European Green Party policy on copyright

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by emellaich

I don't think you can realistically sanction the non-profit concept of making books available freely. I just about guarantee that this would result in web sites of every book published. For that matter, Google woul do it. An author would sell one copy to google and then it would be downloaded to everyone for free.

That would be commercial piracy, which would remain illegal. They're not saying everything should be free, they're saying that something that a large percentage of the population already engages in should be decriminalised.

[gweeks]

Originally Posted by emellaich

I don't think you can realistically sanction the non-profit concept of making books available freely. I just about guarantee that this would result in web sites of every book published. For that matter, Google woul do it. An author would sell one copy to google and then it would be downloaded to everyone for free.

Google sells adds. That does not qualify as non-commercial.

Greg Weeks

Hmm, nothing new under the sun. Certain points of view always expressed in threads on the subject, the content should be free parts, always reminds me of the whole count-culture ethos of the 1960s to early 1970s. Stuff should be free man. Let's put it to the man.



Of course these people and there less deluded contemporaries matured to become some of the most greedy, acquisitive and selfish bastards to ever walk the face of the Earth.

[emellaich]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

That would be commercial piracy, which would remain illegal. They're not saying everything should be free, they're saying that something that a large percentage of the population already engages in should be decriminalised.

Originally Posted by gweeks

Google sells adds. That does not qualify as non-commercial.

Greg Weeks

But Google is quite willing to do non-commercial things where it boosts overall web traffic. For example, I could see Google putting up a free and ad-free book database. You could go directly to the database and download a book for free. Of course, you can go to the Google search engine and lookup books that are in the free database. This is no different than the way that a google search turns up Wikipedia articles.

For that matter, someone could set up a nonprofit to do this. Nonprofits can't make money but they can take money into cover their costs of operation, as long as they don't take in more than they spend, they are a nonprofit. Interestingly enough, one of the costs of a nonprofit is it's employee salaries, including that of it's CEO. A CEO of a nonprofit is only entitled to reasonable compensation as compared to other CEOs. This means a nonprofit founder can make several hundred thousand per year even in small cities and considerably more in SF or NYC.

Lastly, my guess would be different. I think most people today get their books from legitimate sources. A small fraction of those break DRM for archive purposes and an even smaller fraction download pirated works and/or share pirated works. This is just a guess, as I don't have any facts. However, if sharing was completely legal there would be nothing to stop people from sharing books on Facebook. The file size of a book isn't much different from photos uploaded. Allowing for viral communication one copy of a book can be shared among thousands.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by emellaich

But Google is quite willing to do non-commercial things where it boosts overall web traffic. For example, I could see Google putting up a free and ad-free book database. You could go directly to the database and download a book for free. Of course, you can go to the Google search engine and lookup books that are in the free database. This is no different than the way that a google search turns up Wikipedia articles.

Google has done non commercial stuff in the past. Doing non commercial things for direct profit does not mean they will not profit. There are tax benefits at times, plus it raises their name among potential customers. Plus, for something like an adfree database of free books, other companies would pay Google for the ability to use it. Basically, why reinvent the wheel sort of thing.

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

Hmm, nothing new under the sun. Certain points of view always expressed in threads on the subject, the content should be free parts, always reminds me of the whole count-culture ethos of the 1960s to early 1970s. Stuff should be free man. Let's put it to the man.



Of course these people and there less deluded contemporaries matured to become some of the most greedy, acquisitive and selfish bastards to ever walk the face of the Earth.

we see it in our own government. the old hippies grew up to be millionaires who don't see a freedom that they wouldn't love to squash. they became the language police, the thought police, the "we'll tell you what you can eat" police.

the current ones also front multi-million selling bands who rail on about "the man" while being signed to sony records. (ala rage against the machine, pearl jam, several others). everything should be free maaaan....until i stand to lose a few bucks.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by emellaich

However, if sharing was completely legal there would be nothing to stop people from sharing books on Facebook.

That already happens with music, and would happen with books too if more people read them. It's not as if people ponder the legal status of something like that before they do it.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by taustin

Copyright covers a lot more than just books. Meat Loaf's Bat Out Of Hell album, for instanace, first released in the late 70s, still outsells more new albums released today.

And there are many books that are printed today that don't sell. Some are just bad enough that nobody wants them. But how much money does he still make from those albums?

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

But how much money does he still make from those albums?

Not sure how it is now, but for years, royalties weren't being paid on Bat out of Hell. Just a week or so back, another lawsuit was launched over Sony understating what the royalties should be, and it may cost Sony the right to sell Bat out of Hell. Its been a massive legal issue since its '77 release.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

Not sure how it is now, but for years, royalties weren't being paid on Bat out of Hell. Just a week or so back, another lawsuit was launched over Sony understating what the royalties should be, and it may cost Sony the right to sell Bat out of Hell. Its been a massive legal issue since its '77 release.

So in other words, copyright serves to benefit the corporation, but the artist doesn't get squat.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

So in other words, copyright serves to benefit the corporation, but the artist doesn't get squat.

Part of why movie studios moved to the west coast was to try to dodge Edison attempts at patent enforcement.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

So in other words, copyright serves to benefit the corporation, but the artist doesn't get squat.

Music corporations prey on young musicians and get them to sign away their rights on the promise of fame and riches. Even when they do win the right to have someone else release their records they find that the music corporation owns the physical tapes it is recorded onto and won't release them. That was what happened to Angelic Upstarts with Warner Bros, so the CD re-release of their first 2 albums had to be made from a vinyl source. Here & Now (Planet Gong without Daevid Allen) never did get their rights back from Charley Records, and have never made any money at all from any of the re-releases.

[kartu]

Originally Posted by emellaich

I don't think you can realistically sanction the non-profit concept of making books available freely. I just about guarantee that this would result in web sites of every book published. For that matter, Google woul do it. An author would sell one copy to google and then it would be downloaded to everyone for free.

Agreed.
I think realistic is having shortened copyright protection lasting 1-5 years then making it public domain.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Music corporations prey on young musicians and get them to sign away their rights on the promise of fame and riches. Even when they do win the right to have someone else release their records they find that the music corporation owns the physical tapes it is recorded onto and won't release them. That was what happened to Angelic Upstarts with Warner Bros, so the CD re-release of their first 2 albums had to be made from a vinyl source. Here & Now (Planet Gong without Daevid Allen) never did get their rights back from Charley Records, and have never made any money at all from any of the re-releases.

Yet many defenders of excessive copyright talk about how the evil pirates are "stealing" from the poor starving artists. It's kind of tough for pirates to "steal" money from the artists when the corporations have already stolen it.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by kartu

Agreed.
I think realistic is having shortened copyright protection lasting 1-5 years then making it public domain.

Copyright should last long enough for the average work to have a chance to make a reasonable profit, no longer.

Unfortunately, copyright laws stopped being about "promotion of the arts" a long time ago, and are purely to serve the greed/power interests of the corporations.