4 ms·

Um, because the original work is still being sold and is making money for its owners--specifically, the direct relatives of the original author, including one w

by bonch 16y ago

Um, because the original work is still being sold and is making money for its owners--specifically, the direct relatives of the original author, including one who continued his father's work and released The Silmarillion.

joe_the_user 16y ago
But its hard to argue obscure Russian novel that completely changes the entire setting would in any way decrease the money made by the Tolkien estate.
- roel_v 16y ago
  The question is not if the Tolkien estate makes less money. The question is if the Tolkien estate has the freedom to decide what derived works they want to allow. Copyright is not about 'if it makes money for the rights holder, it should be allowed'. It's about the freedom of the holder to decide what they think is the 'best', be it in monetary form, or artistic integrity, or whatever. Let's say I'm an author and I feel that my work is best served with no derivatives like fan fiction or translations. That I feel that my novel is a work of art that only be appreciated in its original language. Should I have the right to prohibit translations? I think so. It's about the freedom and the rights of the author (or creator of other sorts), not about the supposed entitlements of others.
  - Eliezer 16y ago
    I see no public good served by an author being allowed to decide what other people do with their characters. Should Tolkien have the right to constrain what people imagine with his characters? The right to constrain what stories I tell my friend? Never mind physical possibility - if Tolkien had left a note saying that nobody was ever allowed to imagine Legolas/Eowyn, would you obey that note in the privacy of your imagination, because you thought it was his right? IMO copyrights, like patents, should have a mandatory licensing rule - it should not be possible to say "you can't do that", only ever "I get a cut of the profits." (This wouldn't fix either system, which allow for copyright and patent of many things that just shouldn't be patented, but it'd be an incremental improvement.)
    - roel_v 16y ago
      Not everything is about 'the public good being served'. That was my point. Individual freedom usually trumps the public good, imo. Thinking about things has never been under (serious) discussion. The line is roughly at the point where 'public performances' or 'reproduction for the public' is done. Of course you can argue about where things are exactly 'public', but you can do that with anything.
      - Eliezer 16y ago
        Sentence one says that there's no public good being served. Succeeding sentences argue that there's no individual right either.
      - natnat 16y ago
        Individual freedom against the public good isn't entirely what's at stake here. What's at stake is the individual freedom of the original author against the individual freedom of other authors who want to use similar characters, and the individual freedoms of the potential consumers of the derivative work. It's nice to talk about "individual freedom", but you're obscuring the truth in cases like this. It's not about the rights of individuals against some faceless collective. It's about freedoms for one person trumping freedoms of the other. If you restrict the use of any ideas from an original work by anyone else, you're severely restricting the speech of others. If I need your permission before I can write about the characters in your book, what's to stop you from disallowing anyone to write bad reviews of your book? This is an important issue, especially when the laws are vague and you have a massive legal war chest. Your expensive lawyers can argue about where things become "public", too, so me telling my friends about how much your book sucks could get me sued. Overly strict copyright laws have serious chilling effects on free speech. Free speech may be a collective good, but it is also an individual freedom, too, and I think my freedom to speak is more important than anyone else's freedom to silence that speech. Everything can be cast in terms of individual freedom, but more often than not, increasing one person's freedom means decreasing someone else's. That's why you can't just say that individual freedom is necessarily more important than the public good.
        16y ago
  - ddlatham 16y ago
    Copyright is not about 'if it makes money for the rights holder, it should be allowed'. It's about the freedom of the holder to decide what they think is the 'best', be it in monetary form, or artistic integrity, or whatever. I disagree. Copyrights (and patents for that matter) are a temporary monopoly we grant to a creator to give the incentive for people to create new things. We believe that the cost of taking away the rights of other people to reproduce those ideas for a limited time is worth the benefit of the new works that are being created as a result. Should I have the right to prohibit translations? I think so. I think not. Especially 30 years after your death. When does it end? If Shakespeare had left a note asking that his work never be translated into other languages, and never performed outside of England, should we continue to honor that today? We do not have an inherent right to the ideas we express and the words we pen such that we can always control what other people will do with them. We've merely decided as a society to temporarily create such a right because the tradeoff is worth it.

by bonch 16y ago

joe_the_user 16y ago

But its hard to argue obscure Russian novel that completely changes the entire setting would in any way decrease the money made by the Tolkien estate.

roel_v 16y ago
The question is not if the Tolkien estate makes less money. The question is if the Tolkien estate has the freedom to decide what derived works they want to allow. Copyright is not about 'if it makes money for the rights holder, it should be allowed'. It's about the freedom of the holder to decide what they think is the 'best', be it in monetary form, or artistic integrity, or whatever. Let's say I'm an author and I feel that my work is best served with no derivatives like fan fiction or translations. That I feel that my novel is a work of art that only be appreciated in its original language. Should I have the right to prohibit translations? I think so. It's about the freedom and the rights of the author (or creator of other sorts), not about the supposed entitlements of others.
- Eliezer 16y ago
  I see no public good served by an author being allowed to decide what other people do with their characters. Should Tolkien have the right to constrain what people imagine with his characters? The right to constrain what stories I tell my friend? Never mind physical possibility - if Tolkien had left a note saying that nobody was ever allowed to imagine Legolas/Eowyn, would you obey that note in the privacy of your imagination, because you thought it was his right? IMO copyrights, like patents, should have a mandatory licensing rule - it should not be possible to say "you can't do that", only ever "I get a cut of the profits." (This wouldn't fix either system, which allow for copyright and patent of many things that just shouldn't be patented, but it'd be an incremental improvement.)
  - roel_v 16y ago
    Not everything is about 'the public good being served'. That was my point. Individual freedom usually trumps the public good, imo. Thinking about things has never been under (serious) discussion. The line is roughly at the point where 'public performances' or 'reproduction for the public' is done. Of course you can argue about where things are exactly 'public', but you can do that with anything.
    - Eliezer 16y ago
      Sentence one says that there's no public good being served. Succeeding sentences argue that there's no individual right either.
    - natnat 16y ago
      Individual freedom against the public good isn't entirely what's at stake here. What's at stake is the individual freedom of the original author against the individual freedom of other authors who want to use similar characters, and the individual freedoms of the potential consumers of the derivative work. It's nice to talk about "individual freedom", but you're obscuring the truth in cases like this. It's not about the rights of individuals against some faceless collective. It's about freedoms for one person trumping freedoms of the other. If you restrict the use of any ideas from an original work by anyone else, you're severely restricting the speech of others. If I need your permission before I can write about the characters in your book, what's to stop you from disallowing anyone to write bad reviews of your book? This is an important issue, especially when the laws are vague and you have a massive legal war chest. Your expensive lawyers can argue about where things become "public", too, so me telling my friends about how much your book sucks could get me sued. Overly strict copyright laws have serious chilling effects on free speech. Free speech may be a collective good, but it is also an individual freedom, too, and I think my freedom to speak is more important than anyone else's freedom to silence that speech. Everything can be cast in terms of individual freedom, but more often than not, increasing one person's freedom means decreasing someone else's. That's why you can't just say that individual freedom is necessarily more important than the public good.
      - 16y ago
- ddlatham 16y ago
  Copyright is not about 'if it makes money for the rights holder, it should be allowed'. It's about the freedom of the holder to decide what they think is the 'best', be it in monetary form, or artistic integrity, or whatever. I disagree. Copyrights (and patents for that matter) are a temporary monopoly we grant to a creator to give the incentive for people to create new things. We believe that the cost of taking away the rights of other people to reproduce those ideas for a limited time is worth the benefit of the new works that are being created as a result. Should I have the right to prohibit translations? I think so. I think not. Especially 30 years after your death. When does it end? If Shakespeare had left a note asking that his work never be translated into other languages, and never performed outside of England, should we continue to honor that today? We do not have an inherent right to the ideas we express and the words we pen such that we can always control what other people will do with them. We've merely decided as a society to temporarily create such a right because the tradeoff is worth it.