Copyright Discussion and Debate

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
But if you want, I can give quite a good reason for why we're seeing these things happen: the internet.

I would point out that in many ways, Internet distribution is a further evolution of the trend towards becoming more widespread as barriers to entry are reduced.

Consider that historically, the *only* way anyone could make a living as an artist was to be sponsored by a rich patron, or later on some of the universities with "artist in residence" type programs. As confining as the current dominant system of publishing houses is, it is broader and provides substantially more freedom and opportunity than the patronage system it replaced. The growth of Internet-based self-publishing and small-scale indie/niche labels simply carries this evolution towards its next step.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
For most creative works though, thats not really true: like, most movies make something like 90% of their income in the first month of release. Most TV episodes get most of their value on release day.

I mean, evvery comic book writer wants to write watchmen and have their comic book published every year. Unfortuately, theres only really 1 watchmen, and maybe, what, 10 other comics that get anything close in longetivity?

You listen to any comic writer, and it's clear they make their money by drawing or writing a lot of comics, not on much in the way of royalties. There are very few creatives who can afford not to churn out work at a high rate.

It's actually very much like being a carpenter. Most artists get by by constantly producing art and writings for barely making it money, while maybe 10 super carpenters has such high reputation and skill they do one work a year and sell it for a million dollars.
This is actually part of the problem in my opinion. Copyright law was put together when novels were the main action and long-lived movie cinematic universes weren't even a twinkle in the producer's eye. A book needs a fairly different copyright model than, say, software that's going to be obsolete in six months.

However I think you're both overstating how much of those productions get their value on the first day. Comics aren't really my thing so I'm not as qualified to comment on them, but a brief glance at Amazon tells me the top trade paperbacks are House of M, Infinity Gauntlet, Calvin and Hobbes, some horror compilation, Days of Future Past, Dark Phoenix Saga, and Avengers vs. X-Men. All these are stories years to decades old but they appear to still be selling, and should be generating royalties to the creators.

Is every comic doing that? No, of course not, yet we also see old movies finding new life on Netflix and old books still being published. That's why I'd like Copyright law to be extendible so that the company can keep control of valuable properties (encouraging them to keep paying for creation) while the less valued ones can't be sat on unused for a century (thus becoming available for new creators to play with).
 
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Terthna

Professional Lurker
This is actually part of the problem in my opinion. Copyright law was put together when novels were the main action and long-lived movie cinematic universes weren't even a twinkle in the producer's eye. A book needs a fairly different copyright model than, say, software that's going to be obsolete in six months.

However I think you're both overstating how much of those productions get their value on the first day. Comics aren't really my thing so I'm not as qualified to comment on them, but a brief glance at Amazon tells me the top trade paperbacks are House of M, Infinity Gauntlet, Calvin and Hobbes, some horror compilation, Days of Future Past, Dark Phoenix Saga, and Avengers vs. X-Men. All these are stories years to decades old but they appear to still be selling, and should be generating royalties to the creators.

Is every comic doing that? No, of course not, yet we also see old movies finding new life on Netflix and old books still being published. That's why I'd like Copyright law to be extendible so that the company can keep control of valuable properties (encouraging them to keep paying for creation) while the less valued ones can't be sat on unused for a century (thus becoming available for new creators to play with).
Comics don't work like that, as far as I'm aware; not most superhero comics, at least. Nobody who worked on House of M, Infinity Gauntlet, or Days of Future Past receive any royalties; their work is entirely owned by Marvel. This is actually the reason many artists left Marvel to create Image Comics; so that they could own their own work.
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
Comics don't work like that, as far as I'm aware; not most superhero comics, at least. Nobody who worked on House of M, Infinity Gauntlet, or Days of Future Past receive any royalties; their work is entirely owned by Marvel. This is actually the reason many artists left Marvel to create Image Comics; so that they could own their own work.
Hmm, wasn't aware of that, as I said comics aren't my thing. That probably means the artists are doing "work for hire" rather than creative work (in the legal sense) and the company retains all copyrights. Doesn't really change the fact that it's under copyright and still producing cash years later though.
 

Terthna

Professional Lurker
Uniquenameosaurus posted some more videos talking about the abuse of copyright, as well as alternatives to our current system; thought they were interesting enough to share.



Personally I'm convinced; but whatever your opinions are on the guy and his argument, you've got to at least respect his willingness to put his money where his mouth is, making all of his work in perpetuity public domain.
 

bullethead

Part-time fanfic writer
Super Moderator
Staff Member
I finally got around to watching the first video and part of the second and...

This guy is full of shit as to how to fix intellectual property.

On one hand, he's right in that restricting the right to replicate something encourages monopolies and cabals that drive up prices. If all you're concerned about is the price of something, then he's definitely got it pegged.

On the other, he's entirely ignorant of the human psychological tendency to assume that the thing that costs money is therefore of higher value/quality than that which does not cost money/as much money.

And then he's also completely ignorant of the fact that the only to create an copyright/IP law free environment is a reputation based economy... which means people are even more vulnerable to cancel culture and deplatforming, at least without massive restructuring of libel laws.

It's also really ignorant of stuff like the FDA being stupid and causing drug testing to take so long the patent protections on the original formulations of drugs expire, so companies just stop testing them because they won't be able to exclusively make money on them.

It also doesn't doesn't address the utter shitshow that is multiple competing continuities/canons or any of the other negative consequences of abolishing copyright.

Like, most of the problems he's purporting to solve would be fixed by shorter copyright terms and proper incentive structures to reward smaller creators over larger conglomerates.
 

LordsFire

Internet Wizard
So, I watched the first video, started the second, but decided it wasn't worth my time.

This is a classic case of 'just enough knowledge to be dangerous.'

First off, he starts with some good examples of Copyright abuse. Adobe and the like copyrighting a digital tool that does a thing is nonsense. That'd be like copyrighting the basic concept of the internal combustion engine, or a holder for a toilet-paper roll.

The patent office letting them patent that is a problem.

You can't patent the internal combustion engine, but you can patent a particular design. You can't patent the idea of 'a thing that holds a toilet paper roll' but people have patented certain designs for doing so.

I had wondered how Adobe had maintained market dominance for so long, in spite of their outrageous fees, but it's good to finally know, I guess.

The problem that's being encountered here, is that these things are extremely niche. What, one in a thousand people use something like Photoshop in a professional context? Far fewer use it without using a corporate or academic license to get a huge discount on using it?


What the guy making these videos has as a problem, is that he doesn't understand the cost of getting rid of Copyright and IPR. Sure, for someone making media posted on the internet in this day and age, you can find other ways than royalties to make your money, and perhaps even do better through crowdfunding than you would otherwise.

But the people writing online (like me), making art, or even music and the sort of single-creator or small-team movie content you see a lot on youtube, mostly just have their own personal time as the investment cost, probably only using tools we already would have had (home computer, smartphone) with a couple minor additions (better camera and sound equipment maybe.)

Making a new drug? Developing the next iteration of microchip technology? Creating a new composite material to try to make flying safer and more cost effective? Creating the manufacturing methods for creating those?

That costs tens to hundreds of millions of dollars to develop. And if there's no such thing as IPR or Copyright, then the instant that your new product is finished, a company that did not pay that enormous cost can start producing it as well, and they can sell it cheaper, because they don't need to recoup the development cost.


And then all innovation comes very nearly to a standstill overnight.

Oh, some R&D will still be done. But it's no coincidence that it is free market economies with patent law that drove the entirety of the modern technological revolution, with next to no new technology coming out of places lacking it.

The human race has benefited massively from the concept of patents and copyright, but this person seems to be completely ignorant of that.
 

Husky_Khan

The Dog Whistler... I mean Whisperer.
Founder
Sotnik
A new wrinkle in the Copyright debate.

A University of Michigan Professor named Richard Hovden has claimed a copyright of a particular deck of Magic cards from their Angels and Demons line.

Tech Raptor said:
A professor at the University of Michigan, formally filed and received a copyright for a collection of cards. Under this filing, his "Angels and Demons" deck, is officially recognized as his own exclusive intellectual property, which gives him various legal rights when it comes to official use. Hovden then teased that he could prohibit this deck from being used in tournament play. When asked why he made this filing, Hovden stated it was about, "owning culture and people’s participation in culture through copyright."

There are a lot of things to unpack here. First, there is some precedent for this Magic copyright filing thanks to some digging by journalist Cory Doctorow. When it comes to copyright law, the protections are based on expressions of creativity, rather than say of hard work. Because of this, complete collections of materials hold no protection, but a curated collection of materials carries some protection since it reflects the holder's subjective input. In other words, Hovden "curated" the specific cards from the thousands in print right now for Magic The Gathering and legally declared that the ones assembled in this collection are distinguishable enough to be given a certain level of copyright protection.

This Magic copyright filing is meant to imply that anyone can do the exact same thing on a bigger scale. Similar filings could happen for entire decks, effectively marking them as legally distinct IP separate from Wizards of the Coast's very franchise. Imagine a pro player winning a tournament with a certain deck, filing a copyright on that deck, and then seeking legal action against anyone who tries to use it.

Apparently this filing is of dubious legal merit despite Professor Hovden's extensive applicable academic background in Applied Physics, which he apparently teaches at University. And this wasn't the first time he tried to claim a copyright for something either, having done something similar back in 2014 when trying to claim copyright over another artists famous work by modifying it so it could only be seen under a specialized microscope and attempting to sell it as a collection. That artists estate sued the Professor and the case later was settled.

 

Husky_Khan

The Dog Whistler... I mean Whisperer.
Founder
Sotnik
A Judge rules in favor of Cloudflare in a lawsuit brought against it by a Wedding Company that alleged that Cloudflare (and other companies) were being harmed by the proliferation of copyright infringement by websites and businesses that utilized Cloudflare's services.

 

Terthna

Professional Lurker
Anyone else notice how illiterate many people are regarding copyright, and how they seem to have forgotten that the public domain is a thing that exists? They just assume that everything is owned by some major corporation; even things centuries old. Don't even get me started on how they keep conflating copyright with trademark, and vice versa.
 

ShadowArxxy

Well-known member
Comrade
A Judge rules in favor of Cloudflare in a lawsuit brought against it by a Wedding Company that alleged that Cloudflare (and other companies) were being harmed by the proliferation of copyright infringement by websites and businesses that utilized Cloudflare's services.


This one pretty much comes down to saying that third party services get the same "safe harbor" provisions as ISPs and content hosting services do, and are not liable for infringing content that utilize the service. It's a sensible and straightforward case.

Edit: More precisely, they're not liable unless the services they provide "significantly magnify otherwise immaterial infringements."
 
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bullethead

Part-time fanfic writer
Super Moderator
Staff Member
Anyone else notice how illiterate many people are regarding copyright, and how they seem to have forgotten that the public domain is a thing that exists? They just assume that everything is owned by some major corporation; even things centuries old. Don't even get me started on how they keep conflating copyright with trademark, and vice versa.
No real surprise there, when you hear about people getting sued for copyright all the time and hear almost nothing about public domain, then it's natural for them to assume everything is owned by some company somewhere.

Same with copyright vs trademark. Unless you're doing something specifically involving those two, odds are you're not going to be taught the difference between them.
 

Pocky Balboa

Well-known member
Anyone else notice how illiterate many people are regarding copyright, and how they seem to have forgotten that the public domain is a thing that exists? They just assume that everything is owned by some major corporation; even things centuries old. Don't even get me started on how they keep conflating copyright with trademark, and vice versa.

It gets my blood up that every time I have to explain or clarify to teachers about fair use in my job they always have that undercurrent of unease about using something for their lessons because of the bullshit pulled by companies like the Rat even after I've made sure their usage falls under fair use.
 

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
It gets my blood up that every time I have to explain or clarify to teachers about fair use in my job they always have that undercurrent of unease about using something for their lessons because of the bullshit pulled by companies like the Rat even after I've made sure their usage falls under fair use.
It also makes people a lot more negative and hostile to copyright because it's so misunderstood.

It also doesn't help that the thing most people are likely going to encounter involving copyright is Youtube, which doesn't actually follow copyright law, but rather their own policies which are much more strident and set up in the exact opposite way from actual copyright and basically doesn't take into account Fair Use at all. So they'll see creators they like getting "copyright" strikes that are completely bullshit because of Fair Use, and the onus always falls on the creators, not the corporations whom keep making false copyright claims on videos that clearly fall into fair use.
 

Terthna

Professional Lurker
It also makes people a lot more negative and hostile to copyright because it's so misunderstood.

It also doesn't help that the thing most people are likely going to encounter involving copyright is Youtube, which doesn't actually follow copyright law, but rather their own policies which are much more strident and set up in the exact opposite way from actual copyright and basically doesn't take into account Fair Use at all. So they'll see creators they like getting "copyright" strikes that are completely bullshit because of Fair Use, and the onus always falls on the creators, not the corporations whom keep making false copyright claims on videos that clearly fall into fair use.
There's also the times where corporations issue claims over copyright they don't actually own. You could be singing your own original song in a Youtube video, and still have to worry about it getting copyright claimed; either because Youtube's Content ID system made a false match, or because an actual human being for whatever reason submitted a false claim.
 

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