For starters, the GPL, CC, Apache and many other free licenses rely on copyright to work.

Copyleft licenses were created as a reaction against copyright. Sometimes they overstep their bounds, true—especially the less permissive variants. However, in general, if copyright and software patents did not exist then there would be no need for any of these licenses.

> The wholesale destruction of journalism, for example, has clearly damaged society. Part of the damage has been caused because Google and Facebook have subverted copyright to their own causes.

Taking it at face value, this appears to be an argument against copyright? Not that I really agree that Google and Facebook are primarily to blame. The public simply prefers to be entertained and reaffirmed rather than informed. If anything, copyright reinforces this outcome since you can't copyright facts (and rightly so); as such, actual journalism, uncovering the facts of the situation, has become a cost center to be minimized, whereas the "expression" is heavily subsidized via copyright monopoly.

> The law can change tomorrow with the stroke of a pen and society won't owe them anything

What you say is literally true, but because most investment ends up as wages, such an act would literally destroy tens of billions of dollars of working capital, and put a hundred thousand people out of work overnight.

I assume that's not an outcome you actually advocate.

> Property rights arise naturally as a result of scarcity

Rubbish. The whole concept of rights is almost entirely artificial [0]. For most of history, property and other rights were determined by whoever had the biggest army. Jesus, many people still don't have the right to their own bodies in some places in the world.

The idea that rights of any kind are somehow anything other than a set of cherished beliefs codified in law, is nonsense.

> Copyleft licenses were created as a reaction against copyright.

I think the situation is much, much more complicated than that, but it is a side issue of this conversation at best.

> this appears to be an argument against copyright... The public simply prefers to be entertained

You surely can't blame people for wanting to be entertained? Are you saying you never watch something fun?

In any case, weak and misapplied copyright laws have enabled Google and Facebook, in particular, to concentrate the important elements of journalism and present it to their users in a way which reduces the diversity of all journalism. They show just enough to get away with "fair use" while ensuring that the likelihood of people clicking outside the walled garden is minimised.

Imagine what these companies would do to us if basic copyright was even weaker. Do you think Facebook would link to an article it can just copy? 2 billion+ people on the earth would have just one web browser and it would never - not be allowed - to leave fb.com.

That is not a future I want.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rights

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta

> I assume that's not an outcome you actually advocate.

I don't wish misfortune on anyone, and I expect there would be a transitional period in any real-world implementation, but just the same I cannot possibly justify continuing this parasitic situation any longer than absolutely necessary. If I were presented with a button that would eliminate copyright law instantly, globally, and permanently, I would press it without hesitation—and then get to work dealing with the inevitable fallout.

> For most of history, property and other rights were determined by whoever had the biggest army. Jesus, many people still don't have the right to their own bodies in some places in the world.

You are obviously referring to legal recognition of rights, not the rights themselves. The law is artificial, founded for the most part on non-defensive application of force to achieve a desired outcome, and doesn't correlate very well with the rights that people naturally possess. Some legal systems are better than other in this regard. No law which comes from a government will ever fully recognize natural human rights because, quite simply, that would put them out of business. However, here in the U.S. we at least explicitly recognize that there are rights which humans naturally possess ("endowed by their Creator"—whatever that happens to mean to you) which do not derive from the law, but rather have priority over it. There is a difference between what the law says you may do without penalty and what you may rightfully do, and when the two are in conflict it is the law which is wrong, no matter how popular the law might be or how much force can be brought to bear to back it up.

> You surely can't blame people for wanting to be entertained? Are you saying you never watch something fun?

I'm not blaming them. I'm just saying that there isn't a strong market right now for actual journalism. It's thankless work, for the most part, with or without copyright.

> In any case, weak and misapplied copyright laws have enabled Google and Facebook, in particular, to concentrate the important elements of journalism and present it to their users in a way which reduces the diversity of all journalism. They show just enough to get away with "fair use" while ensuring that the likelihood of people clicking outside the walled garden is minimised.

Are you trying to say that copyright should be expanded to cover facts and not just expression? That it should be illegal to quote or paraphrase a small portion of a copyrighted work? I believe the majority would side with me in vehemently disagreeing. Keep in mind that (in the U.S.) the exceptions for fair use are the only reason why copyright law was not declared wholly unconstitutional on 1st Amendment grounds. Freedom of speech is far more important than this runaway social engineering experiment known as copyright. (IMHO they gave in too easily. Copyright law violates the 1st Amendment and freedom of speech even with fair use.)

> I don't wish misfortune on anyone ... I would press it without hesitation

I can’t reconcile these two statements. People would definitely die if you pushed that button; I don’t think you want that.

> here in the U.S. we at least explicitly recognize that there are rights which humans naturally possess

Perhaps true, but only for certain values of ‘human’.

> Are you trying to say that copyright should be expanded to cover facts and not just expression? That it should be illegal to quote or paraphrase a small portion of a copyrighted work?

I think it’s pretty clear that I’m saying that fair use has been subverted by companies for profit, and that eliminating copyright will make things far worse.

> Freedom of speech is far more important than this runaway social engineering experiment known as copyright

Given the rate at which people are getting sick and dying in the US right now, I’m not certain that the “runaway social experiment of free speech” - as moderated and directed by the copyright infringing trolls at big social media - is working out too well for you guys either.

> Copyright law violates the 1st Amendment and freedom of speech even with fair use.

Didn’t you just essentially argue that the law is not morally authoritative?

You clearly believe that there exist natural rights. I happen to believe that the right to control the things I create is natural. Just because something can be copied easily doesn’t abrogate my natural rights, any more than the fact that your genome can be copied abrogates yours.

Despite what you think, its entirely possible and natural for me to suffer a loss if you copy something that I created, particularly if creating it was expensive for me, and your copying it prevents me from making good my loss.

While there is much I find dismaying about copyright law, there is nothing unnatural about it.

The number of CEOs who think printing money is a good idea might make you wonder if they even know anything about money. Polluting air costs less money why not do it ?

80% movies don't need the 100 million dollar budget and I'm pretty sure Johnny Deepp would be happy to release Edward Scissorhands to the public domain.

Most big movies make their money by single day screenings and releasing movies at different dates in different regions with market buzz.

> If we take away the option of artificial scarcity then an entire highly trained professional class will be out of work.

Interestingly your argument fails for porn. Its about 1/4th the size of hollywood.

How about publishers own the copyright and creators own the copyright instead of commoditising a copyright artefact ?

I assure you musicians can survive and Depp can do some theatre. Most EDM is essentially copyright free, especially techno. 1 year of exclusivity is fine. Fuck NDAs.

These days the cost of production has gone down so I think you will see more indie media taking advantage of that. The average budget for a reasonable movie is less than 5 million, heck even 500k dollars going by kickstarter funded movies.

I don’t really know what you’re arguing, you seem to be making a few assumptions about my position, which are probably wrong.

In terms of $100M movies, I think they almost all suck, but that was the value you suggested. I’d say that no movie needs to cost $100M!

But plenty of movies cost $10M. If it takes 100 people a year to make a movie then you can easily spend $10M on salaries and overheads alone.

> Interestingly your argument fails for porn

Does it? I’d guess that the average porno costs a few hundred bucks to shoot, and takes a couple of hours. There is easily 100x more hours of porn produced per day than narrative fiction, and yet it only makes 25% of Hollywood, and notoriously, the actors are frequently exploited. I’d say that porn is a warning of danger rather than a proof of success!

> Depp can do some theatre

When was the last time you paid to go to the theatre?

> Most EDM is essentially copyright free, especially techno. 1 year of exclusivity is fine. Fuck NDAs.

My raver days are (sadly) behind me, but sure, OK, like porn, EDM can be produced with little investment. So what? No everything that is good is also cheap or easy to build.

> These days the cost of production has gone down so I think you will see more indie media taking advantage of that.

I’m a huge fan of indy media but, because of that, I pay for it, and I don’t like it when people freeload.

> The average budget for a reasonable movie is less than 5 million

I think you’re just making things up now, but even so, 5 million is a buttload of money that you need to get back. Few people are gonna spend that sort of money with no expectation of recouping it.

> So what ?

I too can ignore every big budget predictable cliche and say so what. Lets ignore the successes of alternatives.

Is Kanye West and Britney Spears the best you can do with millions of dollars ? I'll stick to punk and EDM ... no thanks.

> I’m a huge fan of indy media but, because of that, I pay for it, and I don’t like it when people freeload.

Is copyright / patents the only way to finance and get money back ?

Absolutely not. Thats the argument I am making.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_rate_fallacy

There are a lot of undeserving idiots with money out there, no doubt. And they have certainly taken advantage of copyright to get wealthy. But it seems to me that you just want to solve this by making everything “indy”, on the cheap, and as much as I love independent music and film (I saw 40 movies over a two week period at a film festival last year, it was awesome) I think the world is far more complex and interesting than can be expressed by a couple of dudes with a camera.

The problem is that some productions are simply expensive. Think about sending an imax camera to the space station. There is literally no way to make that cheap. And why concentrate only on music and movies, what about games? What about journalism? There are a huge number of industries that depend on at least some form of copyright, even if not specifically the bastard form that exists at this moment.

> Is copyright / patents the only way to finance and get money back ? Absolutely not. Thats the argument I am making.

But as far as I can tell, you’re only arguing against copyright, you’re not actually making an argument for a viable alternative, and that is my problem.

Just because you dig EDM and punk, and these specific types of music can be made on the cheap, doesn’t mean all good media can be made cheaply. Just because most $100M movies suck doesn’t mean that $10 million movies shouldn’t be made.

Accept that, and then explain to me how to repeatedly raise the $10 million investment needed to create high quality, high cost products that will be given away for free, no strings attached. I think you’ll find that the problem is that doing so is incredibly hard and extremely risky, which is why nobody is doing it.

I believe in reform. 1 year exclusive copyright / patent at most and author always holds the copyright. Its ironic that the movie with the biggest budget is a pirate movie ;)

https://christianengstrom.wordpress.com/the-pirate-party-on-...

So we agree :) except that like the pirate party, I’d make copyright 5 years since some works take much longer than one year to create, and it can often take more than a year to distribute certain works or plan and go on tour.

Also, I believe nobody should go to jail or be bankrupted for copying digital works.

And what do you know? Two randos came to an amicable position on an Internet forum :) next stop, world peace!!

Cheers

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