Copyright has a chilling effect on book sales...

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by petrucci

One answer that comes to mind is that such shows have to compete with older classics. The rise in reality TV coincided with the increased availability of old TV shows on the net, and on DVD.

If there was such a great demand for old TV shows, the networks would be running old TV shows instead of making new ones. Re-runs have been around for decades, there's absolutely nothing new about it. Independent stations fill up on whatever cheap programming they can get, and old programs can be aired in the middle of the night.

Networks aren't airing reality TV because of any competition from old TV shows. They are airing reality TV because it is cheaper to make then to make, and they still get good ratings. People aren't making reality TV shows because of competition from old episodes of Hogan's Heroes.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by MrsJoseph

Because - and lets be real - do you honestly think that teenagers and 20 somethings are watching Green Acres, Mister Ed or Happy Days? For some strange reason I just can't see it...

In Sweden the network that holds the rights to Fresh Prince runs it in the afternoons every three years. Seems a new generation arrives for that time slot to regurgitate it just on cue.

[MrsJoseph]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

In Sweden the network that holds the rights to Fresh Prince runs it in the afternoons every three years. Seems a new generation arrives for that time slot to regurgitate it just on cue.

lol! That's funny.

I do believe some shows get re-aired simply because there's no real substitute (or is a die-hard favorite).

My favorite of these was Remington Steele. Ahhhh! How I loved that show! It came out when the trend was the rom-com tv shows like Moonlighting (also a fave ). The show aired back and forth for years because...how else was I to get my Pierce Brosnan fix?! Fricking fracking James Bond didn't come out for years after the show went off-air.

[petrucci]

I will attempt to bring this thread back to the realm of books via a short discussion of music, a subject that I am much more familiar than television.

Before the advent of audio recordings, musicians were employed in all sorts of venues, such as hotels, to provide entertainment. Many of these venues replaced live music with recordings. Today a musician has to compete with his peers, and with the recordings of his predecessors.

Live musical performance may be likened somewhat to a bard telling a tale. Books are roughly analogous to recordings. These days an author would be hard pressed to earn a living reading his works to a 'live' audience. When a new book is published it competes with all of the books that are extant. With the advent of the internet, things just don't go away, and tons of old books are readily available. To sell new books, publishers must rely more on advertising.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by MrsJoseph

IMO the reason reality TV shows are being cranked out more often than new TV shows is based in the lack of creativity in Hollywood.

At the risk of getting way ...

I suspect the real draw of reality tv shows (and we know the reason they're being created is because they get watched; advertisers have success with products on them, or they wouldn't be made no matter how cheap they are) is that they're about the only genre that shows middle- and working-class people in something other than a comedy.

We have plenty of cop shows, and cops might arguably be "working class," but the shows aren't about "working stiffs." They focus on cops as authority figures, people with special rights that the rest of us don't have. They're power plays, not shows about how hard it is to make a living or raise kids and still have a social life. Those elements show up as side details, not the main drama.

Shows about working-class families are mostly comedies. (All in the Family. Roseanne. Malcolm in the Middle. ) Shows about people who struggle to make rent and pay bills are comedies. "Reality tv," for all its flaws, doesn't depict "half the company got laid off last week" as a source for jokes.

[QuantumIguana]

So we should burn all the old books just so that new authors don't have to compete with the old books? If your books can't compete with public domain books, then write better books. Build a better mousetrap. No one is guaranteed a competition free marketplace. Plenty of new books sell quite well. There are many musicians making a living. There's still an awful lot of live music out there.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

If your books can't compete with public domain books, then write better books.

In non-fiction, there can be and is progress. But I'd be hard-pressed to see how someone is going to write better books than a whole bunch of nineteenth century novelists.

Fortunately, I don't really see today's novelists competing with Dickens and the Brontes. Sometimes I want to live in the nineteenth century, and sometimes I want to see how the world is going today. I will try to locate better books within an era, but I don't start asking myself, who is better, Richard Russo or Anthony Trollope, and pick a book to read on that basis.

Readers of fantasy books might look at it a little differently. But it's a common observation that most sci fi is really a commentary on the author's own world.

[petrucci]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

So we should burn all the old books just so that new authors don't have to compete with the old books? If your books can't compete with public domain books, then write better books. Build a better mousetrap. No one is guaranteed a competition free marketplace. Plenty of new books sell quite well. There are many musicians making a living. There's still an awful lot of live music out there.

I am certainly not recommending burning old books so that there is less competition. I am pointing out my opinion that the presence of copyright plays an important role in increasing the value of new books.

In terms of producing better books, one of the difficulties is that if the value of a work is driven so low, it is not economical to produce a better work.

On the topic of musicians, although there are many musicians making a living today, there are many fewer than there were one hundred years ago, and back then the population was much smaller.

SteveEisenberg commented that the new books don't really compete with the old ones. To some extent I agree. This is why I mentioned competition spurring the change in genres a few posts back. However, increasingly people are finding old content that is relevant to their lives. This is evident in the popularity of jazz, classic movies, etc. Such content is readily available thanks to the electronic age. The new culture embraces content regardless of age. Books and movies increasingly make reference to old works. Family Guy is a case in point.

[Ninjalawyer]

Originally Posted by petrucci

On the topic of musicians, although there are many musicians making a living today, there are many fewer than there were one hundred years ago, and back then the population was much smaller.

Citation needed. Given the ease with which current technologies allow people to produce music, the increased population of the earth and the fact that the world economy has increased, are you honestly saying that their are fewer people making music today than in 1912? Really? Really?!

Originally Posted by petrucci

SteveEisenberg commented that the new books don't really compete with the old ones. To some extent I agree. This is why I mentioned competition spurring the change in genres a few posts back. However, increasingly people are finding old content that is relevant to their lives. This is evident in the popularity of jazz, classic movies, etc. Such content is readily available thanks to the electronic age. The new culture embraces content regardless of age. Books and movies increasingly make reference to old works. Family Guy is a case in point.

I'm glad old books, and the ideas they contain, aren't being lost like they once were thanks to modern tech. However, I seriously doubt that the popularity and availability of public domain books is affecting sales of new books to any great extent; I suspect people are probably buying more books than ever, most of them new books.

[Ninjalawyer]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

In non-fiction, there can be and is progress. But I'd be hard-pressed to see how someone is going to write better books than a whole bunch of nineteenth century novelists.

Fortunately, I don't really see today's novelists competing with Dickens and the Brontes. Sometimes I want to live in the nineteenth century, and sometimes I want to see how the world is going today. I will try to locate better books within an era, but I don't start asking myself, who is better, Richard Russo or Anthony Trollope, and pick a book to read on that basis.

Your opinion only. The term "better" is entirely subjective. If I consider a book that I can connect with, that has a protagonist in the same circumstances, I'll likely consider a modern book to be "better". Or if I'm looking for a meditation on what it means to be human or what consciousnesses means, I'll likely consider a modern era book like Hyperion to be "better".

I do agree that modern authors can't have the same cultural impact as the likes of Dickens because their ideas and words haven't had the same amount of time to percolate and fester in the public imagination, but who knows what people 200 years hence will consider classics.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

In non-fiction, there can be and is progress. But I'd be hard-pressed to see how someone is going to write better books than a whole bunch of nineteenth century novelists.

Fortunately, I don't really see today's novelists competing with Dickens and the Brontes. Sometimes I want to live in the nineteenth century, and sometimes I want to see how the world is going today. I will try to locate better books within an era, but I don't start asking myself, who is better, Richard Russo or Anthony Trollope, and pick a book to read on that basis.

Readers of fantasy books might look at it a little differently. But it's a common observation that most sci fi is really a commentary on the author's own world.

My point is, if your book isn't selling, it probably isn't because people are choosing a public domain version instead of yours, but that people are choosing some other new book instead of your new book. If we suppressed public domain books, it would result in less readers than in people buying more new books. I'm not saying that you need to write a better book than Dickens.

[MrsJoseph]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

My point is, if your book isn't selling, it probably isn't because people are choosing a public domain version instead of yours, but that people are choosing some other new book instead of your new book. If we suppressed public domain books, it would result in less readers than in people buying more new books. I'm not saying that you need to write a better book than Dickens.

OMG. Thank you.

Cause I'm sure the writers of runaway hits like Twilight, Harry Potter, the Hunger Games, and 50 Shades of Grey are doing pretty well. And I have bought over 100 books so far this year and not a single one was outside of copyright.

And there are BOATLOADS of people making music. Everywhere. Every. Single. Day. And their audience isn't forgoing their work in order to go buy the latest copy of Gershwin. It just so happens that 99% of everything is drivel and isn't going to sell...even if it was free.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by petrucci

I am certainly not recommending burning old books so that there is less competition. I am pointing out my opinion that the presence of copyright plays an important role in increasing the value of new books.

Before e-books came along, if you wanted to read Dickens, you still had to pay. The book might cost a little less because no royalties needed to be paid, but someone still had to print the book. Yet the presence of Dickens on the shelf didn't interfere with new books selling. The intent of copyright isn't to suppress older books to reduce competition to current authors. Not only that, it can't possibly function that way. The books that fall into limbo because of the length of copyright aren't books that would be in high demand. Books that remain in high demand won't fall into limbo, no matter how long the period of copyright is. Take The Great Gatsby, for example. If it had been published a couple years earlier, it would have become public domain. Instead, it is still under copyright. Yet it didn't fall into limbo, copyright didn't take that book out of competition with any new book. It still sells because there is demand for it. It is the books in lesser demand that concern me, those that may sit in limbo forever.

In terms of producing better books, one of the difficulties is that if the value of a work is driven so low, it is not economical to produce a better work.

If that were true, there wouldn't be so many books for sale! Few people think that Twilight is great literature, but people want it. Books aren't fungible goods. They aren't like a bushel of wheat, one book isn't interchangable for another. A book that sells for $10 can still beat out a 99 cent book if the $10 book is the book the reader wants.

On the topic of musicians, although there are many musicians making a living today, there are many fewer than there were one hundred years ago, and back then the population was much smaller.

I'd like to second the request for a source on this. If I want to go out to hear live music, I have no shortage of venues. Even in small towns, bands will play at bars. Even with the availability of recorded music, people still go out to see live music. Sure, there were hotels where they had live musicians instead of piped in music, but that was never an experience most people visiting a hotel would have. Only elite hotels would have had live musicians for their background music.

However, increasingly people are finding old content that is relevant to their lives. This is evident in the popularity of jazz, classic movies, etc. Such content is readily available thanks to the electronic age. The new culture embraces content regardless of age. Books and movies increasingly make reference to old works. Family Guy is a case in point.

Old content is a niche. Classic movies are dwarfed by new movies. Books and movies have ALWAYS made references to older content. When I was growing up in the 70's, the entertainment media of the time made references to material that was decades old. You might have heard a Laurel and Hardy reference, for example. It wasn't meaningful to me then, but older people got the reference. People have always embraced the older content to an extent, but newer content dominates.

[petrucci]

Originally Posted by Ninjalawyer

Citation needed. Given the ease with which current technologies allow people to produce music, the increased population of the earth and the fact that the world economy has increased, are you honestly saying that their are fewer people making music today than in 1912? Really? Really?!

Just to be clear I am claiming that there are fewer people making a living from music today than there were one hundred years ago.

I do not have a citation to support my claim, and I may well be wrong. From my initial search I turned up

http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=127434

The page states that US census bureau statistics show there were 139, 310 musicians and composers in 1910 and 161,000 in 2001.

Regardless of the truth of my claim, there has been a precipitous drop in the percentage of people that are employed as musicians.

[petrucci]

Sorry for the double post, but there are several people to whom I wish to reply.

Originally Posted by MrsJoseph

OMG. Thank you.

Cause I'm sure the writers of runaway hits like Twilight, Harry Potter, the Hunger Games, and 50 Shades of Grey are doing pretty well. And I have bought over 100 books so far this year and not a single one was outside of copyright.

It does not cost anything to 'buy' and e-book that is out of copyright.

Originally Posted by MrsJoseph

And there are BOATLOADS of people making music. Everywhere. Every. Single. Day. And their audience isn't forgoing their work in order to go buy the latest copy of Gershwin. It just so happens that 99% of everything is drivel and isn't going to sell...even if it was free.

There is certainly some truth to Quantum Iguana's statement about a book not selling. There is a lot of schlock out there, and much of it won't sell regardless of copyright. However, there are certainly some people who are choosing out of copyright books over new ones. These people are being lost from the new book market so to speak. This loss hurts authors as there is not as much money to go around.

I agree that many people are making music. However, a much smaller percentage of the population is earning a living from music. And some people are choosing Gershwin over other music.

Editing so that I do not make a triple post.

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

If I want to go out to hear live music, I have no shortage of venues. Even in small towns, bands will play at bars. Even with the availability of recorded music, people still go out to see live music. Sure, there were hotels where they had live musicians instead of piped in music, but that was never an experience most people visiting a hotel would have. Only elite hotels would have had live musicians for their background music.

A much smaller percentage of the population earns a living at music than one hundred years ago. I have found myself having to travel further to go to concerts than in the past. This is caused by venues closing. Many of the bands that play at bars, do not earn a living from music. It is a side job. Live music was certainly not elite in the past. It was everywhere from brothels to department stores.

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Old content is a niche. Classic movies are dwarfed by new movies. Books and movies have ALWAYS made references to older content. When I was growing up in the 70's, the entertainment media of the time made references to material that was decades old. You might have heard a Laurel and Hardy reference, for example. It wasn't meaningful to me then, but older people got the reference. People have always embraced the older content to an extent, but newer content dominates.

Although old content may be niche, it is still a factor. People who consumed old content did not spend their money on new content. This deprives current authors of revenue they would have had if the old content were not chosen.

I suspect that old content will become more and more prevalent in the coming decades. For one, it will not cost anything. Secondly, some of it is really good.