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Morally bankrupt? Copyright is not a moral issue, it is just a several centuries old regulation created by people who could never have envisioned something lik

Morally bankrupt? Copyright is not a moral issue, it is just a several centuries old regulation created by people who could never have envisioned something like the Internet. The effort to turn copyright into a moral issue is nothing more than a tactic employed by copyright-based industries in their desperate bid to stay relevant without changing their business models.

snazz 8y ago
The potential moral issue is that the creator of the work (author, photographer, artist, musician) receives no compensation for widespread use of their work. On the other hand, the publishing company or record label or other middleman almost always makes most of the money anyway. An illegal but morally somewhat right thing I’ve seen people do is to pirate the work and pay the artist directly, cutting out most of the expense while still benefiting the creator.
- betterunix2 8y ago
  There is no moral obligation for people to be paid for their work, even if other people enjoy that work, even if it is widespread. Are you going to track down every person who told you a funny joke at a bar that you go around repeating to your friends, or perhaps feel guilty about repeating that joke? The idea that there is moral obligation to pay authors for their writing was itself a tactic used by the publishing industry to establish copyright law when it was first being debated. As you point out, publishers almost always receive the bulk of the money while creators receive little if any compensation. Copyright has always been about business interests and not about morality.
  - Angostura 8y ago
    > There is no moral obligation for people to be paid for their work Make sure to tell your boss.
    - randallsquared 8y ago
      He and his boss have a contract. That’s the difference.
      - eksemplar 8y ago
        So do you and the content creator. I mean, we've all laughed at the "you wouldn't steal a car" commercials, and the truth is, if you could download and 3D print a car, risk free, you probably would steal it. The underlying social part of that statement is both true and interesting though. Because the reason you wouldn't steal a car is because of the social contract you have with other members of society. We don't steal from each other, and if we do, society punishes us. That's basically what the EU is doing with this legislation, and sure, its annoying, but I have a hard time seeing how it's wrong.
        phreack 8y ago
        There is a very hard difference between stealing something from someone, which deprives them from having access to it, and copying it, which doesn't. The first one is considered morally wrong by everyone here, the second one is argued not to be.
        criddell 8y ago
        I think it's worth being careful with your language, but then you are talking about whether or not it's okay to infringe on the rights of another and I don't think it's any easier to say it is.
        betterunix2 8y ago
        Copyrights are not "rights" the way most other "rights" are understood. The term "right" in this context is an abstraction and it is becoming increasingly strained in the modern world. Copyright is a "right" the way that minerals rights are "rights" -- in reality it is a regulation on an industry.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - vcxxx 8y ago
    Oh cool. Let's stop paying Google and Reddit employees. Why should the packagers and distributors of other people's work always have the power? Google is the ultimate middleman.
  - JumpCrisscross 8y ago
    On the flip side, the newspapers I subscribe to have high paywalls and publish content I can't find elsewhere for free. If I could reliably find FT content for free on Reddit, I'm not sure I'd be a subscriber.
    - betterunix2 8y ago
      What is your point? That FT's business model might fail if they could not rely on copyrights? I think they need a business model that is better suited to the modern world if that is the case (or we need to own the fact that when it comes to newspapers etc. we are not interested in a market-based approach).
      - JumpCrisscross 8y ago
        > they need a business model that is better suited to the modern world The model that works under such constraints is a hard, high paywall guarding differentiated content. A consequence of such regulation is one having to pay for content with dollars, not eyeballs.
      - microtherion 8y ago
        Such business models "better suited to the modern world" were actually developed. Click here to read 5 reasons why the result might shock you!
- dcow 8y ago
  I want to help articulate the point even though I don’t know how I feel about it: Reddit makes money when users post popular things with no regard to how those things were acquired. Often this happens via the inner circle of power posters and meme-trend setters and not actually original content authors. And reddit is perfectly okay with this because it makes them money. If you believe it’s immoral to treat content creators this way it’s a moral issue. I tend to agree more with the GP because I’m pretty copyleft, but I also don’t like the fact that the “reddit machine” is basically an internet link record label where the payout is zero...
  - michaelmrose 8y ago
    Why would anyone pay you for linking to your site? Presumably you can charge money for the content, solicit donations on the site or run ads.
    - 3d-avid 8y ago
      But what if the link text itself contains the most important part of the content? For example the title of a news article?.
      - visarga 8y ago
        When copyright was invented, the bulk of communication was personal and free. Now it is captured into electronic silos on the internet. Creators can't have priority over the interest of the population. They have to cede that public interest in discussing news is more important than their 'right' to monetise even the headlines themselves. When balancing rights, we have to take a larger perspective that includes more than the creators interests.
      - michaelmrose 8y ago
        Lets break it down. You intrepid reporter have discovered that Chairman John Smith has been embezzling from the company coffers and lying to shareholders and even now is preparing to abscond with his ill gotten gains to an island paradise. Your release a blistering expose on this titled Mr Smith goes to Jamaica... with all your money. Robbery and shame at foo corp. You might think that your title communicates the most import part of your hard work but 99.9% of the value consists of the fact that you have no right no NOT your clever presentation of such.
- code777777 8y ago
  It's worth noting that in the US there is already the DMCA that content creators can use to take down their work. Most content owners even big companies like Disney choose to allow (or maybe just ignore) the memes and likenesses because it's free advertising. So in a way they are getting value.
  - pitaj 8y ago
    Memes and whatnot are almost always protected under fair use, which the EUCD does not have.
- Asooka 8y ago
  You can also say that it is immoral to receive compensation for not working, i.e. rent-seeking. The creator should be compensated for his or her work, but that's not what copyright is about, it's about being compensated at the time of information exchange. Further confounding the moral issue is the fact that copyright can be assigned, so now a third party is charging rent for the information exchange of a product that they didn't create. In practical terms, this leads to the creation of entities - media companies, that do not care for morality and are entirely built to maximise profits from the rents they control. Which in turn creates other problems, since those same entities can amass enough wealth and power in order to bend our information exchange technologies in amoral ways, all in the pursuit of perfect rent exploitation. So while the concept of "artist gets paid a fair sum for creating art" is commendable, the current implementation has very detrimental side effects. And you can't fight the side-effects with policy, because free information exchange generates less revenue than the rent on information exchange the media companies seek to extract, so you have less money to lobby for laws against the people trying to restrict your freedom of speech.
- wvenable 8y ago
  > The potential moral issue is that the creator of the work (author, photographer, artist, musician) receives no compensation for widespread use of their work. Just because something has widespread use doesn't mean it's actually worth anything.
eksemplar 8y ago
When I call them morally bankrupt, its because of the social manipulation, meddling with democracy and selling of user data, not so much the fact that they allow people to share images of Yoda. But I guess I could have made that a little bit clearer. I don't personally think the laws are wrong though. I'm a content creator myself, and while much of the code I write is open source, and I'm happy to see people use it to build cool things, I also don't want anyone to steal it and pretend it's their own, and I certainly wouldn't want a social media company to make money from it being shared. So I like the law, and I think it should apply equally to you as it should to a social media company. Reddit shouldn't be above the law, and it makes me proud to be a European citizen when our politicians stand up and tell these companies that they aren't.
- kodablah 8y ago
  > I certainly wouldn't want a social media company to make money from it being shared If you can't handle things like this, you basically can't handle platforms that allow others to share things openly. You'll never have an open environment for anyone to create platforms if you also want to pick and choose communication outlets because it effectively devolves to prior restraint like it has here. Freedom comes at a price, be it sharing your stuff or whatever, and every effort to curb its ills, no matter how noble, reduces the freedom. Sadly, the rest of the world has to suffer these freedom tradeoffs so some can feel proud they are standing up to some companies they don't like.
  - eksemplar 8y ago
    Github is a platform that allows anyone to share my things openly. It also lets them contribute or perhaps even take ownership of the work if we agree it's better off in their hands. I'm perfectly fine with that.
    - kodablah 8y ago
      Do you believe Github should preemptively filter content you are trying to git push? You're ok with me uploading all of your copyrighted photos to my GitHub page with the laws that exist today? Do you believe GitHub profits off of their popularity (driving more private repo and enterprise sales) built on a platform that allows users to upload copyrighted content? Is your answer going to be the same as the ones making judgements on GitHub while clutching this new legislation?

snazz 8y ago

The potential moral issue is that the creator of the work (author, photographer, artist, musician) receives no compensation for widespread use of their work. On the other hand, the publishing company or record label or other middleman almost always makes most of the money anyway. An illegal but morally somewhat right thing I’ve seen people do is to pirate the work and pay the artist directly, cutting out most of the expense while still benefiting the creator.

betterunix2 8y ago
There is no moral obligation for people to be paid for their work, even if other people enjoy that work, even if it is widespread. Are you going to track down every person who told you a funny joke at a bar that you go around repeating to your friends, or perhaps feel guilty about repeating that joke? The idea that there is moral obligation to pay authors for their writing was itself a tactic used by the publishing industry to establish copyright law when it was first being debated. As you point out, publishers almost always receive the bulk of the money while creators receive little if any compensation. Copyright has always been about business interests and not about morality.
- Angostura 8y ago
  > There is no moral obligation for people to be paid for their work Make sure to tell your boss.
  - randallsquared 8y ago
    He and his boss have a contract. That’s the difference.
    - eksemplar 8y ago
      So do you and the content creator. I mean, we've all laughed at the "you wouldn't steal a car" commercials, and the truth is, if you could download and 3D print a car, risk free, you probably would steal it. The underlying social part of that statement is both true and interesting though. Because the reason you wouldn't steal a car is because of the social contract you have with other members of society. We don't steal from each other, and if we do, society punishes us. That's basically what the EU is doing with this legislation, and sure, its annoying, but I have a hard time seeing how it's wrong.
      - phreack 8y ago
        There is a very hard difference between stealing something from someone, which deprives them from having access to it, and copying it, which doesn't. The first one is considered morally wrong by everyone here, the second one is argued not to be.
        criddell 8y ago
        I think it's worth being careful with your language, but then you are talking about whether or not it's okay to infringe on the rights of another and I don't think it's any easier to say it is.
        betterunix2 8y ago
        Copyrights are not "rights" the way most other "rights" are understood. The term "right" in this context is an abstraction and it is becoming increasingly strained in the modern world. Copyright is a "right" the way that minerals rights are "rights" -- in reality it is a regulation on an industry.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- vcxxx 8y ago
  Oh cool. Let's stop paying Google and Reddit employees. Why should the packagers and distributors of other people's work always have the power? Google is the ultimate middleman.
- JumpCrisscross 8y ago
  On the flip side, the newspapers I subscribe to have high paywalls and publish content I can't find elsewhere for free. If I could reliably find FT content for free on Reddit, I'm not sure I'd be a subscriber.
  - betterunix2 8y ago
    What is your point? That FT's business model might fail if they could not rely on copyrights? I think they need a business model that is better suited to the modern world if that is the case (or we need to own the fact that when it comes to newspapers etc. we are not interested in a market-based approach).
    - JumpCrisscross 8y ago
      > they need a business model that is better suited to the modern world The model that works under such constraints is a hard, high paywall guarding differentiated content. A consequence of such regulation is one having to pay for content with dollars, not eyeballs.
    - microtherion 8y ago
      Such business models "better suited to the modern world" were actually developed. Click here to read 5 reasons why the result might shock you!
dcow 8y ago
I want to help articulate the point even though I don’t know how I feel about it: Reddit makes money when users post popular things with no regard to how those things were acquired. Often this happens via the inner circle of power posters and meme-trend setters and not actually original content authors. And reddit is perfectly okay with this because it makes them money. If you believe it’s immoral to treat content creators this way it’s a moral issue. I tend to agree more with the GP because I’m pretty copyleft, but I also don’t like the fact that the “reddit machine” is basically an internet link record label where the payout is zero...
- michaelmrose 8y ago
  Why would anyone pay you for linking to your site? Presumably you can charge money for the content, solicit donations on the site or run ads.
  - 3d-avid 8y ago
    But what if the link text itself contains the most important part of the content? For example the title of a news article?.
    - visarga 8y ago
      When copyright was invented, the bulk of communication was personal and free. Now it is captured into electronic silos on the internet. Creators can't have priority over the interest of the population. They have to cede that public interest in discussing news is more important than their 'right' to monetise even the headlines themselves. When balancing rights, we have to take a larger perspective that includes more than the creators interests.
    - michaelmrose 8y ago
      Lets break it down. You intrepid reporter have discovered that Chairman John Smith has been embezzling from the company coffers and lying to shareholders and even now is preparing to abscond with his ill gotten gains to an island paradise. Your release a blistering expose on this titled Mr Smith goes to Jamaica... with all your money. Robbery and shame at foo corp. You might think that your title communicates the most import part of your hard work but 99.9% of the value consists of the fact that you have no right no NOT your clever presentation of such.
code777777 8y ago
It's worth noting that in the US there is already the DMCA that content creators can use to take down their work. Most content owners even big companies like Disney choose to allow (or maybe just ignore) the memes and likenesses because it's free advertising. So in a way they are getting value.
- pitaj 8y ago
  Memes and whatnot are almost always protected under fair use, which the EUCD does not have.
Asooka 8y ago
You can also say that it is immoral to receive compensation for not working, i.e. rent-seeking. The creator should be compensated for his or her work, but that's not what copyright is about, it's about being compensated at the time of information exchange. Further confounding the moral issue is the fact that copyright can be assigned, so now a third party is charging rent for the information exchange of a product that they didn't create. In practical terms, this leads to the creation of entities - media companies, that do not care for morality and are entirely built to maximise profits from the rents they control. Which in turn creates other problems, since those same entities can amass enough wealth and power in order to bend our information exchange technologies in amoral ways, all in the pursuit of perfect rent exploitation. So while the concept of "artist gets paid a fair sum for creating art" is commendable, the current implementation has very detrimental side effects. And you can't fight the side-effects with policy, because free information exchange generates less revenue than the rent on information exchange the media companies seek to extract, so you have less money to lobby for laws against the people trying to restrict your freedom of speech.
wvenable 8y ago
> The potential moral issue is that the creator of the work (author, photographer, artist, musician) receives no compensation for widespread use of their work. Just because something has widespread use doesn't mean it's actually worth anything.

eksemplar 8y ago

When I call them morally bankrupt, its because of the social manipulation, meddling with democracy and selling of user data, not so much the fact that they allow people to share images of Yoda. But I guess I could have made that a little bit clearer. I don't personally think the laws are wrong though. I'm a content creator myself, and while much of the code I write is open source, and I'm happy to see people use it to build cool things, I also don't want anyone to steal it and pretend it's their own, and I certainly wouldn't want a social media company to make money from it being shared. So I like the law, and I think it should apply equally to you as it should to a social media company. Reddit shouldn't be above the law, and it makes me proud to be a European citizen when our politicians stand up and tell these companies that they aren't.

kodablah 8y ago
> I certainly wouldn't want a social media company to make money from it being shared If you can't handle things like this, you basically can't handle platforms that allow others to share things openly. You'll never have an open environment for anyone to create platforms if you also want to pick and choose communication outlets because it effectively devolves to prior restraint like it has here. Freedom comes at a price, be it sharing your stuff or whatever, and every effort to curb its ills, no matter how noble, reduces the freedom. Sadly, the rest of the world has to suffer these freedom tradeoffs so some can feel proud they are standing up to some companies they don't like.
- eksemplar 8y ago
  Github is a platform that allows anyone to share my things openly. It also lets them contribute or perhaps even take ownership of the work if we agree it's better off in their hands. I'm perfectly fine with that.
  - kodablah 8y ago
    Do you believe Github should preemptively filter content you are trying to git push? You're ok with me uploading all of your copyrighted photos to my GitHub page with the laws that exist today? Do you believe GitHub profits off of their popularity (driving more private repo and enterprise sales) built on a platform that allows users to upload copyrighted content? Is your answer going to be the same as the ones making judgements on GitHub while clutching this new legislation?