Quote:
Originally Posted by Krystian Galaj
The matter would be greatly simplified if the copyright law, and patent law (but not trademarks) was abandoned altogether.
People who aren't entrenched in their beliefs in copyright can find lots of good arguments for economic losses caused by those laws, and lack of proof there's anything to be gained from them, sumarized by much better minds than me in "Against Intellectual Monopoly" book ( available here: http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/genera...ainstfinal.htm , and also at Amazon, should you wish to pay homage to the copyright's golden calf ). |
Yeah, this is stupid. You can find all sorts of support for stupid arguments on the internet; that lends no credibility to the argument whatsoever. And no one - including Levine - can make any sort of reasonable argument about how artists would get paid if they didn't own their copyright. In fact, he basically admits this, but claims that ripping off the artists would be better for the public at large because - paraphrasing - the public wouldn't have to pay the artist.
Look at J.K. Rowlings: her first HP book had a print run of 5,000. After the books became popular, the publisher put out many more copies, she wrote sequels, there were movies, etc.
In the copyright free world, the publisher puts out 5,000 copies (netting her, maybe, $5-10,000). Because the book is popular, anyone can now reproduce it and sell it; the largest amount of money made from HP would likely be from the printer in china who prints out $1 million copies, sells them, and gives the author nothing. This would result in lower book prices, but it is "better" for consumers in the same way that confiscating and redistributing all income over $100,000 per year is "better" for the consumer.
The fact is that there is very little incentive for JKR to produce another HP book. And making a HP movie would be very risky because you could invest years and millions in making a movie, only to see someone else come out with another movie first. The result of this would not be more consumer choice in movies; the result would be no movies from books at all because of the uncertainty and risk.
Not that there isn't room to improve IP law, but arguments for eliminating IP are economically illiterate and morally bankrupt.