02-04-2009, 02:03 PM | #91 |
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Now that we've gone completely off topic, I'd like to add that I can get a package to it's destination more quickly and cheaply with the USPS than I can with the standard UPS or FedEx ground shipping.
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02-05-2009, 05:35 PM | #92 |
Publishers are evil!
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Except that the cost of mailing the package through the USPS is subsidized by taxes where UPS and FedEx are not.
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02-05-2009, 05:50 PM | #93 |
Publishers are evil!
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Why aren't the inventors of all intellectual property given the same benefits? Consider the mathematics and sciences that are invented, published, and taught in colleges. You can copyright the printed material but the 'idea' itself can't be protected. We don't provide Einstein's heirs with royalty checks everytime a school or book mentions relativity. Newton, Leibnitz, Darwin, Godel, Cantor, et. al. don't get squat. In math and science the 'ideas' are made freely available to the public, and only physical property based on these ideas are provided with property protections.
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02-05-2009, 06:20 PM | #94 |
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02-05-2009, 06:29 PM | #95 |
Publishers are evil!
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I stand corrected Alisa. I'd forgotten about that.
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02-05-2009, 06:57 PM | #96 | |
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Quote:
-MJ |
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02-06-2009, 03:34 AM | #97 |
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Since the original point of copyright was to encourage people to produce works for the good of society, arguably, it should be illegal for it to extend the entire life of the author. Think about it - what incentive does, for example, J.K. Rowling have to write another book EVER (not saying she's my favorite, but a good example). She's obscenely wealthy now, and rightly so, because of the success of her books. Did it take 50 years? No. Is she still alive? YES.
Yet, she's not encouraged to produce more work, because she knows that the royalties from her books will carry her on for the rest of her life, and likely most of her children's lives. This is not the point of copyright. We as a society have encouraged her to do exactly what we didn't want her to do. For that matter, one could extend the argument by saying that if you're not currently producing work, you shouldn't be paid beyond say the first 3 years of your book's release (unless you're selling it directly to people a la Steve Jordan). The desire for the residual income waiting for you from the last book could be enough to keep you going. Do we really think that people like Edgar Allan Poe would have been as prolific as they were with copyright the way it is today? |
02-06-2009, 03:52 AM | #98 |
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It's odd that you should mention Poe. As one of the first American authors to attempt to make a living from writing, he really struggled against the pathetic copyright protection that he received at the time, especially the lack of any international copyright protection. He would have been much better served by the current copyright laws than by those that were in force at the time. One might argue that, had he received a decent income from his work, he wouldn't have died at the very early age of 40, and we'd have a lot more from him that we actually do.
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02-06-2009, 04:05 AM | #99 | |
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02-06-2009, 04:50 AM | #100 |
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Scientists and researchers often get paid by universities or research institutes. It would be great if writers could be paid by similar institutions, but where would the money ultimately come from? Taxes?
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02-06-2009, 05:13 AM | #101 |
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Writers, artists, etc, were funded by the state in countries like East Germany, the Soviet Union, etc. In a western nation, though, it would perhaps be difficult to decide who qualified for state funding, how much they should be paid, and so on. Perhaps not, though - it's what (in the UK, at least) we do for top sportsmen and women via government funding, so perhaps the same could be done for creative people too.
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02-06-2009, 08:46 AM | #102 | |
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Pasternak - well he was refused permission to go to get his Nobel and escaped the camps because Stalin liked him and thought him harmless as per their phone conversations musings about the meaning of life Bulgakov? - not published in his lifetime, escaped camp again due to Stalin's patronage Solzhenitsyn - well we all know the story how he got published because Khrushchev liked his work and ordered it allowed and then lived to regret it... All the writers that died shot in the back of the head (Babel, Mandelstam), poisoned (Gorky), in camps (too numerous to count)? |
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02-06-2009, 08:58 AM | #103 | |
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You're absolutely right about the Soviet Union's atrocities towards many "creative" people, of course, but let's not forget what Joe McCarthy was doing in the USA at the same time. The "Cold War" was not one of the proudest moments in the history of either country. |
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02-06-2009, 09:04 AM | #104 |
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Here's an related quote from today's (well in the inside of the paper) Wall Street Journal from the music world....
"Warner Music Post Unexpected Profit" "Warner Music recorded a 23 million dollar profit compared to a 16 million dollar loss the year earlier....Revenues decreased 11%....Recorded music revenue fell 12%, while digital revenue - which now makes up 20% of total revenue - rose 18%....In November, Warner's Atlantic Records became the first major label to have US digital sales outstrip audio CD sales." WSJ Southwest Edition, page B7 Apparently some of the music industry is starting to do what's necessary to survive. If only the book business could learn to think..... |
02-06-2009, 01:37 PM | #105 | |
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Yes- change is needed
Just wondered how many authors replied to this thread?
The following from Z in Paris Quote:
rather covers the conundrum. Disregard of ethics is not the answer, change of system seems more logical. |
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