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Can we even agree on such a proposal among ourselves? I would like to see all copyright completely abolished, or at least reduced to max 2 years or so. I imagi

Can we even agree on such a proposal among ourselves? I would like to see all copyright completely abolished, or at least reduced to max 2 years or so. I imagine a lot of people will disagree with me.

exikyut 9y ago
Okay; for the sake of argument, let's say I agree. The first problem that immediately arises is that of providing a 1984-proof who-made-what oracle. No, the blockchain won't work. :D (Alright, alright, in a perfect-to-the-nth-degree world the blockchain probably would work, but it's generally a good idea to try and invent one new thing at a time, not invent ten interdependent things that all require each other and which all independently have discrete adoption inertia.)
- icebraining 9y ago
  I don't get it, if copyright's abolished, why do you need a proof?
majewsky 9y ago
2 years may be a bit too drastic for many forms of content (e.g. books, music albums) where sales need longer to recuperate the expenses that went into making them. 10 years would seem okay IMO. I would like to have copyright end once your earnings from a certain work exceed some multiple of the expenses that went into making it by a certain factor, but I can see that this is not realistic for various reasons.
- rlpb 9y ago
  > I would like to have copyright end once your earnings from a certain work exceed some multiple of the expenses that went into making it by a certain factor... One of the reasons is that it would have a chilling effect for speculative investment in creating works. What if I'm a movie producer getting an average of one hit for nine flops? I need the profit from the hit to subsidize the flops.
  - majewsky 9y ago
    That's why I said "exceed by some multiple", not just "cover the expenses".
StaticRedux 9y ago
I'm sure anyone who is a content creator would disagree with you. The only reason to abolish copyright would be to freely copy, steal, and use other people's works without compensation or even attribution. It can easily take more than two years to even write a thorough and well-researched article or book. Would you spend two years of your life creating something with the knowledge that it can be freely stolen and resold by other people the day you release it?
- oldandtired 9y ago
  It cannot be stolen if you still have the original. It can only be copied. To steal something requires you removing from the possession of the owner. Making a copy is not stealing. But you can steal someone's reputation.
- nfoz 9y ago
  > Would you spend two years of your life creating something with the knowledge that it can be freely stolen and resold by other people the day you release it? That's the dream of the Free Software movement, n'est-ce pas? When you release something without restriction, it brings the whole civilization forward. The problem is monetizing the creation of the work, which doesn't have to be done by the business-model of restricting its usage. Indeed the latter seems like a violation of individual freedoms that I'm not sure should be allowed by legal contract.
beefield 9y ago
I have lately been fond of the idea of not abolishing, copyright, but setting a copyright tax that increases heavily over time. Say, first two years tax-free, third year USD 1000 and doubling after that each year. Once copyright holder fails to pay the tax, the copyrighted work becomes automatically public domain. Orphan works would be solved as well with this. (Admittably, I have not thought the international problems that this might cause)
- V-2 9y ago
  > Once copyright holder fails to pay the tax, the copyrighted work becomes automatically public domain ...or it gets bought by some more powerful entity - capable of paying the tax - shortly before this happens. Leading to concentration of copyrights in the hands of big corporations, to an extent even larger than under current system.
  - beefield 9y ago
    Did you calculate how much tax would be payable after e.g. 20 years? I guess it would be a very rare piece of work that anyone would be willing to pay the tax for longer than 20 years.
  - dingo_bat 9y ago
    The "doubling every year" part takes care of that pretty effectively IMO.
  - pwg 9y ago
    > or it gets bought by some more powerful entity - capable of paying the tax The "doubling after that each year" provision of the original comment neatly takes care of that. After a relatively small number of doublings the size of the tax for the single item would be larger than the current US national debt. The 'math' term for this is "exponential growth".
  - stale2002 9y ago
    And that entity would be paying massive amounts of money in taxes, which society could use for other things. Sounds great to me.
dingo_bat 9y ago
I disagree. I believe that the code I write for my employer is valuable and I recognize that having no copyright on it would reduce my compensation as an employee. You're right that developing a consensus on this is ngih impossible.

exikyut 9y ago

Okay; for the sake of argument, let's say I agree. The first problem that immediately arises is that of providing a 1984-proof who-made-what oracle. No, the blockchain won't work. :D (Alright, alright, in a perfect-to-the-nth-degree world the blockchain probably would work, but it's generally a good idea to try and invent one new thing at a time, not invent ten interdependent things that all require each other and which all independently have discrete adoption inertia.)

icebraining 9y ago
I don't get it, if copyright's abolished, why do you need a proof?

majewsky 9y ago

2 years may be a bit too drastic for many forms of content (e.g. books, music albums) where sales need longer to recuperate the expenses that went into making them. 10 years would seem okay IMO. I would like to have copyright end once your earnings from a certain work exceed some multiple of the expenses that went into making it by a certain factor, but I can see that this is not realistic for various reasons.

rlpb 9y ago
> I would like to have copyright end once your earnings from a certain work exceed some multiple of the expenses that went into making it by a certain factor... One of the reasons is that it would have a chilling effect for speculative investment in creating works. What if I'm a movie producer getting an average of one hit for nine flops? I need the profit from the hit to subsidize the flops.
- majewsky 9y ago
  That's why I said "exceed by some multiple", not just "cover the expenses".

StaticRedux 9y ago

I'm sure anyone who is a content creator would disagree with you. The only reason to abolish copyright would be to freely copy, steal, and use other people's works without compensation or even attribution. It can easily take more than two years to even write a thorough and well-researched article or book. Would you spend two years of your life creating something with the knowledge that it can be freely stolen and resold by other people the day you release it?

oldandtired 9y ago
It cannot be stolen if you still have the original. It can only be copied. To steal something requires you removing from the possession of the owner. Making a copy is not stealing. But you can steal someone's reputation.
nfoz 9y ago
> Would you spend two years of your life creating something with the knowledge that it can be freely stolen and resold by other people the day you release it? That's the dream of the Free Software movement, n'est-ce pas? When you release something without restriction, it brings the whole civilization forward. The problem is monetizing the creation of the work, which doesn't have to be done by the business-model of restricting its usage. Indeed the latter seems like a violation of individual freedoms that I'm not sure should be allowed by legal contract.

beefield 9y ago

I have lately been fond of the idea of not abolishing, copyright, but setting a copyright tax that increases heavily over time. Say, first two years tax-free, third year USD 1000 and doubling after that each year. Once copyright holder fails to pay the tax, the copyrighted work becomes automatically public domain. Orphan works would be solved as well with this. (Admittably, I have not thought the international problems that this might cause)

V-2 9y ago
> Once copyright holder fails to pay the tax, the copyrighted work becomes automatically public domain ...or it gets bought by some more powerful entity - capable of paying the tax - shortly before this happens. Leading to concentration of copyrights in the hands of big corporations, to an extent even larger than under current system.
- beefield 9y ago
  Did you calculate how much tax would be payable after e.g. 20 years? I guess it would be a very rare piece of work that anyone would be willing to pay the tax for longer than 20 years.
- dingo_bat 9y ago
  The "doubling every year" part takes care of that pretty effectively IMO.
- pwg 9y ago
  > or it gets bought by some more powerful entity - capable of paying the tax The "doubling after that each year" provision of the original comment neatly takes care of that. After a relatively small number of doublings the size of the tax for the single item would be larger than the current US national debt. The 'math' term for this is "exponential growth".
- stale2002 9y ago
  And that entity would be paying massive amounts of money in taxes, which society could use for other things. Sounds great to me.

dingo_bat 9y ago

I disagree. I believe that the code I write for my employer is valuable and I recognize that having no copyright on it would reduce my compensation as an employee. You're right that developing a consensus on this is ngih impossible.