Quote:
Originally Posted by bingle
For the good of society, copyright law should be reworked to reflect the lack of scarcity and the unbinding of creative works from physical media.
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Sorry, bingle, but you've hit a hot-button for me, so now you must endure a rant.
The
originals are just as scarce as they ever were -- only
one person can create each original, the fact that
copying and distribution is cheap and easy hasn't changed that.
Very few folks are wealthy enough to do something like writing for free -- if they depend on it for their bread and cheese then they need
some safe-guard on the income (I'm not arguing for any
particular approach, only pointing out the issue). In the absence of such a safe-guard, most will have to find some other way to put food on the table.
The next point is usually something like "true writers
have to write, and will do so regardless." That's generally true. But it's extremely low, petty, greedy, and several other unprintable things, to take advantage of that fact to leave true writers in poverty because we, as a society, refuse to acknowledge that they should have some way to secure a living from their labors, just because it's cheap and easy to rip them off.
If they can't reliably sell what they write, then they
can't afford to write -- and they
can't sell it if the filthy so and so down the way is giving away copies or selling them for pennies. If the impact is severe enough then they'll have to choose to either stop writing, or starve to death, and either way, nothing much gets written.
Okay, end of rant.
I'd agree, however, that copyright law is seriously overdue for a total rebuild from the ground up, and the non-physical nature of modern media needs to be addressed ... among many other issues, but protecting the concept of protecting the creators of them from shameless exploitation, and balancing it against the good of society at large should be heart and soul of that re-build.
It's not in anybody's best interest for work to be unprotected just because it's easy to copy.