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Comment by ivan_gammel | Hacker News Reader

>People still do software based on the GNU license. What's the difference?

The right question to ask is what do they have in common, and the answer is nothing but an artificial legal construct of IP. To write public domain software you need a computer and 2 sqm of space (or even less) that you occupy while working. Material resources needed to shoot one movie are one big reason you need financial model.

2. math is irrelevant here, has nothing in common with movies or music

3. yes. It’s our culture and our history.

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You're comparing apples and really big complicated apples. Books are protected by copyright and they only need a computer and 2 sqm of space, right? People make copyright protected videos with 2 sqm of space and a phone that get as many views as many large budget movies.

I think the differences between inventing a story or song and inventing a theory are not as great as you pretend.

The big difference really is status quo and tradition.

>I think the differences between inventing a story or song and inventing a theory are not as great as you pretend.

I do not pretend anything and I‘m not talking about inventing a story. I‘m talking about movie production, which, even with heavy use of AI is by orders of magnitude more expensive than a piece of free software, and certainly cannot be done with a single computer.

Why are you choosing to compare inventing math to producing a movie? How does that help you advance your argument that it is reasonable for one to be under copyright and not the other?

Movies absolutely can be created with one computer. There was a movie shot entirely on an iphone. They can be edited on an iphone too. Heck, movies can be created without a single computer. That was the only way to make movies for many decades.

> Why are you choosing to compare inventing math to producing a movie?

I don’t understand where did you get that from. I did not „choose“ that. Please re-read the conversation.

> There was a movie shot entirely on an iphone.

And? Are you claiming that someone can shoot „All quiet on Western front“ with iPhone and on low budget?

> Heck, movies can be created without a single computer. That was the only way to make movies for many decades.

Yes. What is your argument exactly?

If something is important culturally and historically, financial incentives aren't really important (assuming you're not making a joke about Hollywood being creatively bankrupt).

Whenever it concerns expensive production, and historical pieces are inevitably not „Blair witch“ cheap, financial model is very important. Given that this suggestion implies that copyright still exists, the film makers will have to choose either to raise money from state or donations to make something from public domain works or to explore material that is still copyrighted and count on box office and streaming revenues. The boundary between those choices is set to a random expiration number, the incentives are obviously skewed towards better pay, so chances are high that whatever enters public domain will be quickly forgotten by the public.

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