Martin Luther was a thief

Great Debates
21

I really need to work on my sarcasm. I’m obviously not in favor of Copyright Now, Copyright Tomorrow, Copyright Forever. I’m adopting the tone of the most radical, zealous, lunatic copyright maximalist to point out how unlike the RIAA’s version of reality the real world actually is.

The RIAA reacts to every act of piracy as if it were the Apocalypse, Doomsday, One Last Saturday Night, and Ninth Coming all wrapped up into one low-bitrate MP3 downloaded by a nine-year-old schoolgirl. They got similarly stroppy when tape recorders were sold in Wal-Mart, and when radio stations were invented, and when wax cylinders were first cut, and when piano rolls looked like they could outsell sheet music. And I’m sure they went ten kinds of animal feces when sheet music was first invented, screaming in Latin and Gallic and all of the kinds of Greek no longer taught in high school.

So why worry now? Because they have the technological/legal tools to do something about it now. DRM (Digital Restrictions Management) is software meant to do the technically impossible – prevent you from recording what you are allowed to play – but is really one half of an equation that is effectively destroying all limits on copyright in this country. By breaking DRM, even to study it in an academic setting, you are opening yourself up to massive penalties under the DMCA, law that has no respect for fair use or public domain or even the actual license the work was released under.

By attaching DRM to something, someone who did not create the work can own it forever. Or at least as long as the DMCA lasts, which looks like it might be a very long time.

Look at what happened every time a new technology came on the scene: Piracy, whining and screaming and moaning by the current business interests, and then a quiet calming period when the new regime was negotiated. Everyone was happy after that. Now, with DRM and the DMCA, the current industry might never have to come to the bargaining table and negotiate a fair deal with anyone. They look like they’ll have their cake, your cake, the artists’ cake, and everything else they want.

This will kill American entertainment industries. People who make the art that makes money will go somewhere where copyright law isn’t actively trying to kill them. And then what the fuck will we do?

22

[QUOTE=Derleth]

[list]
[li]He stole the Bible from its rightful owner, the Roman Catholic Church.[/li][/QUOTE]

Seems like the author of the Bible, according to many, is God. And God would still hold the copyright. Ah well, I was told as a child that Luther was in hell, so he got what he had coming.

23

Well, Derleth, I get what you’re saying at least, and support your rant wholeheartedly. What’s more, I agree with you.

For what it is worth, I don’t agree with what Luther said, but I sure don’t think he was a criminal, at least not for that reason, and wouldn’t be even if the bible had been written five years before and the writer was still living.

I really don’t think copyright (or patent!) laws are necessary or wise. I really don’t think artists or inventors are entitled to anything they couldn’t get without those laws. But I’m not sure if you’d go that far or not, I don’t really think it will ever happen, abolishing copyright laws that is; there is too much money to be had by people in power, and too many non-powerful creators who actually think copyright laws are good for them. But what I’m seeing is technology finally getting to the stage where copyright laws can be shown to be what they always were: stiflers of progress and inhibitors to the spread of information.

24

You’re damned well right I wouldn’t. I am against people being able to rip off creators who are still living. I think the copyright and patent laws we now have would be perfect if they were shorn of the DMCA and anything like it and only extended protection for the lifetime of the author. (No, assigning copyright (or a patent) to a corporate ‘person’ should not make that legal fiction the creator. Go ahead and ask me what I think of the moron who made corporations legal ‘people’.)

They are. They prevent others from preventing the author from making a living off his work. (I don’t care about the descendants of the author being able to sponge off something they had no hand in. If the author wants to provide for them, he can create bank accounts and such like everyone else.)

No. They encourage people to create and make their creations public by providing a limited-time monopoly for the creator.

Prior to copyright law, the only way an author or a painter or such could survive was by finding a rich patron, typically a prince. This made the prince the arbiter of what the creator could create and limited the range of what the creator could even contemplate doing. This is intolerable for anyone whose ideas are even the least bit unorthodox.

Prior to patents, every useful technique or invention was a trade secret and protected by closed guilds. Nobody could learn from what anyone else was doing. Time was wasted in reinvention that should have been spent in fresh creation.

25

Eh…everyone reacts that way these days. Tried to change gun laws recently? Watched political commercials last month? Even on internet forums, I see people reacting with extreme dudgeon all the time.

I saw a smidgen of honesty peep through on one game forum in a discussion about a proposed change that was being denounced as the Worst Thing Ever. One kid said “we HAVE to play up how bad it is to influence things the way we want! Everyone else does it and we have to compete!” And it’s true…uh, at least, that such exaggeration is common. Years ago, my brother said “No one these days debates alternatives with an honest intent to choose the best. We’re each advocates of one specific alternative, and we’re not listening…we’re just waiting for the other guy to shut up so we can push for our own preferred idea.”

Sailboat

26

Replace “prince” with “publishing company” and I don’t see how things are any different nowadays. What we have now is a few crappy artists hocking mediocre but easily-digestible (and easy-selling) music, movies, etc… Most artists of any kind these days make negligible money on their art because everybody buys mass-produced crap. I’m totally convinced that in this case laissez-faire capitalism (like limited or no copyright protections) would spread more money around to more people instead of concentrating it in the hands of a few.

As far as patents go, I’m of the opinion that regardless of whether you invented something, if you can’t make it better and cheaper than the next guy then you have failed and we shouldn’t support you with laws that basically prop up bad businesses.

27

I think the OP’s point is more valid if you consider what things would have been like in Martin Luther’s time had today’s standards of copyright law been in place since the time the Bible was written.

With the recent changes extending copyrights, does anyone want to bet on how long it will be until Mickey Mouse material is in the public domain?

28

Mickey Mouse is a trademark…I think that’s somewhat different from copyright,. although you still have a point.

Sailboat

29

I understand what you’re saying here, but “prior art” is not a term used in copyright law. It’s relevant to showing novelty in patent law. Copyright law doesn’t require novelty, only originality, which is a much lower hurdle.

30

Strangely enough, the RIAA and the MPAA did not exist at the time that piano rolls and sheet music were first invented, owing probably to the fact that recording did not yet exist.

I think if you look at history, this is not the exclusive domain of the copyright and patent industries. Businesses have always tried to find ways to stop sources of new competition. Remember the town guilds of the mediaeval era?

Although artists – particularly songwriters and music recording artists – have a long-standing beef against the music industry, I think you’ll find that they don’t believe they’ve lost every recent battle. For example, as late as 1994, music recording artists got a digital public performance right. Until then, the United States was the only developed nation to deny music recording artists any performance right (songwriters have had a performance right since 1909). And that brings up another point, U.S. law is not the end-all and be-all of copyright law or artists’ rights. There is considerable variation, particularly between American and European law, and there is reason to believe that artists and consumers have more coming to them (although maybe not exactly what you’d like).

I think you’ll find that most creators don’t believe that the current copyright law is trying to kill them, although there is a pretty large movement to protect circumvention so long as it’s for a legal purpose (fair use, public domain, etc.). Look forward to U.S. Rep. Frederick C. “Rick” Boucher (D-Va.) proposing such a bill again in the near future.

Cartoon characters are protected under both copyright and trademark law.

31

[QUOTE=Derleth]
[li]He evaded justice by skipping jurisdictions, a sure sign of guilt.[/li][/QUOTE]
Give the guy a break–in the 16th century you couldn’t cross a German street without crossing at least one national boundary and pissing off the Archduke of The Middle Third of Main Strasse.

32

No. People self-publish all the time and don’t have to worry about being ripped off wholesale due to our strong copyright laws.

Oh, this shit again. 90% of everything is crap.

And this would be improved under your scheme how? Changing copyright law won’t change what people like.

You’ve misunderstood capitalism by linking it to “no copyright protections” and torpedoed your own position by advocating “limited … copyright protections”. I’m in favor of limited copyright protections, especially compared to what the RIAA wants.

No. A lack of copyright protection would ensure that those who own the largest presses would make all their money from stealing works from authors and nothing would filter back to those who create their art. (This is not a stable situation, I grant you. It would persist until there was nothing left to steal and then the patronage system would likely be reinvented.)

Again, review what happened before patent laws. Guilds kept everything a trade secret and nobody was in a position to improve on the work of anyone else.

A specific drawing is protected under copyright law. Identifiable features (ears that look like that, voice that sounds like that) are protected under trademark law.

33

Yes, Mickey Mouse is a trademark. Yes, trademarks are different from copyright – trademarks last (IIRC) forever.

However, material featuring Mickey Mouse is copyrighted. Copyrights expire. Or at least, they have in the past. Time will tell whether the Disney Corporation et al manages to change this.

For another perspective, note that patents have a much shorter life, and that sometimes patent holders live to see their work pass into the public domain (e.g., from memory, the inventor of the pager).

I think it’s instructive to consider this when those advocating extension of copyright protection make mother-and-apple-pie speeches about how Walt Disney’s grandchildren shouldn’t starve.

34

It might be worth noting that when strong copyright protections were instituted into U.S. law in 1909, the poster boy for the effort was Stephen Foster, who died a pauper, despite having been the author of numerous popular songs.

No, a cartoon or comic or movie character (but not a literary character), as defined by a specific drawing as well as a set of character traits, can be protected under both trademark and copyright law. (See, for example, Gaiman v. McFarlane (7th Circuit 2004) about the copyrightability of several characters, including, I think, Mediaeval Spawn, Count Cogliostro, and Angela .) Such a character constitutes a copyrightable work independent of any particular story that it might be featured in.

No, a trademark lasts as long as it (1) is used in commerce, and (2) remains distinctive. If the trademark owner stops using the mark as an identifier of the source of goods or services, it is abandoned. If the mark loses its distinctiveness (by, for example, becoming a generic term), then the owner loses exclusive rights in it.

35

Accepting the rather farcical presupposition that the RCC had copyright on the Bible, still your entire argument seems to boil down to, “If there had been copyright back then, we wouldn’t have Protestantism! Oh no!”

Well pff. Ghandi may been a great leader for peace, but that doesn’t mean that self-starvation is a good thing. Murdering any mass murderer before the fact would be a good thing; that doesn’t make murder a saintly act.

Copyright allows the rightful owner of his own work to be able to control and profit from it. Enforcing that, be it through simple policing or DRM, is perfectly justified in the face of mass theft. Sure one of the random millions of people who illegally download some song may end up resampling and releasing it as a song which changes the world, bringing peace and brotherly love to the world, but so…? What the heck are the odds of that? Allowing people to steal from the rightful owner of a song on the off-chance that one of them is the new Ghandi, and that Ghandi needs to illegally download music, is just stupid.

36

First of all, I doubt people who self-publilsh make much money, unless they own a major publishing company. Furthermore my goal is not to ensure some artists get paid large sums of money. I envision a world where the creative act and publication of said artform is what artists get paid for. Living forever off of one hit song is not what I call fair to anyone, including the myriad other starving artists competing for that three minutes in the listener’s ear. Its simple economics. The initial creative act is valuable, the packaged publication is valuable, the one-millionth download is not. That’s why nobody pays for it. I buy lots of CDs all the time when I want the permanence and aesthetics of a packaged album. If I want to check out a musician I’ve never heard or if I only like one song buy a particular artist, I listen to a friend’s copy or, god-forbid, download it. (I don’t really see the difference but many people do.)

At least we agree that 90% of everything is crap. I don’t pretend to improve it. I only think that instead of spending all our money on a few easily-digestible artists we could spend it on many different artists with a more varied output and still allow the popular ones to get paid more simply by making more music (or movies or whatever).

I didn’t link capitalism to no copyright protections. I linked laissez-faire capitalism to no copyright protections. If I’m not mistaken laissez-faire is French for “let it be” or somesuch, meaning, ideally, no economic regulations. I don’t know what else to call copyrights if not economic regulations. I don’t normally advocate extreme laissez-faire, but in this case I think it would help spread more money around to more people while boosting the economy as well. I’m not sure what “torpedoed” means but you probably think I’m hedging my bets, so to speak. Not really. By limited copyrights I mean no plagiarism. The original artist should at least be given credit for his work. I also think they should get some percentage of all the money that is made off of their creation. However, if it is being given away, any percent of zero is still zero.

I just don’t think burning a CD is a crime anymore than letting a friend listen to the original. Artists should have a right to publish their work in any way they wish, charging accordingly. If I’d rather download a low-quality version for free, nuts to them. I didn’t commit a crime, I just chose not to buy their product. That is, once the information is out in the open, they can’t just monopolize it, the same way I can’t tell everyone my password and then say, “but you can’t use it!”. A novelist can charge all they want for their particular set of bound pages but the information, once out in the open, is there for all to see. The market will decide who’s product is better.

As far as patents go, I’m a little hazy on the particulars. My understanding is that most engineers must by contract sign over their patents to the company they are working for at the time. Independent inventors by all means go try to make your product on your own. But if you can’t make it cheaper and more reliable than your competitors, you have failed as a businessman and, as I see it, an inventor. Weren’t guilds long gone by the time patents came around? I’m pretty sure England had an entire industrial revolution without the help of patents, but I could be wrong.

You might be asking me how artists are supposed to make any money when I can just go get their last CD for fifty cents at “Crazy Dave’s Bootleg Emporium”. Simple. Just make something new and sell it to somebody. You see, authors, musicians, inventors and filmmakers all have an enormous economic advantage because they are the first to know about and market their product. If I’m dying for Robert Johnson to release a new album, I’m not going to Crazy Dave. (I can’t go to Robert Johnson, but substitute the name of your favorite living musician and ask him.) But after that initial advantage I don’t see how our government encouraging a million and one monopolies helps our society at all.

37

Who are they going to sell it to? Why would anybody buy a song when a few minutes after they sell it to somebody it’s going to be given away for free on the interweb? You are reducing the value of a creative work to its reproduction cost, and vowing that, regardless of the quality or popularity of the work, the author will only be getting payment to the tune of 1*reproduction cost. Which, for songs nowadays, is nothing.

So you don’t want to have to pay for things; that’s an opinion. (I have opinions about that opinion, but let’s not digress.) The proposition that absent protection of compensation that it will magically develop on its own, however, is farcical and need not be repeated.

38

Define “things”, “protection”, and “compensation”. IMO, the greatest music was developed in an environment wth little or no copyright law, by musicians who created what they did because they wanted to, and usually eked out livelihoods from tips and patronage (e.g., J.S. Bach, Robert Johnson, Blind Blake, Sam McGee, etc.)

A significant difference back then, which I can live with: there were no rich IP lawyers.

39

Please forgive the nitpick, Sage Rat, but its Gandhi, not Ghandi.

40

Ding Ding Ding! If reproductions costs are zero, why should anybody be compensated for them? Productions costs, on the other hand, are real and artists should be compensated. This, of course, will come after the initial creation and publication of the artwork. Because if nobody pays for it, it won’t get made.

I think it all boils down to my conviction that information only has economic value as long as it is hidden or hard to get. Once, when I was in the Army, I came up with a new way to count our tools, so that toolbox inventories only took about half the time as before. I bet my old shop is still using that system. I’d sure as hell like to get some royalties in perpetuity for all the money and time and effort saved by me over the years. But once they knew how to do it the information was no longer valuable to anybody so I’m not getting paid for it. I suppose if I knew its worth in advance I could have negotiated some deal where I got money in exchange for that information. So it is with novels, music, movies, etc… If people like the artist, they’ll negotiate a deal in advance to pay for their art, but you can’t expect people to continue paying forever for something that no longer has any value.