[LAU] ASCAP Assails Free-Culture, Digital-Rights Groups

PMA PeterArmstrong at aya.yale.edu
Wed Jun 30 22:23:39 UTC 2010


Has this thread distinguished between Copyright and Patent?
As I understand, it is the latter that makes ideas property.

P.A.

Dave Phillips wrote:
> Greetings,
> 
> <caffeinated_rant>
> I have an observation re: this thread: People who don't hold copyrights 
> or patents typically don't understand the full significance of copyright 
> or patent laws because they never have to. Those of us who do hold them 
> regard the issue differently. My advice, try making your living from 
> royalties for a few years, then let me know how you feel about watching 
> someone else appropriate your work. Copyright means literally that the 
> holder owns the right to make copies, not you or anyone else.
> 
> I'm reminded of my mother's oft-repeated adage, "What part of 'NO' don't 
> you understand ?".
> 
> The assertion that copyright is not an incentive to creativity is 
> correct, of course, though its assurance of payment might function as a 
> spur to take on a job and get it done. I wonder sometimes, how many 
> members of this list actually make their living as creative artists ? 
> Because unless that's what you're doing for your livelihood (i.e. buying 
> groceries and clothes for your kids, paying the rent, paying the utility 
> bills, etc) then I suggest that it's simply too easy to make blanket 
> assumptions about  the processes by which an artist produces work for 
> payment.
> 
> Btw, if anyone would like to get a more realistic sense of that Better 
> World Without Copyright, I suggest you read the memoirs of Hector 
> Berlioz. And let us not forget Disney's famous appropriation of 
> Stravinsky's work. Yep, the same Disney who perverted the existing 
> copyright law, aided & abetted by Sonny Bono. If international copyright 
> law had covered Russia then Igor would have got a fair cut of the 
> royalty pie from Disney's Fantasia. As it happened, Disney basically 
> said "You're screwed" because he knew Stravinsky had no legal recourse. 
> At least Stravinsky got in a last bite: When asked if he had any comment 
> on the film he referred to it as an "imbecility". I'll guess that he 
> wouldn't have liked Snow White either.
> 
> Yeh, yeh, yeh, artists made art before copyright. What they didn't make 
> was as much money as they now stand to make because of it. Ezra Pound 
> once wrote that knowing a little hunger isn't necessarily bad for an 
> artist, but starvation is definitely not good. Or maybe we think someone 
> makes "enough" or too much money, so we can justify the theft of 
> copyrighted material. Okay, why stop there, why not steal rich people's 
> cars ? They probably have enough of them , and they can certainly afford 
> more, so why not steal their cars ? Oh that's right, cars are different 
> from software. We can take a copy of the software and the original 
> remains, so that makes the theft okay. No, it does not, and that is 
> exactly why we have copyright law. The car *can't* be copied without 
> undue effort, the software can. The ease of reproducibility calls for 
> further protection *if* it is an agreed-upon principle that the maker of 
> the work is due the rights to its copying. At this time that's the law, 
> at least here in the US. You're welcome to try to change it, but you're 
> not welcome to break it as though it doesn't exist or because you 
> believe it's unjust. Of course we can go ahead and break whatever laws 
> we feel like breaking, whether we understand and accept the consequences 
> or not, but if we're serious about changing those conditions then we 
> ought to engage in the proper process towards that end.
> 
> Btw, I'm not playing "holier than thou" here. I've downloaded my share 
> of copyrighted material, but I don't illude myself about its ethicality. 
> Nor do I flog myself over the deed.
> </caffeinated_rant>
> 
> Best,
> 
> dp
> 
> "They were artists in their own right, Andrea said, intent on 
> restructuring reality, and the New Jerusalem was a fine place indeed, 
> free of overdrafts and disgruntled landlords and the need to find 
> someone to cover the evening's bill."
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