Why public domain

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

And I've explained why physical property is different. Calling something property doesn't make it actual property any more than calling a steer a bull means he can sire calves.

What makes something actual property are laws.

Copyright isn't property, it's a government granted monopoly. In theory at least, governments pass laws that benefit society as a whole. In the US, copyright is enshrined in the Constitution. However, it's enshrined as a limited time monopoly not as property.

And that's what I'm disputing. It needs to be changed.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

Fortunately they are because someone else than you says so.

Such is life.

Sometimes laws are just and sometimes they aren't; with justness being in the eye of the beholder.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Society protects your right to ownership without demanding that you relinquish control of it after a set amount of time. So why should intellectual property be any different?

If your country has no or minimal estate or net wealth taxes, yes. But if those are significant, you or your descendants will likely wind up having to relinquish valuable property.

In the U.S., there is no wealth tax, and minimal taxation at death, but there are significant property taxes. As a result, every last one of the great 20th century physical estates in my area has been subdivided and/or donated to the public -- usually a bit of both.

Every year my wife and I purchase a popular-price membership that allows us to stroll, sit, and read on this wonderful property, previously owned by people who relinquished control. I know that popular-price isn't free, but several other local estates have become free public parks.

Maybe, if the value of copyrights was included in the base for local property taxes, unless and until donated it to the public domain, I'd be more sympathetic to long copyrights.

[barryem]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

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

That's true but he could have earned a living in a lot of ways. That's how he chose to do it.

Barry

[barryem]

Originally Posted by Philippe D.

This is the same flawed argument whenever comparing intellectual property and physical property.

I think I was the first to use physical property to illustrate my point and I think I made a mistake in the way I did it.

It's reasonable to compare a gold watch to a book. A single book.

It's reasonable to compare the guy who first thought up the original gold watch with a guy who writes a book. Invent something and you get a few years of exclusive rights to it. Write something and you should get the same.

Barry

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by barryem

IIt's reasonable to compare the guy who first thought up the original gold watch with a guy who writes a book. Invent something and you get a few years of exclusive rights to it. Write something and you should get the same.

Exactly.

[doubleshuffle]

Trying to clarify - not least for myself - why I find the idea of eternal copyright so utterly offensive:

I think it would destroy the last bits of the idea of people forming a community, in which ideas are exchanged - for mutual benefit, joy, entertainment, etc. Exchange of ideas means that the reader (I'll stick with this, though it also applies to other media) is potentially also a writer, or, in oral communication, the listener is also a speaker.

So someone who has to say something offers it to others, and is glad if people react to it, taking it up, quoting it, alluding to it, expand on it, and so on. Living in a money-based society, the writer has to make a living, hence copyright, which limits the free exchange of ideas, but is an unavoidable compromise the way the world is right now. Copyright for the writer's lifetime and perhaps even some years on top doesn't completely destroy the idea of exchange.

Eternal copyright, on the other hand, would crush the idea of exchange right under the Mouse's giant steel boot. It is not about writers and their ideas anymore, but about franchises. It only makes sense for corporations that cannot see content as something to communicate about, but as something to consume. The listener who might talk back, the reader who might write back, are reduced to consumers who buy the T-shirt. The only thing they are supposed to write is an Insta post with a selfie in the T-shirt.

Introducing it would turn all creativity into the franchise model, burying the last shreds of the idea that there might be parts of human communication that are not commodities.

[/rant]

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

Trying to clarify - not least for myself - why I find the idea of eternal copyright so utterly offensive:

I think it would destroy the last bits of the idea of people forming a community, in which ideas are exchanged - for mutual benefit, joy, entertainment, etc. Exchange of ideas means that the reader (I'll stick with this, though it also applies to other media) is potentially also a writer, or, in oral communication, the listener is also a speaker.

So someone who has to say something offers it to others, and is glad if people react to it, taking it up, quoting it, alluding to it, expand on it, and so on. Living in a money-based society, the writer has to make a living, hence copyright, which limits the free exchange of ideas, but is an unavoidable compromise the way the world is right now. Copyright for the writer's lifetime and perhaps even some years on top doesn't completely destroy the idea of exchange.

Eternal copyright, on the other hand, would crush the idea of exchange right under the Mouse's giant steel boot. It is not about writers and their ideas anymore, but about franchises. It only makes sense for corporations that cannot see content as something to communicate about, but as something to consume. The listener who might talk back, the reader who might write back, are reduced to consumers who buy the T-shirt. The only thing they are supposed to write is an Insta post with a selfie in the T-shirt.

Introducing it would turn all creativity into the franchise model, burying the last shreds of the idea that there might be parts of human communication that are not commodities.

[/rant]

...we're all doomed

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

What makes something actual property are laws.



And that's what I'm disputing. It needs to be changed.

And you still seem to be unable to formulate any sort of rational argument. There are no laws that state copyright is property, ergo by your argument, it must not be property.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

...we're all doomed

He (or she since one never really knows online) is at least expressing a rational for his opinion and is doing something other than saying "because I said so", then mocking anyone who disagrees. In general, mocking is a sure fire indication that the facts are not on that person's side and thus they are forced to retreat to using rhetorical tricks such as mockery rather than honest debate.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by doubleshuffle

Trying to clarify - not least for myself - why I find the idea of eternal copyright so utterly offensive:

I think it would destroy the last bits of the idea of people forming a community, in which ideas are exchanged - for mutual benefit, joy, entertainment, etc. Exchange of ideas means that the reader (I'll stick with this, though it also applies to other media) is potentially also a writer, or, in oral communication, the listener is also a speaker.

So someone who has to say something offers it to others, and is glad if people react to it, taking it up, quoting it, alluding to it, expand on it, and so on. Living in a money-based society, the writer has to make a living, hence copyright, which limits the free exchange of ideas, but is an unavoidable compromise the way the world is right now. Copyright for the writer's lifetime and perhaps even some years on top doesn't completely destroy the idea of exchange.

Eternal copyright, on the other hand, would crush the idea of exchange right under the Mouse's giant steel boot. It is not about writers and their ideas anymore, but about franchises. It only makes sense for corporations that cannot see content as something to communicate about, but as something to consume. The listener who might talk back, the reader who might write back, are reduced to consumers who buy the T-shirt. The only thing they are supposed to write is an Insta post with a selfie in the T-shirt.

Introducing it would turn all creativity into the franchise model, burying the last shreds of the idea that there might be parts of human communication that are not commodities.

[/rant]

I think you have a solid point about eternal copyright only making sense to corporations. For the most part, the only two arguments that I've seen for copyright as property comes from two different entities. The first is corporations who hold franchises with significant value and don't want their gravy train interrupted.

The other is from a small group of writers who simply feel that they wrote it therefore it's theirs to control. It's the same feeling that any craftsman might have, but it's the same basic argument that a small child who wants a cookie might make, i.e. because I want it. They are unable to say why they should be treated differently than the guy who hand carves a beautiful chair.

That's not to say that there aren't solid arguments for copyrights that extend longer than I would like. That's why I'm open to many ideas to make sure that authors get paid while society as a whole also gets the benefit of books being available for purchase and reasonable use of those works.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

The other is from a small group of writers who simply feel that they wrote it therefore it's theirs to control.

Do you happen to have the names of some of those writers?

Originally Posted by pwalker8

That's not to say that there aren't solid arguments for copyrights that extend longer than I would like.

What are those? I've come across the argument by publishers that without the rights to their "modern classics" they couldn't fund publishing fresh talent. Are there more?

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

And you still seem to be unable to formulate any sort of rational argument. There are no laws that state copyright is property, ergo by your argument, it must not be property.

Nothing I say will be rational to you, because you believe that intellectual property is a lesser form of property and doesn't warrant the same protection rights as physical property.

Hence the impasse.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

He (or she since one never really knows online) is at least expressing a rational for his opinion and is doing something other than saying "because I said so", then mocking anyone who disagrees. In general, mocking is a sure fire indication that the facts are not on that person's side and thus they are forced to retreat to using rhetorical tricks such as mockery rather than honest debate.

It was so melodramatic and over the top that it didn't warrant any discussion.

[doubleshuffle]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

It was so melodramatic and over the top that it didn't warrant any discussion.

Says the poster who hasn't contributed anything to the discussion except, "I say it so it must be so."

I'd rather be a bit over the top at times in order to make a point, than bore the rest of the world by relentlessly repeating non-arguments.