Why public domain

[crich70]

Originally Posted by leebase

The public benefits most when people are incentivized to create works. Works the public then pays for. Because works are paid for, more incentive to create works.

When the public seizes property...there is no incentive to create.

Sure, very few works are valuable....but those are the works people want. People want Mickey Mouse and Star Wars and Harry Potter. They want them because they are valuable.

The original story of Snow White is not why people want to have access to Disney's Snow White. You can ALREADY write new Snow White stories based on the original. But what is valuable is Disney's Snow White and the 7 dwarves with explicit names and the look of Disney's drawings. Why? Because of the business Disney built making the brand, the characters, the story valuable. People spend thousands of dollars to go to Disney theme parks so the kids can meet the characters that the movies and tv shows and cartoons have built up demand.

So of COURSE, people would love to have free access to the value the Disney Corp has spent decades and billions of dollars building up. They want to sell Mickey Mouse hats, and Halloween costumes, etc.

All of this economic good....blessing children generation after generation...providing jobs and powering innovation....

All of this because of the concept of intellectual property.

And like real property...it’s value does not belong to the public.

Ah but when things go out of copyright then people can create new works based on the old ones. So you have a book like Le Morte D'Arthur (written long before copyright laws) and you have other books and later movies based on Arthurian legend. Books and movies you wouldn't have if the book was still considered under a copyright.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by crich70

Ah but when things go out of copyright then people can create new works based on the old ones. So you have a book like Le Morte D'Arthur (written long before copyright laws) and you have other books and later movies based on Arthurian legend. Books and movies you wouldn't have if the book was still considered under a copyright.

And Le Morte d'Arthur was a compilation of older verse romances, whose authors' heirs would have sued Malory and Caxton's codpieces off if they'd had eternal copyright.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by leebase

The public benefits most when people are incentivized to create works. Works the public then pays for. Because works are paid for, more incentive to create works.

When the public seizes property...there is no incentive to create.

Sure, very few works are valuable....but those are the works people want. People want Mickey Mouse and Star Wars and Harry Potter. They want them because they are valuable.

The original story of Snow White is not why people want to have access to Disney's Snow White. You can ALREADY write new Snow White stories based on the original. But what is valuable is Disney's Snow White and the 7 dwarves with explicit names and the look of Disney's drawings. Why? Because of the business Disney built making the brand, the characters, the story valuable. People spend thousands of dollars to go to Disney theme parks so the kids can meet the characters that the movies and tv shows and cartoons have built up demand.

So of COURSE, people would love to have free access to the value the Disney Corp has spent decades and billions of dollars building up. They want to sell Mickey Mouse hats, and Halloween costumes, etc.

All of this economic good....blessing children generation after generation...providing jobs and powering innovation....

All of this because of the concept of intellectual property.

And like real property...it’s value does not belong to the public.

Where this argument falls apart is that through out most of history, copyright did not exist, yet stories were still told and books were still written.

The second fallacy of the argument that infinite copyright is necessary for a writer to want to write a book is that until 1975, copyright in the US was 28 years plus a 28 year renewal. The lack of infinite copyright doesn't seem to have stopped anyone from writing books prior to 1975. When Walt Disney created the cartoon character Mickey Mouse in 1928, he wasn't expecting it to still be generating revenue 100 years later. Expanding the copyright past 28+28 didn't happen until well after he died in 1966.

Of course the whole idea of wealth being past down from generation to generation as you describe rarely works out that way mostly because very few works retain value for long. Old authors are replaced with new authors who re-imagine old stories for new audiences. All one has to do is read stories from one's youth and see how dated they feel to understand this.

You take the exceptions and act like they are the norm. What's more, you take the current state and project it back. Does anyone think that Tolkien wrote LOTR with the expectation that it would bring in hundreds of millions of dollars long after his death? Unlikely, writing was a sideline to his main academic job. Tolkien was already in his 60's when LOTR was published. His earlier work, the Hobbit was very well received and won awards as a children's book when published in 1937, but he certainly didn't quit his day job because of that.

[ekbell]

I can see it now.

Mickey Mouse movies fall out of copyright, some bozo tries to make money off of Mickey Mouse merch....

Disney stomps all over them in defense of their Mickey Mouse trademark.

[leebase]

Throughout history....nobody was making money writing stories....outside of kings and queens sponsoring you.

It is the advent of intellectual property that's given rise to what we have today. And there is FAR more being written than anyone can read. Copyright has been a boon, not a hindrance, to book creation.

Copyright enables corporations to invest many millions into moves and other works because they have a defensible moat that keeps folks from just ripping off their works.

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by leebase

Copyright has been a boon, not a hindrance, to book creation..

You've shown that you understand half of the copyright bargain. Do you know what the other half is?

[leebase]

There doesn’t need to be the other half as there is no scarcity of fiction. Which is why, unlike patents, I see no reason for limits to copyrights.

[barryem]

Originally Posted by leebase

Throughout history....nobody was making money writing stories....outside of kings and queens sponsoring you.

While there have been a lot of examples of this and some time periods where it was usually the case, there have been lots of examples of writers who wrote for the love of it. Plato, for example, and most of the Greek writers. And most of the Roman writers. And many of the British writers. Copyright didn't begin in England till 1710. Shakespeare and Chaucer and Christopher Marlowe and Milton, for example.

Of course if writers today only wrote for the love of it we'd have a lot fewer writers. Writers such as James Patterson and Danielle Steel would find another line of work. OMIGOD!!!

Barry

[barryem]

Originally Posted by leebase

there is no scarcity of fiction. Which is why, unlike patents, I see no reason for limits to copyrights.

Some might think that's exactly the reason.

Barry

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by leebase

There doesn’t need to be the other half as there is no scarcity of fiction. Which is why, unlike patents, I see no reason for limits to copyrights.

Copyright began as a reciprocal bargain. Maybe we should withhold our half until people remember what they agreed to.

[leebase]

Originally Posted by arjaybe

Copyright began as a reciprocal bargain. Maybe we should withhold our half until people remember what they agreed to.

Yes....I agree that history exists. I’m not describing current laws and I’m not describing historical precedent.

I’m advocating that the concept of intellectual property all by itself is a good thing for society.

I see a reason for limits on patents. There is only one chemical composition that is Aspirin. If you are the first to discover it, you get an x year monopoly. Somebody else would have eventually discovered it....it’s science/medicine.

Not so with fiction. There are endless ways to make up stories.

[arjaybe]

Originally Posted by leebase

Yes....I agree that history exists. I’m not describing current laws and I’m not describing historical precedent.

I’m advocating that the concept of intellectual property all by itself is a good thing for society.

I see a reason for limits on patents. There is only one chemical composition that is Aspirin. If you are the first to discover it, you get an x year monopoly. Somebody else would have eventually discovered it....it’s science/medicine.

Not so with fiction. There are endless ways to make up stories.

I agree that the concept of IP is good for society in that it supports its creative members. You're right that patents are different from copyright in that we want their fruits freed as soon as possible, hence the shorter period of protection. Copyrightable works can wait a little longer, but not too much longer, before they repay our support.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by leebase

Yes....I agree that history exists. I’m not describing current laws and I’m not describing historical precedent.

I’m advocating that the concept of intellectual property all by itself is a good thing for society.

I see a reason for limits on patents. There is only one chemical composition that is Aspirin. If you are the first to discover it, you get an x year monopoly. Somebody else would have eventually discovered it....it’s science/medicine.

Not so with fiction. There are endless ways to make up stories.

You keep saying that there are countless ways of making up stories, yet it's not really true. Many stories are effective because of the shared culture referenced in the story. To a great extent, that is what society gets out of public domain. It's not so much that we get free books, it's that other authors can use those books as a foundation for new stories, i.e. derivative works, without worrying about being sued.

But also, you simply don't make any sort of case about why. Why should the bargain be changed? What good will society as a whole get out of eternal copyright? We got plenty of stories in the US before the change over from 28+28 to life plus 70. Copyright is how we make sure artists get paid, but why should artists get paid forever and no one else? You make the assumption, That copyright should be treated as physical property without justifying the assumption. There are plenty of facts that show that copyright is not the same as physical property. Why should it be treated as physical property.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

What good will society as a whole get out of eternal copyright?

And therein lies the problem. Copyright is a flawed proposition. Who says society needs to benefit from the artistic works of others?

We got plenty of stories in the US before the change over from 28+28 to life plus 70. Copyright is how we make sure artists get paid, but why should artists get paid forever and no one else?

Because it's their work, not yours. You have no right to it.

How about granddad's gold pocket watch? He dies and passes it on to his heirs for them to enjoy. Then 70 years after he dies, you're forced to give it to a museum for the rest of society to enjoy. Does that sound fair?

How about confiscating the original paintings of famous painters that are in the hands of private collectors and giving them to museums for the rest of society to enjoy?

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by barryem

While there have been a lot of examples of this and some time periods where it was usually the case, there have been lots of examples of writers who wrote for the love of it. Plato, for example, and most of the Greek writers. And most of the Roman writers. And many of the British writers. Copyright didn't begin in England till 1710. Shakespeare and Chaucer and Christopher Marlowe and Milton, for example.

Shakespeare didn't write for the love of it, it was his job.
He earned his living from putting on plays.