That’s not the way technology works. As the lower-rung of quality for any profession rises, the highest rung also rises. There’s only so much demand for any one product, and so there’s only so many people that can be supported within that industry. The industry is going to select the people who pull in the money–AKA the top X percent. It doesn’t matter if 100% of everyone can turn out a better product than the people of 50 years ago, so long as demand hasn’t particularly changed from 50 years ago, the percent of people that make it into the work force is going to be exactly the same.
A great way to destroy copyright, and to make supporting copyright laws political kryptonite.
I like this idea. Copyright is too useful a concept to toss out, but it needs to change with the times.
A relevant article :
And another about how music copyrights are keeping shows from being reprinted on DVDs.
If copyright laws are keeping works out of circulation, then they are having the opposite effect that they should and need to be changed.
I’m not suggesting removing the option. It’s the internet which is removing that option. I simply see no reason to fight this change.
I never meant to imply it was easy, just that it’s becoming more accessible, and that if it has not yet crossed the threshold where the quality of amateur work rivals that of professionals, it will, sooner or later.
I really don’t see how any of this contradicts what I said. ???
You said that amateurs can create high quality work. Amateur work is the definition of “low quality”. It’s only high quality compared to the work of previous ages. Compared to what professionals make, it’s crap.
He countered your assertion that amateurs creating art in their free time create equal or better art than those with more time to devote to their craft by supplying anecdotal evidence (which is better than what you have supplied so far, which is zero) that it is difficult to get in the amount of time required to produce quality art in one’s “free” time.
You responded with a ridiculous statement about how you can tell him how to be a “better” musician. How can you possibly know in what areas sleestak is deficient and in what areas he/she excels? Are you psychic? Is there an agreed upon definition of “better”?
Technology is merely the rising tide, all boats are lifted. In some cases it can help replace practice. In other cases it absolutely can’t.
Technology can help the mechanics of certain actions, but can not replace experience and knowledge.
If you are referring to the strictly mechanical sense of, say, playing a note on an instrument, in some cases what you say is true, in other cases it is false.
However, that’s just one piece of art, and generally not the most important.
Oh sorry for the confusion. I was referring to the definition of amateur as A person attached to a particular pursuit, study, or science as to music or painting; esp. one who cultivates any study or art, from taste or attachment, without pursuing it professionally. Since the definition you’re thinking of, would make the sentence I wrote completely nonsensical, I assumed you were smart enough to figure this out. I’ll be more careful in the future. :rolleyes:
Careful now, I suggest you go back and read again. Where did I make such an assertion?
I certainly never said that it wasn’t difficult.
Incorrect.
I merely asked if sleestak wanted my advice. I don’t need to know in what areas he/she is deficient and in what areas he/she excels to do that.
How about an example of a case where “* it absolutely can’t.*” (Ever? Really?) One severe enough that it can only be overcome by working at it full-time. One common enough to support the claim that amateur artists will not in the foreseeable future be able to produce the same quality work as full-time professional artists. I have not been presented with such an example.
And the only experience and knowledge which count are that gained by practising full-time? Because, otherwise this statement seems somewhat irrelevant.
I seriously doubt you even know what I’ve said.
To do NoJustice justice (heh), there is a little truth in what he says:
Modern technology has made some parts (but only some!) of the creative process easier, faster, and more widely accessible. For example, nowadays a writer can easily produce a professional-looking manuscript, that doesn’t have to be retyped anytime she wants to make revisions. But it still takes a lot of time and mental effort to do the writing (at least if you want to produce something that people will want to read).
And it’s true that some successful musicians, writers, etc. got their start by working on their art in their “free time,” that some wonderful things have been produced this way, and only later were they able to quit their day job and devote full time to their craft. And others have, throughout their career, maintained “day jobs” or additional sources of income rather than supporting themselves entirely by their art.
But none of this changes the fact that it requires a big investment of time and effort (and sometimes money), both directly and indirectly (e.g. time spent learning and honing one’s craft) to produce artistic works of value to significant numbers of people. And those who do this deserve to be compensated.
Because, after a few years,the only candy available in the bottomless candy dish (and everywhere else) is stuff that people make at home, because candy professionals have either given up the trade, or jealously guard their stuff so it never becomes generally available.
The internet is doing nothing of the sort - it’s just a tool like any other. It’s the criminals who are stealing and getting away with it and the practical lack of enforcement of copyright laws that are causing the problem. If the political will existed we could crack down on them, and while I’m under no illusion we could get rid of it completely we could at least make it risky and/or complicated enough that your average person wouldn’t consider it so carelessly as they do now.
Of course there is no political will - Many people either don’t care, or are stealing themselves.
It’s getting easier for the professionals too, allowing them to create even better music then before just as Sage Rat said. Even if you are right, and technology will eventually let amateurs put out works that are equal in quality to professionals in their spare time then we still don’t need to get rid of copyright - everyone will be able to produce high quality art and so it’s value will be essentially nothing and no-one will charge for it anyway.
I’m interested in what differences you see in the meaning of those 2 statements.
You’re able to tell someone how to be a better musician without knowing what they need to be better at? If it’s something they are already doing then you aren’t telling them how to be better, you are telling them how to be the same.
When you say “advice on how to be a better musician”, it implies that if the person does what you say, that the quality of their music will increase as a result. You get that, right?
What can’t be replaced by a computer (with respect to music, in this case) is the knowledge and experience required to write and perform music in such a way that other humans enjoy it. Sure, the mechanics of playing a note or a chord can easily be produced with a computer, but the knowledge and experience that allows people to create quality stuff comes from trial and error, learning, feedback, all of which take time and a human brain.
I suppose I can’t complain about your literal interpretation… 
cheerfully withdrawn
When I said “it’s the internet which his removing that option”, I only meant that any change in artists’ options are not the result of me or anyone else standing between the artists and those that want to pay them. Rather the change is that the internet offers new options which many people seem to prefer to paying. I wasn’t trying to place any guilt or blame on the internet as if it were a being with free-will.
Technically I’m not sure they’re criminals until they’ve actually been convicted of a crime, are they? As for the ‘problem’ which they are causing, I suppose the blame for it does fall on them, but I don’t think this ‘problem’ amounts to any more than people’s natural resistance to change. Illegal downloaders could keep the world the way it used to be by not using the internet to do anything they didn’t already do before. They choose not to go this route, and it is indeed for their own selfish reasons. Excuse my while I cry my eyes out.
I don’t think we “need to get rid of copyright” either. I think it’s falling into irrelevance, and I see no reason to make any effort to prevent this, even if it were possible to do so.
Whoa, I’m not sure I’d go that far. Regardless, not everyone will produce high quality art, even if they’re able to.
As long as you mean ‘value’ in a purely economic sense, and nothing broader, then yeah, I guess that sounds about right.
I could be really obtuse and just point out that there are 3 quotes, all with meanings so completely different as to make comparison pointless.
The 3rd quote does not contain an “assertion that amateurs creating art in their free time create equal or better art than those with more time to devote to their craft”. I don’t know what else I can do for you… I am not your English teacher.
I have no interest in arguing these points with you, as they are entirely irrelevant. I merely asked if sleestak wanted my advice. I never made any claims of what value that advice would actually have to him/her.
Sure… fine… whatever… SO WHAT? Just what is it, in your quote of me that you are trying to respond to?
Since the OP encouraged us “to not get too focused on any one train of thought and turn the thread into a discussion of that one tangent.” I think it’s better to just drop this here, especially since you aren’t even discussing anything, and so are derailing the thread for absolutely no reason.
If anyone posts something which actually responds to something I’ve said or a question I’ve asked (as opposed to merely quoting me, and writing an unrelated opinion underneath) I’ll consider answering… but apart from that I’ll just remain silent in the hopes the thread can continue.
I will give you credit, you actually had me going there, although I was prepared for the possibility of this response.
They’re criminals. They haven’t been formally established as criminals in the eyes of the state, but criminals they are nonetheless - just the way a duck is still a duck before I grab my textbook and identify it.
As for the rest, I could make a similar argument defending those who use that newfangled “gun” technology to facilitate their selfish desires to kill people and take their stuff. An identical argument, really. ‘People are getting shot by criminals? Excuse my while I cry my eyes out.’
As for your notion that technology is going to level the playing field between artists who do it as their day job and those who do it when they can scrape up some free time, that’s nucking futs. Arguments follow:
Firstly, anything that can be completely created at a quality unaffected by the skill or lack thereof of the artist - isn’t art. It’s product. It’s mass-produceable. It’s not something that will be rare, and it’s not something that anybody will bother to copyright - so there’s no reason to remove copyright to facilitate it.
Secondly, technology typically aids in taking care of the grunt work, but not the artistic aspect of a work (nearly by defintion). Case in point: I’m a writer. Amateur. Never published. Never will. I just do it in my free time, for fun. And yes, it’s much easier to do on a computer than it was when I wrote it out longhand in high school. (Especially if I wanted to distribute it - copying it by hand would be a bitch.) But the actual writing writing part of it? The computer is useless. It takes hours and hours of manual work - and practice. I seriously doubt that a computer will ever be able to write well - not before they’re smart enough to demand that we pay them for their services like everyone else. And prior to that, you’ll still as a rule get better work out of those using the tools professionally than those who are just screwing around with them.
Thirdly, creation is slow. I’ve been screwing around with this writing thing for years, and am still only good for about ten to twenty pages as week, in my spare time. Sometimes less, when other things come up. Often less. And sometimes I have to backtrack. If I was doing this full time, if I didn’t have to hold down a day job, I’d actually be able to produce some content in my lifetime. All these artists producing stuff for you to download? Not only would the quality of work degrade when they couldn’t devote time to it, not only would the amount made decrease because you’ve removed the financial incentive, but also the amount produced would dramatically decrease just from lopping the amount spent on it per week from fifty hours to ten, broken up and scattered erratically.
And fourth, of course - lots of people will only share their content if you give them a reason to. Lots of people will only make content if you give them a reason to. My stuff, that I write? You’ll never read it. Maybe if you paid me, I’d let you read it. But not if you were going to pay me once and then give it to everyone else for free - not unless that one payment was freakishly large. So yeah. Cut off the financial roots of the creative industry, and the tree will wither and die, and all you’ll be left with are funguses and the occasional, rare, flower.
So yeah. Those who think the creative industry is a bottomless candy jar that people will keep filling just for the heck of it, 1) are delusional, and 2) have never created anything more artistically complicated than an hand puppet in their lives.
I’m fine with copyrights for the most part. Artists deserve to get paid for their efforts. I personally think they generally get paid too much(much like sports players), but there is little i can do about it.
What rubs me wrong are software copyrights. The copyright should be a law against copying. Thats it, period, end of story. No eulas or tos that tell you what you can do or can’t do with a product you paid for. Once i unwrap the packaging, It should be legal for me to do whatever I damned well please to said program, and modify it however I want(since I also believe to get copyright protection one must provide source code), so long as I don’t make additional copies(though I can resell my own, modified version).
Basically, I’d reduce all EULAs to ‘Don’t give away or sell copies of this to other people.’
Software copyrights are a crappy mess of intellectual property law that really needs to be fixed. I think CutterJohn is only scratching the surface. Here’s my solution:
You can copyright the media that’s part of your program, but you can’t copyright the functionality. That means MS can protect their wonderful “Widows startup” noise or the spiffy wallpapers they include. They can’t copyright the functionality of their calculator application. Also, if a copyrighted work is so integrated into the program that it cannot be removed without making the program unusable, it is not protected under copyright.
You can patent non-obvious implementations that are part of your program. Yes, there’s a lot of squishy in “non-obvious,” but it seems to work for non-software patents. This would prevent patenting of what are basically mathematical algorithms. This should parallel the way a process could be patented but the product might not be patented. If you want your calculator to function like a Rube Goldberg device, you can patent that implementation, but if you want a normal calculator function you’ll use the obvious implementation and receive less patent protection.
Trademarks in software would be left unmodified, as I think the current trademark system works reasonably well as far as intellectual property goes.
Patents, and software patents especially, also need to be tweaked for this to work. It’s too easy to get a patent for a business model or a mathematical algorithm under the current system, and computer code evolves too fast for the 20 year term to be useful. In that time, the inventor has recouped the money from the useful life, then the technology has languished in limbo for well a decade or more as its useful life is expired but the patent still protects it. A 5 year term might be more appropriate for software, but the life of XP may indicate a 10 year protection could be appropriate. Patents should be specific enough to allow a good programmer to replicate the technology by reading the patent. After all, the purpose of the patent system is a government sanctioned monopoly on a technology for a limited period in exchange for divulging how that technology works.
Like the current system, this system would create a bizarre mix of of IP protections on a piece of software, but you should be able to copy and distribute a piece of software if the patents expire and you strip it of copyrighted and trademarked property. It might look a little spartan, but it would be functionally the same.
Getting back to the OP and copyright in general, we need to do several things to make the copyright system sane again. First, protection needs to be reduced back to a reasonable time. Retroactively extending the protection given to Mickey Mouse in the 1990s does not increase Walt Disney’s incentive to create cartoons in the 1930s.
That’s not a solution to pirating music over Napster, Kazaa, BitTorrent, or whatever the technology of the year is. I don’t think there is a legislative solution for that problem. Distributing the music is prohibited and should remain prohibited, but the RIAA has repeatedly shot themselves in the foot when dealing with the situation. Rather than see that MP3s were a new potential revenue stream and offer consumers the digital files they wanted, the RIAA alienated consumers by filing lawsuit after lawsuit against Napster, Kazaa, and people who uploaded songs. They aggravated the mistake with sloppy lawsuits against people who never used computers, arguing out of both sides of their mouth in different court cases, and pursuing ridiculous damages.
The best thing the music industry has done was to embrace the iTunes store. It’s what people wanted long ago. For a reasonable price, people can buy the music they want and the music industry gets its cut. They’re never going to eliminate distribution of pirated music. Their efforts failed when it took physical media to copy a song, and their efforts will fail when all it takes is a little extra space on a hard drive.
I think software patents should just be scrapped. About the only things I have ever seen patented in software that I don’t think any old good programmer can come up with are good compression algorithms and cryptography. If we have software patents, the bar needs to be real high.
At the very least, all software patents should have their ‘obviousness’ assessed by seasoned programmers, not lawyers.
Definitely.