# Alternative to Copyright: Protecting Consumers and Compensating Creators **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 15, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alternative-to-copyright-protecting-consumers-and-compensating-creators/634753 "2012-09-15T02:19:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![HoldenCaulfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/22d042/32.png) [@HoldenCaulfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoldenCaulfield)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alternative-to-copyright-protecting-consumers-and-compensating-creators/634753/1 "2012-09-15T02:19:46Z")
**Beware of Doug** links to an interesting [proposed book](http://joeclark.org/cranky/) in the [Pirate Bay](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15487340&postcount=425) Pit thread. > [@](#): > > The Cranky Copyright Book is a response to the two conflicting narratives of copyright that have dominated the discourse since the 1990s. > > One story, the corporate or copyright-maximalist view, is represented by industry groups like the MPAA, the RIAA, and CRIA. Copyright law is interpreted literally; even minor duplications of computer files are viewed as egregious violations that merit gigantic fines; people act as though legal exemptions don’t exist; copyright should apply forever; DRM keeps even otherwise-dishonest people honest and is generally a good idea. > > The other story, the copyleftist or copyright-minimalist view, is represented by luminaries like Cory Doctorow, Michael Geist, and (especially) Larry Lessig and by organizations like the EFF and Creative Commons. Here, copyright is viewed as a mechanism for general cultural enrichment; copyright law needs to be updated to recognize the relatively harmless and arguably beneficial habits digital natives already have, and existing exemptions need to be interpreted broadly; DRM doesn’t work in the first place and squelches people’s legal rights. > > Both sides have good points, but both sides miss a bigger point: Who’s sticking up for the individual creator? Neither side is. The maximalist side wants to collect as many copyrights under a corporate umbrella as possible, guarding them forever. The minimalist side wants you to voluntarily surrender most of your important rights – also forever – on the off chance that “the culture” might someday wish to use your work. Both sides argue in favour of a rapacious maw that consumes rights the way a panda chews through bamboo. > > What rights? Yours – the individual creator’s. I don’t want to have exactly that discussion; in fact, I don’t want to talk about “rights” at all. However, I do want to have a “cool-headed rational discussion” that focuses on how to compensate creators. As background, I think copyright law as it currently exists harms consumers. I think that harm is so great that it doesn’t justify the benefits of copyright law to society at large, and thus we need to get rid of it. If you like, you can disagree with me in one of many other threads where I’ve discussed this point. I do want to discuss how **legal** or **social** rules/institutions could be changed/emphasized so that creators can make a living in a world without copyright. I don’t think I have the answers, but I can start off with some broad ideas: [ul] [li]We could do nothing. Perhaps only a handful of major content-creators will be able to make a living through sales of _initial_ copies of content, performances, teaching, likeness rights (if they become celebrities), etc. How do we feel about this? How different is this from our current system?[/li][li]We could do significantly more government funding of the arts. This may bias content to be more favorable to certain political constituencies, or towards government in general. (One particular genius/flaw of copyright that we may miss is that it rigs the system to fund content that the most people will enjoy.)[/li][li]We can establish more resident artists at universities. To the extent that academia is disconnected from the interests/needs/wants of the mainstream, this may only produce similarly disconnected content.[/li][li]We can establish a patronage system, much like in the bad old days, where wealthy patrons fund artists to create content. This may bias art to the needs/wants/interests of the wealthy.[/li][li]We can look to crowd-funding sources (like Kickstarter) to fund not just the _costs_ related to content-creation, but also to _compensate_ the creator. This is an off-shoot of relying on sales of _initial_ copies that I reference above, but perhaps thinking of it in terms of crowd-funding makes it a more viable solution.[/li][/ul] I am open to discussing the above possibilities and also to adding additional possibilities with only one requirement: no proposal can involve restricting the copying, distribution, or performance of content. If you want to make such a proposal, I’m happy to discuss it in a different thread. Thanks for reading. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2012, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alternative-to-copyright-protecting-consumers-and-compensating-creators/634753/2 "2012-09-15T04:58:51Z")
[quote=“HoldenCaulfield, post:1, topic:634753”] . . . [li]We could do significantly more government funding of the arts. This may bias content to be more favorable to certain political constituencies, or towards government in general. (One particular genius/flaw of copyright that we may miss is that it rigs the system to fund content that the most people will enjoy.)[/li][/quote] I’m very much in favor of this. Also, of the giving of awards and grants prizes. [QUOTE] [li]We can establish a patronage system, much like in the bad old days, where wealthy patrons fund artists to create content. This may bias art to the needs/wants/interests of the wealthy.[/li][/QUOTE] Already exists to some extent. Perhaps tax incentives could be established to make it more common. Another classic idea is to measure consumption of a freely-distributed product, and then award taxpayer money to the creators. If 500,000 people look at your web comic, but only 5,000 people look at mine, you get paid 100 times what I get paid. Everyone is free to consume, yet the rewards are still proportionate to the popularity, exactly as if in an ordinary capitalistic free market. At first, rewards would be based on existing pay structures from current for-profit publishers. As time goes by, and the system replaces the publishing profession, I’m not quite sure how rewards would be calibrated. (And, alas, they’d be the first thing cut when budgets need trimming…)