Recording Industry takes action against 12 year old girl, forces settlement

The BBQ Pit
341

“Perhaps” bullshit.

Not buying it. I don’t believe that a whole new set of people will come out of the woodwork and start creating. If they’ve got that “spark,” that “drive,” they’re already doing it. The absence of a law won’t all of a sudden force a whole fresh new crop of “creative” people out of hibernation.

So what? It’d be a little more popular, sure, but it’s already popular because most of it’s either underground in plain sight (on the web) or the copyright holders (many movie studios) don’t care as long as no one’s making a profit.

Most people who are “turned off” of fan fiction or fan art right now because of the law is still doing something creative. Remember—I have friends who are fan writers. They do fan stories for a while, but when they get good enough, they “adapt” these stories to make them original. Several of my friends or acquaintences have done this their Star Wars fan stories. Their books are for sale on Amazon. They aren’t hibernating or in the woodwork. I can’t imagine that any decent author would be, even if they can’t officially sell their fan stories.

I don’t believe for a second that anyone with a genuine talent would just up and not do any writing (or art, or whatever) just because their first choice of subject matter is “off limits” to them. If they have any bit of ability, they’ll make it “theirs.”

If they’re any good at all, they’ll be able to do what my “Star Wars” fan writer friends have done. If their only talent lies in mixing up other people’s work and making something interesting out of it—I guess they’re shit out of luck. But I don’t think there are all that many people that are quite that pathetic that they would literally be unable to do anything without ripping off someone else’s work.

I think such people would be in the vast, vast, vast minority.

That’s your perspective. I don’t think it’s “selfish” to want to protect my hard work and the product of my sweat and effort.

Bullshit. You seem to want to ignore what a creative work is. It’s often a manifestation of a person’s heart and soul, hard work, etc. Not only will allowing anyone to “give away” the work severely hamper the profits that the creator gets for that work, (and don’t try to tell me that the profits wouldn’t be hurt if anyone could get it for free) but allowing the work to be “bastardized” by anyone would also prompt many an artist from witholding the work in the first place.

You ignore the fact that someone created something with certain stipulations or limits in mind. Just because you don’t have those stipulations, and you personally wouldn’t mind, it doesn’t mean that anyone else who would mind is out of line. They created their work with different elements in play than you did.

Well, bully for you. But a lot of people don’t feel the way you do about their work.

Perhaps because you personally can’t fathom the “emotional investment” some people have put into their work?

I have a drawing that is quite simple. A pen-and-ink drawing of a man holding a cat. Nothing too extraordinary.

However, the “back story” behind this drawing is extraordinary—to me. It’s a drawing I did of my dad, to be put on the program book that was handed out at his memorial service. I still don’t know how I managed to draw that thing, the day after his death, and get it to look like him. I don’t know how I managed to draw a straight line that day, actually. But I remember how it felt drawing it, and that drawing has special meaning to me.

But hey! It’s just some damned ink drawing of a man holding a cat! It’s in ink, which means it’s extra easy to reproduce (line work is cheap and easy to print). Surely someone who got a copy of that memorial service program book still has it, and hey! Why can’t they just print that ink drawing out for their cat food ad? Or put some goofy caption under it? Why the hell should I care?

But I would care, and if I thought that the law would allow someone else to do that to my drawing, I sure as hell would have never let anyone else see it. It would have been for family only. It would have upset me (and my entire family) more than I can fathom to see my dad’s drawing, that has so many memories, to be on some damned cat food ad, or adapted and made into some “joke” cartoon.

So not that I really know if you’ll understand how this feels in your own work, but don’t presume to understand how I would feel. Don’t speak for everyone else here.

I don’t think that there’s anything selfish about me not wanting my dad’s memorial service drawing to be made into an ad, or a joke, or whatever. And if you think that I am “selfish,” then all I can say is that you haven’t got the remotest clue of what I am talking about. I’d have to assume that you’ve never even remotely gone through anything similar yourself, with your own work. Therefore, I’d have to conclude that you are talking out or your ass on this particular subject.

342

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Your knowledge of copyright law would appear to be minimal. Either the hobbyist in question is producing something original (in which case copyright will not bother them), or they are not, in which case the copyright holder may prevent them from leeching off their work, which is only right and proper.

**

What a load of shit. The only rights that copyright gives the copyright holder are rights in relation to the commercial profits from the copyright holder’s own original work. And why the hell shouldn’t the copyright holder have those rights? It’s their goddamn work!

Pretending that this amounts to censorship is purest whining self serving crap. If it’s not your work, if it belongs to someone else, you have no rights in relation to it. If it is your original work, if it is your thoughts, then no one else could possibly hold copyright and you can do whatever the hell you want with it? Where is the censorship, you pillock?

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Agreed. But since copyright doesn’t give anything more than what you are not opposed to, what is your point? Other than showing off your own ignorance?

Do you have any experience or knowledge of commercial matters at all? What a stupid burke. If you earn a living out of running a bus line between A and B, but a million people hitch a ride on your car at no direct cost to you or them between A and B, what do you think the effect on sales of bus tickets?

Twat.

343

Holy crap, Blalron, could you actually be this much of an ass? Out of curiosity, precisely what sort of things qualify under this vision of the world? My father, for example, is a chemist. Every day, he (and those with whom he works) spends his time combining and reconfiguring molecules to create new molecules; every once in a while, one of these new molecules turns out to be spectacularly useful, curing or alleviating the symptoms of a heretofore unmanagable disease.

Now, my father really likes his job. He enjoys it. In its own way, he considers it an artistic endeavor. The product of his labor contributes to the welfare of others. And - get this - he expects to be paid for it. Because it’s his freaking job. And because if he didn’t get paid for it, he’d still have to eat, so he’d have to stop being a chemist and take on a job that would pay him, so that he could eat. So is my father a whore?

Me? I’m a professional writer. I write - which I enjoy - and get paid for doing it. If I didn’t get paid, I wouldn’t write (at least not as much, or with as much dedication), because - see if you can wrap your mind around this - I would still have to eat. And pay rent. And buy gas for my car. So all the time I spend writing in this version of the world, I would be forced to spend doing something that paid in your version of the world. Net effect? One fewer writer.

How can you possibly fail to understand this? It’s so obvious that I’m embarassed I’m writing this much about it. If you want someone to spend the amount of time and effort required to create high quality art (or any high quality product), you have to reimburse them for that time and effort.

Put more simply, were Blalron’s rule of unpaid artists to go into effect, we’d have no plays by Shakespeare, no films by Orson Welles, no onstage performances by Maria Callas, no novels by Toni Morrison, and no sculpture by Auguste Rodin. But we’d have plenty of leeches (and thank you, yosimitebabe, for the perfect word) creating mediocre derivative art in their spare time, never devoting any real effort to the work because they have to freaking get money from somewhere.

  • FCF
344

In the ideal world, everybody would make enough money to afford the music they want. For that matter, everybody would have a job which is more than I can say for the present state of affairs.

In the ideal world, artists would receive profits from their work. All if not most of the profits; it would be really hepful if somebody figured out a way to get rid of the middleman. And it wouldn’t be necessary to buy a whole album if all you want is one song.

But in real life, the RIAA is screwing over the artists. I hear so many Dopers saying that the leeches are bad people and should be stopped. Maybe so. But whether or not music is being illegally shared doesn’t change the fact that so many artists aren’t being adequately compensated for their work.

In any situation that is illegal or quasi-legal, the usual approach for many people and for all large businesses is to do what they will until somebody tells them to stop it. That’s what the file sharing users are doing, and so far 261+ lawsuits haven’t swayed them all.

345

In principle, I agree. But what gives me the shits is the way the allegation that the RIAA rips of the artists is somehow juxtaposed as if relevant to, or even justification for, ripping off the recording companies.

Every time you download a commercially sold track instead of buying it, the recording company gets less money, and that is simply less money in the pot for the artists.

This whole debate is about people loving the convenience of getting music for nothing by ripping artists and record companies off, then thinking of ways to delude themselves that what they are doing is not what they are doing so they don’t feel so bad about it.

346

Perhaps not, but it might let them release what they’ve already done. Who’s to say they aren’t already making their own mixes and sampled songs, in their basement, without any way to legally release them?

I can’t tell whether you’ve just slandered every DJ and fan fiction author or not. Very few artists are literally unable to do anything else… they could always flip burgers or dig ditches.

Well, I don’t think it’s “selfish” to want to be able to share any information I want, or include any information I want in my own works, regardless of whether or not I’m the first person to come up with said information. I guess that makes us even.

Then those people aren’t prepared to live in the real world. Not everyone is going to respect your work, no matter how much a “manifestation of a person’s heart and soul” you may think it is. If you put a sculpture in a park, someone might spit on it. Anyone who would be scared out of creating by such a possibility should find another job.

They also created it with the knowledge that people can and do infringe copyrights all the time.

Why should their emotional investment have an impact on what I’m allowed to say or write?

You think it’s “right and proper”. I personally think that electronic dance music, turntablism, and fan fiction are artistic and interesting, that the world would be a poorer place if they ceased to exist, and that a copyright holder’s “emotional investment” should have nothing to do with whether a DJ is allowed to include his song in a mix, or whether an author is allowed to include his character in a story.

Oh really? I didn’t think Australia’s copyright law was that different from our own.

Here in the United States, copyright is about the right to distribute copies, not just the right to profit from them. Noncommercial copying is illegal just like commercial copying: It would be illegal for me to rent a DVD and copy it for my own use, or to copy a CD and give it to my friend, even though I’m not making a dime from it.

The censorship is that I can’t say, write, or play certain sequences of words or notes simply because someone else has already said, written, or played them before.

I’m not claiming to have any “rights” in relation to those words or notes, any more than I do to any other words or notes - I’m taking issue with the very notion that one needs “rights” in order to say, write, or play them at all.

(We’re still talking about moral rights, correct? I’m aware that you need legal rights if you want to stay within the law.)

If copyright didn’t give anything more than what I’m not opposed to, then I wouldn’t be here posting, now would I? When noncommercial copying is legal, then I will be satisfied.

Oh, I’m running a bus line now? Someone must have left that out of the analogy. I thought it was about people using my property against my wishes, at no cost or inconvenience to me.

Why would I try to make money from a selling tickets on a bus line, when it doesn’t cost me anything to drive a million people around? Why would I think anyone would consider paying me for something they know doesn’t cost me a thing (once I’ve already bought my bus), since apparently I have no way to know when someone gets on or off the bus?

But hey, let’s say it’s a bus line now. Here’s what would happen: King A and King B decide that a bus line running between the two kingdoms would benefit both of them, bringing tourism and commerce from one kingdom to the other.

King A and King B pool their money to buy a bus which will provide service between the two points. Remember, this is an “intellectual” bus which can carry an infinite number of people, and has exactly the same cost in time and money to carry one person as to carry a million. The bus operator can’t even tell how many people are on the bus or when someone has boarded. (Other intellectual bus lines have tried various methods of “boarding protection”, but none of them are entirely effective, many of them have been defeated entirely, and they’re all inconvenient and uncomfortable for the passengers.)

They abandon the idea of charging bus fare, since they have no marginal costs to cover, and it’s difficult or impossible to keep people from boarding the bus. Instead, to cover the price of the bus, they raise prices on the goods sold in their kingdoms, charge advertisers to put their ads inside the bus, and rent the bus out as a charter on the slow days. The bus attracts more tourists and consumers to the two kingdoms; it soon pays for itself many times over, and the kings buy some new elephants and jeweled scepters.

Now, if I can translate that back to copyright:

Band A and investors B pool money to record an album. They abandon the idea of charging for access to the songs, since they have no marginal costs to cover (other than the cost of media), and it’s difficult or impossible to keep people from copying the album. Instead, to cover the cost of recording, they sell concert tickets and merchandise, sell the use of their music to advertisers and commercial users, and write commissioned songs for other commercial users. The free music attracts more fans to the band; it soon pays for itself many times over in ticket sales, merchandise sales, and advertising revenue.

Now that’s a knife!

Every time you buy a DVD instead of a CD, the recording company gets less money.

Every time you choose not to buy a CD because you read a bad review, or you listened to the first track at the store and didn’t like it, or you already got it as a gift, or because you’re sick of the song being overplayed on the radio, the recording company gets less money.

If you break a CD, but luckily you thought ahead and made a backup when you bought it, the recording company gets less money because you don’t have to buy another copy.

The mere fact that the recording company doesn’t get your money doesn’t mean you’ve done anything immoral. The only possibly morally questionable aspect of downloading music is that you’re enjoying something without the creator’s permission.

Ah yes, because no one could ever disagree with you unless they were deluded!

347

“Perhaps” again.

A lot of people take their “fan” work and adapt it to be non-fan work. They’re doing it now. The work is getting out there. If they have any ability at all, any fan writing they do can be altered enough to not violate copyright. Like I’ve said, I have friends who have already done it. They are published authors. They took their fan manuscripts, re-wrote them, and got published.

So they are too untalented and pathetic to come up with anything viable to release that does not violate copyright?

Don’t believe it.

Are you being deliberately obtuse? Of course all these people can hold down other jobs. Artists do it all the time. I’m not talking about that, and have never been talking about that.

My point is this: Most artists or creative people of any stripe, if they are worth their salt, can and do find a way to express their creativity without violating someone else’s copyright. If they literally cannot find a way to express their talents without having to simultaniously leech from someone else, then that’s kind of sad. And I daresay, their “talent” is probably of a mediocre, lukewarm type anyway.

Obviously not getting it still, I see.

Your “selfishness” comes into play when you want to leech off of someone else’s effort, without their permission and against their expressed will.

But apparently, you’re never going to get that.

If they don’t “respect” it, that’s fine. They can leave it alone, not buy it, not have anything to do with it. But if they do want it, and want to consume it, by damned, they’d better want to compensate the creator of the work for his efforts.

All artists are very well acquainted with the lack of “respect” known as apathy, thank you. But that’s not what I’m talking about, and you’re trying to skirt the issue.

Sculptors know this up front. It comes with the territory. They create their sculpture to withstand spit or pigeon droppings (if it’s an outdoor sculpture). Just like I create pottery that can withstand the dishwasher.

But when I put my dad’s drawing on his memorial service booklet, it wasn’t in my mind or my intention that the drawing end up as a joke illustration, or a cat food ad. If I knew up front that this were a possibility, I’d never have released the drawing to the public. And I daresay that A LOT of artists would feel similarly, whether or not you are acquainted with such feelings yourself or not.

See, you say this because you don’t understand. You’ve never indicated that you understand. But you still want to dictate how people who do understand should have their work treated. And you obviously figure—if they don’t feel the way you do, well, they should be shit out of luck and shouldn’t be in the business of creating in the first place. Or, perhaps you just figure that if you don’t “get it,” then it doesn’t really exist, or the people who do feel this way are making it up or just not entitled to their feelings.

The thing is, people who feel the way you do (that creative works should be “shared” without many restrictions) can still share their work. No one is stopping them. And that’s dandy. The people who don’t want to give away their work for free are not forcing you to not give it away for free.

But you want to make it so that they will have no power over their work, and so they will be “forced” to give it away if they let it be seen by the public.

And regardless of whether or not you personally can grasp this, a lot of artists would not like this, and would be more reluctant to release their work to the public if what you want were to come to pass.

And you drive a car knowing that people steal cars all the time. So I guess you’d better not be upset when someone tries to steal your car. And certainly there’s no need for any laws to be passed assuring you that you are legally entitled to own your car.

Good grief. Completely, totally not getting it, are you?

Your “rights” do not automatically trump theirs. And after all, you have invested nothing, NOTHING into the creation of THEIR work. They did. Their work. Their years (possibly) of study and education. Their investment of time and effort, and their “emotional investment.” But that means nothing to you, because you think that the leeches out there should have their freebies, or should be able to shit on the hard work and emotional investment of the artists?

No. Not buying it.

Also, your “rights” (to possibly shit on someone else’s work, or to give it away, and therefore dilute any profits the original creator could make on it) really impact on the original creator. If you are freely allowed to exercise your rights, they (the people who are actually working on the things you want to consume) are either not going to be able to afford to keep working on the stuff you want to consume, or they will be so disgusted with people shitting on it, they will no longer release it to the public.

Look—I get it that you apparently cannot fathom this whole “emotional investment” deal with creative works. You. Just. Don’t. Get. It.

Fine. But the truth is, a lot of people do feel an “emotional investment” for their work, and just because (for whatever reason) you are incapable (apparently) of getting it, it doesn’t mean that they are “selfish,” or somehow “unfit” to be doing creative works because they are too “sensitive.” If you want such “sensitive” folks to stop releasing their works to the public, fine. What you are hoping for would certainly help that to happen.

348

Well, considering that you don’t have any solid evidence for your side either, I think “perhaps” will have to do.

Sure, they could write something else instead of what they really want to write. I just don’t think they should have to.

Ah, so you are slandering every DJ. Good job.

You want to censor people to make a buck, I want to enjoy works despite the artist’s wishes. Either we’re both selfish, or neither of us are.

Under a copyright law that only gave you a monopoly on commercial use, it wouldn’t end up as a cat food ad.

Their feelings don’t trump anyone else’s right to free speech.

You think I should be prevented from saying, writing, or painting something just because it might upset someone else who wrote it first? What’s next, banning offensive language because people get upset when they hear swearing?

Oh, they’re entitled to their feelings. They can have all the feelings they want. There is, however, more to life than protecting each other’s precious feelings, and there’s more to deciding whether an action is moral than how someone will feel about it.

Now who’s being deliberately obtuse? You ought to know the differences between physical property and intellectual property by now. If someone could “steal” my car without actually damaging it or depriving me of it, then you’re right, there would be no need for laws against that kind of “stealing”.

Right on, sister. You hit the nail on the head this time: It’s all about getting a free lunch and shitting on artists. Hell, I ate three baby artists for breakfast this morning, marinated in their own paint!

All that stuff about freedom of expression and the importance of the public domain? Don’t worry your pretty little head about that, it’s just something the mean old artist-haters made up to justify their war on artists’ feelings. Just keep telling yourself “They’re nothing but a bunch of freeloading thieves”, and everything will be so much simpler.

349

What Yosemitebabe said (great post by the way) plus:

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You need to read a basic text on copyright. You have a contradictory stance. You seem to believe there are works that at one and the same time:

1/ are distinctive and original enough that the first author can claim copyright in them, but which

2/ at the same time are so general and undistinctive that it infringes upon the expressiveness of another person to be prevented from using the same work.

This is a contradiction in terms.

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I think it would be interesting for me and others if I was to be allowed to steal stuff from a hardware store and build things with it. So therefore I should be allowed to do it.

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What you either fail to grasp (or are steadfastly and obtusely refusing to grasp) is that giving away free copies of something potentially damages sales. Hardly anyone who has been given something or made an illegal copy of something is going to buy it as well.

**

Bollocks. You just can’t do it for commercial gain. You actually think that if you sit down at your piano at home and start playing a tune you heard on the radio you’re going to get hit with a copyright suit? Feh.

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Bwahaha. That sure is a neat argument. Perfect. You can use that one to win every single argument you ever get into. “If I was wrong about what I am saying, I wouldn’t say it. Therefore, I’m right”. Brilliant. Must remember that one for next time I’m in court: “Your honour, my client’s case is a winner, otherwise, why would he be litigating. QED.”

Drip.

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When you grasp the effect of noncommercial copying on commercial sales, I will be satisfied. I’m not holding my breath though.

**

Yep, you sure did. Very deliberately I’ll warrant. That’s why your argument was so dumbass. You don’t want to have to face the fact that artists are or are attempting to earn a living out of what they do. So you avoid in your analogy any reference to any form of commerciality. I, however, am trying to impress upon you the effect of leeching the work of professional musicians, which is why I deliberately introduced into your inadequate analogy a bus line to represent the commercial aspect of the topic under discussion.

**

Because you are trying to earn a living so as to be able to pay for food shelter and accommodation. Or are you some sort of independantly wealthy prat or little rich kid whose daddy pays for everything, and who shits on and cares nothing for those who have to have money to put food on the table?

[My Emphasis]

This is a classic example of the type self serving shit that passes for reasoning by those that adopt your position. Get this and get this good:

My choice to adopt a business model that people such as Blalron and Mr2001 consider to be old fashioned and/or ultimately unprofitable does not mean that I am no longer entitled to the protection of basic property law

The kings in your example decide to adopt a certain business model, deliberately and of their own free will abandon an alternative business model. Great. Fine. Their choice. But this debate is about the other kings who decide they are going to try the more conventional model of attempting to charge for riding on their bus. They may, according to you, be losers. They may, according to you, be headed for bankruptcy. That is none of your business, and does not excuse you from trampling all over their rights and wishes by riding on their bus without paying the fare when you know that is what they want. It’s their bus.

Or to put it in Blalron’s terms: your two kings are like a couple of courtesans who decide they are going to have sex with anyone who wants it, and the end result is that they end up wealthy and with lots of powerful lovers. Fine.

But if a couple of other women decide, against your advice, that they are going to become more conventional whores, who charge for each sex act, and who as a result end up poor why the fucking hell do you believe that entitles you and your friends to rape them?.

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Every time you choose not to buy a stereo system because you read a bad review, or you listened to the stereo system at the store and didn’t like it, or you already got it as a gift, or because you’re sick of the advertisements for the stereo system being overplayed on the radio, the stereo system company gets less money.

So therefore, according to you, if I steal a stereo system retailing for $100, but send the stereo system company the cost price of $50, that’s OK. The mere fact that the stereo system company gets no profit because you stole something is not immoral.

According to you and your twisted logic.

I don’t accuse everyone who disagrees with me of being deluded. Only those who show signs of having an ability to reason, but who pervert that to an extraordinary degree to support what they so desperately want to believe.

350

Thanks, Princhester!

I do find it amazingly hard to swallow that a bunch of people that previously did not do anything creative would all of a sudden start producing creative works. You think they would? “Perhaps” bull.

Hey, they can write it all they want. Fan writers are doing it right now. They just can’t make a profit from it and they can’t have it legally protected the same way that original works are protected.

But they can still do it.

I didn’t think DJs went around claiming they were great artists. :shrug: And after all, you “slander” artists by calling them “selfish” because they merely want to keep rights to their own work.

So I’ll “slander” right back atcha.

Princhester already touched upon this—no one is “censoring” you from copying or performing the work in your own home. You or anyone else can “express” yourself in any way you want, you just can’t make a profit off of it, or freely distribute it (unless, as in the case of a lot of fan works, the copyright holder doesn’t mind as long as no profit is made). Because, bottom line (and something you continually refuse to acknowledge), the one who did the actual work DID IT. All you want to do is leech off of it.

:rolleyes: Big whoop. It could still be put on some “joke” publication, published in some way that was offensive or repulsive to me and my family.

You are trying to spin this into a “free speech” issue this time. Cute.

The fan artists and writers aren’t being prevented from doing their work. You just won’t see their work for sale on Amazon.com.

In art classes, it was pretty normal to copy photographs out of magazines or to copy paintings out of “how to” art books. That was fine, because these student paintings were never going to be published or sold as prints.

And you are missing one important detail here: These people with the “feelings” that you apparently can’t comprehend, these people will withhold their works to the public if they know anyone can shit on them.

That’s what will happen in a lot of cases.

So what will you have to say about that? Will you piss and moan about how “selfish” they are because they won’t freely distribute the work that you want to admire and enjoy? Will this be a good thing that you want to see happen? Is this the best thing for society—for a lot of people to decide that it’s just “not worth it” to distribute their work? Oh, they might still create it, but there’s not much incentive to distribute it, is there? Just so that a bunch of leeches can shit on it?

No, I did not miss the point AT ALL.

Just because someone knows that people out there may do things that they don’t want to happen, or don’t like (i.e. stealing a car, “shitting” on original artwork, violating copyright) it doesn’t mean that the person should just say, “Oh well! I guess since I know beforehand that people can and do [steal cars / “shit” on artwork / violate copyright] then I won’t kick up a fuss when it happens to me. And I won’t expect that the law will protect my rights. Since I knew beforehand that it could happen, I guess I’ll just suck it up and accept it when it happens to me.”

That was what you were essentially saying when you wrote:

“They created it with THE KNOWLEDGE that people CAN AND DO violate copyright all the time.”

Oh, so since people “violate copyright all the time,” I guess anyone who bitches about leeches who violate copyright is out of line, huh? And if, God Forbid, there were no laws protecting an artists’ work from the leeches, why should an artist want to release it to the public anyway?

If stealing cars had no legal penalty, don’t you think more people would be riding buses and trains? Would as many people want to invest money in cars if the cars could be easily taken away by anyone, anywhere? Would such a person be “unprepared for the real world” because they decided they’d rather take the bus instead?

(And yes, once again, I know that a car is a physical thing that can be taken away, while artwork can be copied. But, as I know you don’t comprehend, some people don’t want their artwork SHIT on. That would be “taking away” something from their artwork, to them. Also, some artists release artwork in order to make money. If they know ahead of time that the artwork can be legally distributed freely and therefore not much profit will be made, they have no incentive to distribute it, do they?)

Well, it sure as hell can be. And will be, some of the time.

Please. So melodramatic.

Public domain is important, and should be preserved. But to only allow an artist a few scant years to have control over the work THEY CREATED will severely inhibit artists’ willingness to “share.”

Well, you make it so much easier to get that impression, the way that you talk sometimes.

351

You need to pay better attention: I don’t care how distinctive or original it is. My expressiveness is infringed if I can’t write a certain sequence of words, play a certain sequence of notes, or send a certain number over the internet, regardless of how original or distinctive it may be, simply because someone else has already done it before.

Now, there are times when curbing one’s expressiveness is justified–when such expression is an incitement to violence, for example–but protecting an author’s supposed right to make a buck is not one of those times.

When you figure out a way to steal things from a hardware store without damaging the store or depriving the store owner of any of the things you stole, be sure to let us know… after you collect James Randi’s million dollar prize, of course.

If this were GD, I’d ask for a cite for that last statement, since there’s no evidence of file sharing harming record sales. Since this is the Pit, I’ll just point out that you’re talking out your ass.

There are plenty of things that potentially damage sales - bad reviews, overplayed singles on the radio, free listening stations at the record store, or plain crappy albums. Damaging potential sales is not a sin.

Depends who’s in attendance and how much they care about enforcing their copyright. Chances are I’m not going to “get hit with a copyright suit” for copying CDs for my friends, or even for sharing music on Kazaa, but that doesn’t mean those actions don’t violate copyright.

You are aware that people who share music on Kazaa aren’t doing it for commercial gain, aren’t you? They don’t get a check from Saddam Hussein every time they upload or download a song. It’s noncommercial copying and it’s still illegal.

When there’s evidence, maybe there will be something to grasp. I’m not holding my breath for that either.

Are we talking about legality or morality here? I’m well aware that copyright infringement is illegal, and that you’re “entitled” to certain “protection” under the law. Really, we all are. That’s GQ territory.

“Basic property law”, morally speaking, applies to real property. You know, the kind that can only be in one place at a time. It makes intuitive sense to protect real property because if I steal your car, you don’t have a car anymore.

That’s a noble attempt to put words in my mouth, but you forgot one major detail: If you steal a stereo, the person you stole it from no longer has a stereo. I’ve never condoned actual theft, so if you want to keep writing “The World According to Mr2001”, you’d better brush up on my positions first.

They can’t distribute their work either. I’m sure a confident artist like yourself would have no problem spending her life writing stories that only she could read, but alas, some authors crave an audience.

Man, what a shame. It’s almost as bad as racist groups being allowed to march and offend families in the neighborhood. Good thing that’s illegal here in the feel-good U.S. of A., right? Oh wait… I guess it’s still OK to do things that are offensive and repulsive to others. They’re adults, they can take care of their own feelings.

Or anywhere at all. Hey, it’s still free expression though, right? You just have to keep it inside a little “free speech zone” in your own studio, and never give it to anyone.

I won’t shed a single tear; art isn’t going to go away. I have no problem with an artist choosing not to share his works, only with an artist telling me what I can or can’t share myself.

If it means that society can now freely use all the work that is distributed, then yes. It’s a trade-off, but I believe society’s freedom is more important than the availability of works made by people who will only create if they can charge for access to their works.

Of course not. My point, however, is that they can’t expect copyright to be upheld by everyone, and if they’d be devastated by someone illegally using their work, then they should find another job.

I know that stealing cars is illegal, but I also know that some people steal cars anyway. So I lock my doors, pay for full coverage insurance, and don’t keep valuables in my car. If I were to leave my car in a dark alley, unlocked and uninsured, with a priceless heirloom inside, and someone stole it, I’d be well within my rights to complain - but I’d still be an idiot because I set myself up for that tragedy.

An artist who distributes something that would devastate her if it were “shat upon”, and is then devastated when someone uses it as a joke or a cat food ad, is well within her rights to complain - but she’s still an idiot because she set herself up for that tragedy.

Oh shit, are you serious? Some artists don’t like it when people use their work without permission? I did not comprehend that! The scales are lifted from my eyes.

No. Sorry, but “taking something away” has a definition besides what an artist thinks it should mean. I could claim that I’ve lost something when the corner store closes, but that doesn’t mean I have a right to force the corner store to stay open. An artist could claim she’s lost something when I make a copy of her portrait with a moustache on it and hang it on my front door, but that doesn’t mean she has the (moral) right to force me not to draw moustaches on copies of her pictures or hang them on my door.

Only a few scant years, what a shame. God forbid someone who sees a work released should still be alive when it enters the public domain! He might actually want to use it for something, instead of letting it rot away in an archive or museum.

Look, it’s true that some artists will be enticed to create by the promise of centuries of control over their works. That doesn’t mean it’s a good thing to have copyrights lasting forever, or giving complete control over every possible use of the work, though. At some point you have to say “Screw it, I don’t need your works that much. You can have X years of control over uses A, B, and C, and if that’s not enough, I hear McDonald’s is hiring.”

What exactly do you think the public domain is going to be good for if there’s nothing in it?

I have a theory. You realize that nearly all art has a useful life, after which no one is going to care much whether or not they can use it, copy it, draw moustaches on it, or use it to sell cat food. After its useful life is over, it’s either too dated to be relevant to anyone but a historian, or in some cases it can’t be used at all. (When was the last time you listened to an Edison cylinder? Who will even know what a PlayStation, a DVD player, or a CD player are in the year 2100?)

You can’t stand the thought of someone using your ideas in a way you don’t approve of, so you want copyright terms to be long enough that a work will spend its entire useful life under copyright. That way, when it finally falls into the public domain, no one will have an interest in using it, and you’ll be long since dead anyway.

So you clamor on about the importance of long copyright terms, and how you need to pass your cherished rights down on to your children and grandchildren. You give lip service to the importance of the public domain, but only to mask your contempt for it.

If you really think the public domain is important and needs to be preserved, what are you going to do to help?

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But they do distribute their work, and with full knowledge of the copyright holders. One of my friends has a “Star Trek” joke film that he distributes to fans via mail. All he asks is that they send him a tape and pay for postage, and he sends them a copy. He’s been doing this for years. And Paramount, trust me, knows about it.

So to think that no one gets to distribute their fan works is silly. They do it all the time. They just don’t make a profit from it.

And it is totally within their power to have an audience. No one is stopping them from “adapting” their stories and taking out the copyrighted elements. Remember—I’ve had friends who have done just that.

And the way they will do that is to NOT SHOW THEIR ARTWORK TO THE WORLD.

That’s my whole damned point. You think that not many artists would be “offended” enough to stop showing their work to the world, if they knew it would be “shat on”? Think again. Just because such feelings are apparently beyond your comprehension, it does not mean that others don’t feel that strongly.

Oh, perhaps artists would still do work for public consumption, but they’d alter what kind of content they’d be willing to release. They’d “hold back” on the more heartfelt stuff, because that’s the stuff that is most irksome to see “shat on.”

Oh please. What bullshit. If the production of new or quality creative works were to take a big hit (as I am pretty confident that they would) because artists can’t afford to work, and they don’t want to see their hard work shit on, I don’t doubt that you’d sing a different tune. After all, you’ll have a lot less work to “leech” (errr…“share.”)

You mean you want to retroactively revoke people’s copyright? You mean that the person who created something and released it with the understanding that they’d own the rights for that work for Life + 70, you want to just pull the rug from underneath them and change the rules for them after the fact? Really?

“Devastated” os your word. I think that “royally pissed off and not going to allow that to happen again” would be more accurate. One of two extreme examples of peoples’ works being “shit” on, and a lot of artists (and writers, filmmakers, etc.) will decide that the environment for creativity is just too hostile. Screw it.

So how do you translate this to intellectual property? How does someone “protect” their property as vigorously as you do with your car? Only show a few people a painting at a time, and not allow cameras in the room? Never release digital copies of their artwork, music, or writing, and never allow anyone else to possess an original work? How?

Tell me—how would I “set myself up” for someone using my dad’s portrait to be a cat food ad, other than having the audacity to put it on his memorial service booklet? Was that a foolish act, equal in foolishness to leaving all my car doors unlocked and valuables inside?

Please.

I know, I know. You don’t get it.

The intent and meaning they put into that work is diluted and “lost” when the public now associates it with a cat food ad. There may be revenue “lost” when people can get it for free instead of buying it. Oh, but wait—I guess these artists are not “entitled” to expect to get money for their work when others use it.

They are entitled to profit from their work, and yes, sometimes it takes a while for the work to generate attention and get any income. God Forbid a person be allowed to make money off of their work.

I never said it was. I think “fair use” is fine, and Life + 70 (or even Life + 50, or Life + 35) is fine.

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The OP of this thread is a complaint that the RIAA is behaving immorally. Or that’s my understanding of it. Of course unauthorized copying is illegal, the way the law is written. But as for whether it is moral: isn’t it akin to stealing from a thief?

Is it moral to steal from a thief?

But copying music is not stealing, because it does not deprive the owner of a copy. And I’m not saying that copying music is stealing from a thief; I’m saying it’s morally equivalent.

How long do U.S. copyrights last nowadays? Life of author plus 110 years? Has it been extended? None of us will be alive when those copyrights expire. They’re too long. Reason? The movie industry has been persuading the government to extend the duration. It is now so rediculously long it’s not even funny anymore.

Look at classical music, on the other hand. Its authors are long gone and the copyrights long expired. Classical music is in public domain now. And people still listen to it. People still download it without permission. But who’s complaining?

By the way, in the United States, if you came up with something that’s already been copyrighted and you can show that you came up with it independently, then you hold a legal claim to your version. But that doesn’t apply to the OP.

It seems like an ironic piece of fate that filesharing became wildly popular at a time when the recording industry is making an ass out of its collective self. Aside from the legal and moral implications, they’ve screwed people and now they’re getting screwed. They’ll have to adapt or go extinct. Either filesharing will help them or it will hurt them. The proof is in the pudding.

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Nice anecdote. Your friend is lucky that Paramount allows fan fiction… a lot of people haven’t been so lucky. Fox shut down quite a few fan sites a few years back. In any case, Paramount could decide tomorrow that they don’t like fan fiction anymore, and your friend would be screwed.

Ah, so they have a choice: Either write something you don’t really want to write, or don’t have an audience. That’s not much of a choice if you ask me.

What a classy tactic: Ask me a question, and when you don’t like the answer, claim that I really believe the opposite of what I said.

That’s a good question.

It would be most fair to the artists to let them keep the copyright terms that were in place at the time their works were created. That would mean “retroactively” revoking some copyrights - the same ones that were retroactively extended by e.g. the Sonny Bono act.

Interesting side note:

Yes, those are all good ways. If you don’t want someone to repeat your song, don’t let them hear it. If you don’t want someone to repeat your poem, don’t let them read it. Once you distribute an idea, you can’t control it, no matter how much you want to or how many legal rights you have.

Shrug… that “loss” is only in their minds, just like my “loss” when the corner store closes.

Yes, now you’re starting to get it. :wink:

If they can’t make money off their work in a few decades, then they should find another job, or at least a business model that doesn’t depend on exchanging copies of works for money.

What’s the point of the public domain if there’s nothing relevant in it? You claim to agree that it’s important and needs to be preserved, but how are you going to offset the damage caused by century-long copyrights?

I’m glad you don’t think so, though I think life+35 is still way too long. However, as you can see above, the people with power seem to think “forever less one day” is an appropriate goal - and life+70 may as well be forever less one day, because none of us are going to be alive then.

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What the copyright holder is deprived of when thousands or millions of people steal their work, is the chance to sell their work to those people.

Pretending that one is not stealing anything from someone because you don’t steal anything physical but only an opportunity, is a cornerstone of copyright thief mentality. It’s just a shame it’s a cornerstone made out of vacuousness.

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Sorry. I don’t get it. Why are copyright holders thieves? I hear this sort of shit but I just don’t see the basis.

The recording industry has always made an ass out of itself. It’s just that when the internet and peer to peer file sharing provided an opportunity to rip off the industry wholesale, people like you needed some way to kid themselves that what they were doing wasn’t the moral equivalent of theft, so they started coming out with the usual criminal self serving blather: calling the recording industry names so as to somehow pretend that stealing from them is OK.

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**

Let me get this straight: your whole concern is accidental infringement of copyright by artists happening to independantly come up with original work that co-incidentally reproduces other people’s existing work?

Because I could have sworn what you were talking about earlier was deliberate use of other peoples works or significant parts thereof by DJ’s and others.

Which is it?

**

Well perhaps you should think about the example I gave before, which (expanded slightly) is this:

Say I happen to know what the cost price of several items that I need for my home is. I go into the hardware store and steal them without getting caught. But I leave enough cash on the counter to cover the cost price to the hardware of the items.

Moral or immoral?

Bear in mind that if everyone did this, the hardware store owner would obviously go broke, since he would make no money. And yet the theft would not have cost him anything, according to your “logic”, since he could always replace his stock with the money left for him.

Except of course my theft would have cost him something. It is called opportunity cost: the opportunity to sell the items to me at a profit.

But don’t worry yourself about that, that sort of commercial and life reality and the need to make money out of one’s work is beyond your ability to understand. Or at least, it’s beyond what you are willing to understand.

**

You’ve never responded to my bus analogy. Too hard, no doubt. But I take it that you don’t believe that a free bus line would put out of service a fee charging bus line on the same route? I think it is up to you to prove that laughable proposition.

Nice little bait and switch. First you list a number of things that artists and their record companies might accidentally or due to lack of talent might do to themselves to damage their own sales, and then you use that to justify something that someone else does to them.

It’s the rape thing again. “If you’re a whore it’s OK if I rape you”.

**

You are aware that this is a total straw man, aren’t you? Yes it’s non commercial copying. In just the same way my stealing from the hardware store to fit out my house but leaving the cost price on the counter example is non commercial theft. I just want the stuff for myself, and I don’t want to have to pay what the hardware owner is legally and morally entitled to.

**

Both.

And it makes intuitive and intellectual sense that it is immoral to steal someone’s opportunity by taking their intellectual property. It may not suit you to acknowledge that, but I think that is because you enjoy getting free stuff too much to let yourself do so.

Oh, I understand your position alright. All the implications of it. Even the ones you don’t want to admit.

It is interesting to note that you did not respond or acknowledge the bit in my last post where I talk about giving the company you stole from the cost price back. Too hard, no doubt. Wouldn’t suit you. Might highlight the vacuousness of your position.

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I missed this the first time around.

Of course (this being in the Mr2001 moral universe):

The investors make no money out of their concerts because too few of those attending actually paid for their tickets for the investors to make a profit. The rest of the attendees are (unbeknown to the investors) using fake tickets. This of course is not immoral, because the band were going to play anyway, and they haven’t lost anything physically.

They make no money out of merchandising, because pirate merchandisers copy all their designs and undercut their prices because the pirates have spent nothing on designers or advertising campaigns and have less overhead. This is of course moral, because the pirates did not physically take any of the investors’ merchandise.

They fail to sell their music to advertisers and commercial users, because the advertisers and commercial users just download their tunes off the internet and use them. I need hardly set out for you your own arguments as to why this is perfectly moral, and as to why your investors have not lost anything, because nothing has been physically taken from them.

The investors make no money out of commissioned songwriting, because when they send demo tapes, the recipients just copy the demos, say “thanks very much” and send the tapes back. They then use the songs but don’t pay. This is of course perfectly moral according to you because the investors got their tapes back.

So it seems our investors find themselves howling for copyright protection after all. Oops.

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Yeah. And he’s a creative guy—he’d find another way to express himself creatively. Oh wait—he already does.

Sure it is. Because if they write a story, an adventure, a romance, a morality tale, it’ll still be all of those things even if the character’s names are no longer “Captain Kirk” and he isn’t on a Starship “Enterprise.” His name may be “Admiral Sequoia,” and perhaps he’ll have a spaceship called “Challenger,” and perhaps he’ll work for an outfit called “The Space Agency” or whatever, but it’ll be basically the same adventure, romance, or morality tale.

If someone hasn’t enough imagination make those relatively minor adjustments, then they are pretty limited creatively anyway.

So, yes or no—you wouldn’t mind at all if new creative works were limited, the artists “held back,” and in some cases, decided that they couldn’t afford to continue creating stuff? You’d prefer this? Yes, or no?

So what do you see happening? Would the next Disney film that features Mickey Mouse (with the newer, shorter copyright limits in place) mean that Mickey would become Public Domain after a certain amount of years? Because you know what would happen—no new Mickey Mouse cartoons. Just keep recycling the old.

Oh, I see.

So basically, anyone, if they even show their artwork to anyone who may have a camera, they’re “asking for it.” So because intellectual property is not so easy to pin down and “protect” (becase any leech can copy it on the sly without the artist even knowing) then the artist is shit out of luck.

Well, that’s just dandy.

So, if I take my artwork or a photo to the Kinko’s to have a copy made for myself, and the clerk likes it, they can on the sly scan a copy, and then sell it or distribute it, right? Because I was stupid enough to let someone else see it, and I didn’t physically have the work in my hands at all times, I’m just a chump because some leech scans it with the intention of spreading it hither and yon, right?

And when I get my negatives processed at the photo lab—how will that work? Hell, a whole lab full of people see the negatives. They can do a high quality drum scan of my pictures, and have them made into prints, before I even get my pictures back.

And that’s OK with you, I assume, because I was stupid enough to not have my own color film darkroom in my house? And don’t tell me to go digital—the best cameras are still too expensive for me and I prefer the warmth of film emulsion.

So I guess if I have anything processed at a photo lab, I’ve got no reason to complain if the lab starts cranking out high quality prints before I even get my pictures back, huh? And even if I can’t afford a drum scan on each of my negs (I think they are about $50 each) the lab can go ahead and do drum scans of anything they like, and they’ll have far better digital copies of my own negatives than I’ll have.

And what about if I get a painting framed? I have to leave it at the framers usually, so they can prepare it. I have no intention of ever “publishing” it, but hey—the framer saw it, liked it, scanned it, and bam! A jillion prints available for sale of something that I never intended to be released publicly, and I just “asked for it,” right?

And we can see how well this would go with movies too. Just let one print out of their sight, and everyone can copy it, make DVDs of it, have it available for free download on the Internet. Basically, no one can release anything anywhere—hell, they can’t even get their pictures developed—without “asking” to see it made into prints and published hither and yon. Is that what you’re saying?

So how exactly will anyone make money on anything they do, if the minute a copy leaves their sight, a bunch of leeches can descend upon it and copy it? Even if they have no desire to “publish” their work (not all my photos are meant to be “published”) if they get film developed or a painting framed, it’s been “seen” by someone and therefore can be copied and distributed, right?

Yeah, I know you see no difference between a local store and someone’s personal work. And I suppose you don’t care if someone’s religious music were “adapted” to be portray hardcore anti-religious message, (and all the while, the public associated the anti-religious work with the original artist). And if, say, someone makes a movie and gives it a happy ending, but someone else comes along and edits it so that everyone dies (and now the public gets confused about which version “belongs” to which filmmaker, and associates the unpopular “unhappy” ending with the original filmmaker, thus damaging the filmmaker’s reputation with the public), well, that doesn’t matter either.

Because you want what you want, and the hell with the people who actually do the stuff you want. Doesn’t matter that if enough people “shit” on their work, they’ll just stop producing it. ::shrug:: Who cares?

And if they can’t make any money off of it in a few decades, then maybe it’s SHIT and no one will EVER want it. In which case, why are you so eager to wrest this useless, hopeless, worthless, non-money-generating BOMB piece of SHIT away from the original artist? Because if it’s SHIT, then no one will want it, even if it’s in the public domain.

But if it isn’t shit, but instead was a brilliant, insightful work that was either not promoted properly, or was way ahead of its time, then why tell the artist that beause they were unlucky enough to create work that was 20 years ahead of its time that they aren’t “allowed” to make any money off of it?

It’s almost like you want to be a dog in the manger about it— so the artist obviously was a hack who couldn’t do anything with the work, because no one wanted the work and no one appreciated the work. But the artist still values that work (even though he couldn’t even get anyone else to piss on it) and therefore, he wants to keep rights to it. But oh no! You don’t want him to keep rights to it! He’s the only one who wants it but he can’t keep it.

But if instead he’s just ahead of his time, and the work needs some years to “find its audience,” well, tough shit. That’ll teach that artist to stop doing things that are “ahead of their time.” Better to do something pithy and trendy and possibly shallow, rather than “ahead of its time.” So let’s punish artists who are ahead of their time.

So Romeo and Juliet are no longer “relevant”? Beethoven’s 5th Symphony is no longer “relevant”?

Tell you what—why don’t you cherry pick which things need to be put into public domain earlier, so they can be “relevant”? How about video games? Why not just shorten their copyright limits? What about software? Just cherry-pick their copyright limits, if it’s so important to you. Let’s see how that will fly.

But don’t throw all works into one big pile, as if they are identical. Because a lot of works stay “relevant” for a very long time, and some are even ahead of their time. And you want to punish artists for being ahead of their time.

Life + 35 is acceptable. Forever minus one day is absurd.

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Actually, that isn’t what would happen. You are confusing copyright with trademarks.

The only effect of the expiration of Disney copyrights would be older films like Steamboat Willie would fall into the public domain; it means any company could produce a DVD containing that particular film without paying royalties to Disney.

But Mickey Mouse is also a trademark of the Disney corporation. Trademarks are endlessly renewable, and always have been – the Bono extensions only applied to copyright. Disney could continue to enjoin the use of Mickey Mouse on trademark grounds.

Still, even if we ignore the availability of trademark protection, your assertion that “no new Mickey Mouse cartoons” would be produced after copyright lapses on existing MM films is absurd. Certainly any new films would also exist under copyright (however long or short that may be). And if trademark protection wasn’t available, you’d actually have more MM films, because producers other than Disney could try their hand at using the character.

But ignoring all of the above legalities, the point Mr2001 is making here about retroactive extension is a good one. Copyright exists to induce artists to create. For existing works, whatever the term was at the time of creation was clearly sufficient to induce those artists to create – those artists didn’t expect lengthier protections at the time they created their works. Why should those artists gain lengthier protections without having done anything new? **

Riddle me this, batman: why do creative artists get treated better by the IP system than inventors?

Patents last, at most, 20 years from the date of application. That means that some guy laboring in his garage to create the ultimate widget gets at most 20 years to make some dough off of his idea; otherwise, the idea falls into the public domain.

And as important as art is to society, I think patentable items are more valuable. A cure for cancer is more important that Britney Spears; better microchips are more important than the latest boy band. And if you think producing a record is expensive, I assure you that those costs are dwarfed by the expenses involved in bringing a new drug to market.

So why do artists get lifetime protection? Why does James Joyce get longer protections than Thomas Alva Edison? The only reason I can think of is we have this romantic view of the tortured, starving artist.

Oh, but what if an artist is ahead of his time? Well, what if an inventor is ahead of his time? Design patents relate to the cosmetic appearance of an item, and they have a shorter life (14 years) than utility patents. What if your product design doesn’t catch on until 15 years after filing? Too damn bad for you.

Copyright terms are far too long. We should stop coddling artists, and nevermind the boo-hooing over “emotional investment” in their artwork. Inventors are emotionally invested in their work, too, and you don’t see them bitching. Indeed, lifetime protections are actually counterproductive, because a very talented artist can simply stop creating once he has a hit, thus depriving the world of his genius. Who knows what literary works we’d have from J.D. Salinger if he had been unable to rest on his Catcher in the Rye laurels for the past fifty years? Copyright terms should be brought into line with patent terms – twenty years or so, and no more.