Why public domain

[Timboli]

Originally Posted by hildea

There's an obvious reason to treat the work of an author and a furniture builder differently, and that's in how they get paid.

• I bake you a bread, build you a chair, mow your lawn, teach you how to knit -- I do a job for you, you pay me for it, I get enough from you to cover my expenses and get a decent wage. We're done.
• I hold a concert -- I do a job for a lot of people, all of them pay me a part of the total cost, and all together, I get enough to cover my expenses and have a decent wage. We're done.
• But: If I write a book, or make a computer game, or design a new type of chair, I need a lot of people to each pay a part of the total cost, the payments will be spread out over time (unlike the concert), and I'm vulnerable because someone else could copy my work in a fraction of the time I spent, sell it much cheaper, and rob me of the fruits of my labor. So we need laws and cultural norms to protect the creators' rights in these cases.

Life + (small amount of time) will be enough to protect the creators' wages, eternal copyright gives no advantages to society, and a lot of disadvantages that have been described in this thread.

Well said, and I guess our only disagreeance might possibly be how long that "small amount" of time is. And I am not sure, that you can apply the same amount of time to something an author wrote early in their career as compared to something they wrote decades later. As surely over that time, they have met that criteria you mentioned for others.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by Timboli

Well said, and I guess our only disagreeance might possibly be how long that "small amount" of time is. And I am not sure, that you can apply the same amount of time to something an author wrote early in their career as compared to something they wrote decades later. As surely over that time, they have met that criteria you mentioned for others.

Since copyright also, to some degree, covers derivative works, early works and later works should be both treated the same.

[Little.Egret]

Originally Posted by davidfor

When I read this, I thought good, but, then I thought about it and there is a fairly major problem with your builder analogy.

Firstly, you are correct, if I get a builder to build me a house, I don't keep paying the builder once I have it. But, if I buy a book, I don't keep paying the author once I have it. I only pay the author if I want another copy of the
{ . . .}

In fact the builder can refuse to sell but instead offers a 99 or 999 year lease at a small ground rent with conditions on appearance, paint and replacement.
If it is a good deal you may choose to accept (see Mayfair, London, England) or go elsewhere.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by davidfor

When I read this, I thought good, but, then I thought about it and there is a fairly major problem with your builder analogy.

Firstly, you are correct, if I get a builder to build me a house, I don't keep paying the builder once I have it. But, if I buy a book, I don't keep paying the author once I have it. [...]

The contract matters, what are you actually paying for? Are you paying the builder to build a house (paying for labour and materials, see also hildea's post #247), or are you paying the builder for the use of a house (see Little.Egret's post above), or are you paying for the final product? You need to know before work starts if you don't want nasty surprises.

Pay a writer to write a book and ownership of the IP goes to you, unless the contract says otherwise. (With photography - I think - the assumptions go the other way unless the contract says otherwise.)

[PKFFW]

Originally Posted by gmw

You replaced that with: "Whilst, like anything at all, IP and PP can be compared to each other if one wishes to do so, IP and PP are so significantly different that to attempt to treat them the same under the law and have a workable and enforceable solution is simply not possible."

Which is close enough to meaning the same thing, don't you think?

Not at all. I admitted they can be compared, which my original post explicitly stated they could not, and I reiterated my point that I don't think it is possible to treat them the same under the law because whilst they have similarities they are not the same thing.

Originally Posted by gmw

There, that wasn't so hard. The rest is just a matter of degree. I believe the similarities are such that it is a societal choice whether we treat copyright the same as a physical property and offer eternal copyright. I don't believe we should, but I don't see it as impossible.

No, you keep on suggesting at least that they are the same, which they are not. Society can choose to treat water and air as the same things but that does not make them the same.

I still contend that it would not actually be a workable situation to treat them the same under the law. There would be complications right from the start that would need to be resolved. The resolution would inevitably result in IP and PP being treated differently under the law. Which, funnily enough, they already are.

Originally Posted by gmw

I don't really expect you to agree, I was just hoping to show you that this middle ground existed, and I'm standing on it.

There really isn't any middle ground on my actual point though.

Either IP and PP are in fact the same thing or they are not. I contend they are not. You seemingly contend that they are. There isn't any ground in which they are both the same thing and not the same thing at the same time. This is not quantum physics after all, the probability wave has been collapsed, the box has been opened.

Having said that, yes I totally agree with you that there are some legal similarities between IP and PP and yes society can choose to treat them the same under the law. If that is the middle ground of which you speak then I'm on it right there with you. However, even conceding that to be true I still don't believe they are the same thing in actuality regardless of whether society chose to claim they are nor do I believe it would work in the legal world.

[PKFFW]

Originally Posted by PKFFW

Yes, you are correct. I admit to not knowing this since I have seen so many near identical houses in my time I made the incorrect assumption that architecture was not covered by copyright.

Now we are getting somewhere.

Your points have given me a lot to think about so thank you. I'll respond further after thinking about it for a bit.

Apologies for the length.

Firstly let me state that what is interesting about your post is that it made me think about my analogy and whether it works so thank you for that.

Also, I'd like to be clear that I acknowledge you have not made the argument that IP should be treated the same as PP and have in fact stated in a previous post that "[F]or the record, I have absolutely no idea what should be done with copyright." So I don't want you to interpret the following as my arguing with you or suggesting that I disagree with you about copyright etc.

You did state in the above quoted post "The writer is putting out their IP, why should they not be paid as long as it is considered valuable to someone?" and I'd like to address that in light of the "IP should be treated the same as PP argument."

Having thought about it some more, I would like to respond with the following.

To begin with, you are right, the house versus book analogy is inaccurate due to the single instatiation issue. A book and a building are each a single physical item purchased and thus rights for the use etc of that single physical instatiation are conferred to the purchaser.

I chose that analogy after a poster earlier in the thread argued that IP should be treated the same as PP and gave the example that the government does not repossess your house after a certain time, and so they shouldn't repossess IP. I did not think through the analogy adequately and should not have used it in the way that I did.

However, it strikes me that the house and architect copyright example still provide an interesting issue that may raise concerns for those suggesting IP should be treated the same as PP.

So here goes;

(Disregarding copyright law in this example and dealing solely with your physical house.)
If you own a house I can not physically take your house or any single part of your house to use as my own without depriving you of the house or part thereof. However, it is physically possible for me to copy your house or any part thereof for use as my own without depriving you of it. Furthermore, if I were a commercial builder, I could copy the entire design and build multiple houses and sell them to make money. In both cases you still have the use of the house and can go and sell that house or any part thereof to anyone you like.

Hence, the law states it is illegal for me to steal your house but not illegal to copy it.

So here is the first difference. It is physically possible for me to copy and use any part of an author's book without depriving them of the use of their book. They can still use it, edit it, modify it, and sell it to whomever they like. The only thing I have arguably deprived them of is the sale income they would have received had I purchased the book. If I were to make copies and sell them, I would of course deprive the author of further sale income. However, in both cases the author still has full use of the book and can modify, change, and sell the book to whomever is willing to buy it. I will call this loss of sale income "secondary deprivation" to distinguish it from the deprivation that would be caused if I stole your house. Due to this secondary deprivation the law does say I am not allowed to copy the authors book for my own use without first purchasing it or make copies and sell them to others.

The difference in type and level of deprivation alone I think shows that IP and PP are different and therefore should be treated differently.

However, on to my next point;

Now, imagine you have a house that you have paid an architect to design and is covered by copyright. The above still applies in that I am not allowed to steal your house, however, in addition, I am not legally allowed to copy the design. However, my (obviously, considering my previously admitted hasty assumption regarding architectural copyright) limited reading leads me to believe that it would be perfectly legal for me to take parts of the design to use in my own design.

For example, I might copy the exact size and internal lay out of the rooms. I might copy the way the roof is designed. I may copy the exact exterior wall cladding. I might copy the design and layout of the windows. All this would be perfectly legal so long as I made substantial changes to the overall design of the house such that it would be considered a different design.

Furthermore, if I were a commercial builder, I could even copy design elements of the architect's design and implement them into my buildings to enhance their value and thus use the architect's ideas to make more money for myself. Perfectly legal with the caveat that the totality of my building needs to be substantially different.

So when it comes to physical property, the exact design of the building can be copyrighted but not each individual part of the physical item. And if your house is not covered by copyright but is nothing more than your own physical property I can copy it exactly to my hearts content.

In this example, I would liken the architect's design and your own home to the specific word for word book an author wrote. I would liken the design elements that make up the overall design to be like characters and settings.

So to use JK Rowling and the Harry Potter series as the stalwart example, Rowling would have complete control over the specific word for word expression that is the Harry Potter books. If I wanted to print those books and sell them to make money I should have to pay her.

What if I wanted to take a character or setting and use that to write my own stories and books or make a movie etc so long as the end result of my work was substantially different to her books? It would seem that this should be totally fine if we are treating IP the same as PP.

So, for debate’s sake if one agrees that IP and PP are different and therefore need to be treated differently under the law (I realise no one currently responding will agree, hence the bold and italics, it's basically a rhetorical question following), it then needs to be asked what rational and cogent argument can be made for copyright being changed from the status quo to extending in perpetuity?

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by Little.Egret

In fact the builder can refuse to sell but instead offers a 99 or 999 year lease at a small ground rent with conditions on appearance, paint and replacement.
If it is a good deal you may choose to accept (see Mayfair, London, England) or go elsewhere.

Originally Posted by gmw

The contract matters, what are you actually paying for? Are you paying the builder to build a house (paying for labour and materials, see also hildea's post #247), or are you paying the builder for the use of a house (see Little.Egret's post above), or are you paying for the final product? You need to know before work starts if you don't want nasty surprises.

Pay a writer to write a book and ownership of the IP goes to you, unless the contract says otherwise. (With photography - I think - the assumptions go the other way unless the contract says otherwise.)

Which is the case with anything, whether the product is IP or physical. There is a contract between whoever commissions and pays for the work and whoever does the actual work. That should explicitly state who owns what when the work is finished.

And I did think of those things when responding to @PKFFW. But, to my mind, what you are referring to is closer to leasing or renting, not buying. I chose to keep it simple. I believe the intention of @PKFFW's analogy was clear, as was my reply.

And it is fairly common for there to be restrictions on changes that can be made to a house. But, these usually come from some level of government or a local group of some sort, not the builder or architect.

[Timboli]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Since copyright also, to some degree, covers derivative works, early works and later works should be both treated the same.

You've lost me. The same what? And why?
And you make it sound like Copyright is set in concrete, when we know it varies from country to country and can even change over time etc.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by davidfor

And it is fairly common for there to be restrictions on changes that can be made to a house. But, these usually come from some level of government or a local group of some sort, not the builder or architect.

In the UK, you have to get the local council's permission to make changes to your house or for the house you want to build on land that you own.

My mother decided she wanted to make some changes to the house. There was no problem doing so. This was in Lexington, MA in the US.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by PKFFW

[...] No, you keep on suggesting at least that they are the same [...]

Goodness, if you keep repeating this you'll even have me believing I said it. So it could be time to stop.

[PKFFW]

Originally Posted by gmw

Goodness, if you keep repeating this you'll even have me believing I said it. So it could be time to stop.

My apologies if I have misunderstood.

I admitted they have similarities and can be compared and that wasn't good enough for you. I admitted society can choose to treat them the same if it wants to and that wasn't good enough for you.

So I'm left with the fact that my point is only that IP and PP are not the same and as such I believe they should not be treated the same. You have repeatedly responded in a way that suggests (though does not explicitly state) that you disagree with my point.

So what is it you are actually disagreeing with, if you don't mind my asking?

[gmw]

Originally Posted by PKFFW

My apologies if I have misunderstood.

I admitted they have similarities and can be compared and that wasn't good enough for you. I admitted society can choose to treat them the same if it wants to and that wasn't good enough for you.

So I'm left with the fact that my point is only that IP and PP are not the same and as such I believe they should not be treated the same. You have repeatedly responded in a way that suggests (though does not explicitly state) that you disagree with my point.

So what is it you are actually disagreeing with, if you don't mind my asking?

In my view, the reasons you give for IP and PP not being the same (physicality, builder analogies and so on), are distractions. As such they clutter the debate unnecessarily, and obscure the real reasons why we should consider treating IP differently - not because we must, but because there are genuinely useful reasons for doing so.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by gmw

In my view, the reasons you give for IP and PP not being the same (physicality, builder analogies and so on), are distractions. As such they clutter the debate unnecessarily, and obscure the real reasons why we should consider treating IP differently - not because we must, but because there are genuinely useful reasons for doing so.

I think that it's both because we must, i.e. one is a physical object and the other is an expression of an idea, as well as there are useful reasons for doing so. One must keep in mind that the term IP was coined to make it sound like things like copyright were the same physical property, not because it was an accurate expression of what they are (i.e. a government granted monopoly on making copies of a book or manufacturing a device [like copyright, patents originally had nothing to do with who actually had the idea or created the device]).

[gmw]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

I think that it's both because we must, i.e. one is a physical object and the other is an expression of an idea, as well as there are useful reasons for doing so. One must keep in mind that the term IP was coined to make it sound like things like copyright were the same physical property, not because it was an accurate expression of what they are (i.e. a government granted monopoly on making copies of a book or manufacturing a device [like copyright, patents originally had nothing to do with who actually had the idea or created the device]).

I think we've had this discussion before . Property has a specific meaning (a thing or things in owned) in legal and commercial circumstances. Non-tangible "rights" of many sorts have been treated as property (traded, subleased, used as collateral) for centuries before IP. Defining IP as having rights makes it property, no conspiracy required, just centuries of experience.

[Greg Anos]

This sounds like discussing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

The real issue is how cheap and readily available the ability to manufacture information currently is.

What happens when the people currently trying to exactly mimic $1,000 bottles of wine for $20 succeed?

I'm not talking about passing it off as the real McCoy, but in a bottle proudly stating that the contents is exactly the same as that $1,000 bottle of wine.

When does IP end and PP begin? Think about a world of Star Trek-like replicators. What rights should the original creators of a physical product?

This is the real question.