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I am a writer, a songwriter in fact, and I have definitely benefitted from copyright. In the past I've sold parts of my rights to a publisher, in exchange for

I am a writer, a songwriter in fact, and I have definitely benefitted from copyright. In the past I've sold parts of my rights to a publisher, in exchange for cash, who then was incentivized to go out and licenses some songs for obscure commercial purposes. It made both of the publisher and myself some money. It's kind of a fantastic way of doing business. Publishers work as speculative investors and help to spread the risk of creating intellectual property. It only works if we treat the "song" as the item of property, and not "me". I can't be bought and sold on a marketplace, rather my songs are. In the time of patronage, it wasn't the intellectual property that was bought and sold, rather the artist. Slavery and patronage are very related systems of organizing human capital. They're both based around primitive ideas of the relationship between labor and capital. What we developed in the subsequent five hundred years is really much better than what this article is arguing for a return to. --- EDIT: I haven't been able to comment for the last 40 minutes or so with a "too many comments, slow down" warning... I think it is a bug... so patcon: As soon as you consider a "song" an asset that can be bought or sold, you're dealing with the notion of copyright. What you're describing will only work if there are certain fundamentals in place, namely, that the "song" in question is generating profits either through royalties or direct licensing. So in order for a futures market to develop, the assets in question need to have the ability to create earnings so then investors can discover a speculative price for the underlying asset, based on the profits they think the song will generate. In order for this to happen we need people and software to honor the notion that the author and whomever he sold assets in his "song" are due said royalties and other types of direct or indirect payments. That is, we need to honor their rights as to how copies are distributed and paid for. --- Still can't comment... ThomPete: We're building a solution on top of just that kind of unnatural artificial scarcity, the Bitcoin blockchain: We're still working on pretty much everything and are somewhat close to a launch (~2-3 weeks? but we've been saying that for 3 months, you know how it is...) Anyways, in the meantime we've been publishing a lot of code, so most of this stuff does in fact work as intended, just there's a decent amount of moving parts that had to be invented from scratch and devilish details abound... Anywho, take a look... but please, be kind about the existing copy and lack of documentation... we'd love some feedback as well! Spelling mistakes, etc. Marketing Copy: http://blockai-front-page.herokuapp.com/ http://blockai-front-page.herokuapp.com/ Code: https://github.com/blockai/openpublish https://github.com/blockai/openpublish https://github.com/williamcotton/blockcast https://github.com/williamcotton/blockcast https://github.com/blockai/bitstore-client https://github.com/blockai/bitstore-client https://github.com/blockai/abstract-common-blockchain https://github.com/blockai/abstract-common-blockchain https://github.com/blockai/react-image-publisher https://github.com/blockai/react-image-publisher https://github.com/blockai/react-published-images-list https://github.com/blockai/react-published-images-list https://github.com/howardwu/react-openpublish-assets https://github.com/howardwu/react-openpublish-assets https://www.npmjs.com/~andrewmalta https://www.npmjs.com/~andrewmalta https://www.npmjs.com/~howard.wu https://www.npmjs.com/~howard.wu https://www.npmjs.com/~williamcotton https://www.npmjs.com/~williamcotton Screenshots: https://bitstore-test.blockai.com/mqMsBiNtGJdwdhKr12TqyRNE7RTvEeAkaR/sha1/c8cbbd01da3c635a3b2500b707ec90d4248b16ae https://bitstore-test.blockai.com/mqMsBiNtGJdwdhKr12TqyRNE7R... https://bitstore-test.blockai.com/mqMsBiNtGJdwdhKr12TqyRNE7RTvEeAkaR/sha1/5c5e668833155925ec44f3183b367d6f028150e1 https://bitstore-test.blockai.com/mqMsBiNtGJdwdhKr12TqyRNE7R...

patcon 11y ago
Could this not also be solved by a speculative market for songs, sort of like what is described here for an autonomous Associated Press for article content? http://wiki.bitshares.org/index.php/Potential_DAC_Ideas#Associated_Press http://wiki.bitshares.org/index.php/Potential_DAC_Ideas#Asso... So as in, you pay a bit to create a market, and buy a bunch of shares low (because you think your song is awesome). Those who find it early and think the price will go higher will buy more shares, and share the song widely so as to increase the chances of others buying in higher. You eventually sell your original shares when you think your song is at it's peak, and make a pretty penny. Maybe you sold too soon, or too late, but you learn for next time. Maybe you should've kept some for a decade later, at which point some future DJ samples your song and it becomes popular again and the share price starts inching up. Maybe you, as the artist, farm out this speculation part, because -- hey -- you're just interested in making music, and that middleman music trader takes a cut of your earnings :) Doesn't that give most of the positive effects you mention, but without the notion of copyright?
- anigbrowl 11y ago
  No. Why are people going to buy shares in something on which they have no way to assert a property interest that would allow them to get paid? It won't work for the same reason that there's no market in fresh air even though everyone consumes it.
ThomPete 11y ago
Which is the very problem with the whole discussion. It requires something that is unnatural and for that reason won't be happening unless there is some way to re-introduce scarcity into the system.
- api 11y ago
  Might makes right is the law of nature. Anything else is unnatural.
drcube 11y ago
>> In the time of patronage, it wasn't the intellectual property that was bought and sold, rather the artist. Slavery and patronage are very related systems of organizing human capital. They're both based around primitive ideas of the relationship between labor and capital. This is absurd. Paying for expert services is not the same thing as slavery. I work as a consultant. Am I a slave? Why can billions of people go to work each day and earn a paycheck with no expectation of getting paid ever again for that day's work, but with artists, the world owes them a living based off of work they did years ago? And if they must continue to work to get paid it's tantamount to slavery? You won't win any friends with that kind of logic. Most of us earn paychecks, dude, not royalties.

patcon 11y ago

Could this not also be solved by a speculative market for songs, sort of like what is described here for an autonomous Associated Press for article content? http://wiki.bitshares.org/index.php/Potential_DAC_Ideas#Associated_Press http://wiki.bitshares.org/index.php/Potential_DAC_Ideas#Asso... So as in, you pay a bit to create a market, and buy a bunch of shares low (because you think your song is awesome). Those who find it early and think the price will go higher will buy more shares, and share the song widely so as to increase the chances of others buying in higher. You eventually sell your original shares when you think your song is at it's peak, and make a pretty penny. Maybe you sold too soon, or too late, but you learn for next time. Maybe you should've kept some for a decade later, at which point some future DJ samples your song and it becomes popular again and the share price starts inching up. Maybe you, as the artist, farm out this speculation part, because -- hey -- you're just interested in making music, and that middleman music trader takes a cut of your earnings :) Doesn't that give most of the positive effects you mention, but without the notion of copyright?

anigbrowl 11y ago
No. Why are people going to buy shares in something on which they have no way to assert a property interest that would allow them to get paid? It won't work for the same reason that there's no market in fresh air even though everyone consumes it.

ThomPete 11y ago

Which is the very problem with the whole discussion. It requires something that is unnatural and for that reason won't be happening unless there is some way to re-introduce scarcity into the system.

api 11y ago
Might makes right is the law of nature. Anything else is unnatural.

drcube 11y ago

>> In the time of patronage, it wasn't the intellectual property that was bought and sold, rather the artist. Slavery and patronage are very related systems of organizing human capital. They're both based around primitive ideas of the relationship between labor and capital. This is absurd. Paying for expert services is not the same thing as slavery. I work as a consultant. Am I a slave? Why can billions of people go to work each day and earn a paycheck with no expectation of getting paid ever again for that day's work, but with artists, the world owes them a living based off of work they did years ago? And if they must continue to work to get paid it's tantamount to slavery? You won't win any friends with that kind of logic. Most of us earn paychecks, dude, not royalties.