3 ms·

Cameras made it easy to copy things, so did printing presses, photocopiers and now computers. None of them have killed copyright, which is still functioning jus

by simonh 5y ago

Cameras made it easy to copy things, so did printing presses, photocopiers and now computers. None of them have killed copyright, which is still functioning just fine. Musicians still sell music, directors still make films, the apocalypse simply isn’t happening. Yes there are occasional abuses, unfair YouTube takedowns and crap like this from Google. They must be fought, no argument there. Life will go on.

matheusmoreira 5y ago
> Cameras made it easy to copy things, so did printing presses, photocopiers Not at massive global scales. Not at negligible costs. Not with complete impunity. Not in a way that was accessible to everyone.
- Supermancho 5y ago
  > printing presses, The arrival of mechanical movable type printing in Europe in the Renaissance introduced the era of mass communication, which permanently altered the structure of society. - Wiki > photocopiers A primary obstacle associated with the pre-xerographic copying technologies was the high cost of supplies: a Verifax print required supplies costing US$0.15 in 1969, while a Xerox print could be made for $0.03 including paper and labor. - Wiki > Not at massive global scales. Not at negligible costs. Not with complete impunity. Not in a way that was accessible to everyone. You're trying to split hairs to justify a belief here. It doesn't seem like you're making a compelling case by stringing together conditions that you think are unique to the modern day.
  - matheusmoreira 5y ago
    How are modern day conditions not unique? The printing press changed the world but it was huge expensive hardware and if you had one it meant you were a major industry player and therefore an easy target for copyright enforcement. Copiers were also expensive machines owned by businesses and they also worked with physical paper. There were inherent limits to the scale of any copying operation. None of this is comparable to what we have today. Now everyone has a computer that fits in their pockets and is more than capable of instantly creating an unbounded number of copies of any data at nearly zero cost as well as transmitting those copies to anyone else connected to the global network. People infringe copyright every day, most of the time without even realizing it.
    - Supermancho 5y ago
      > The printing press changed the world but it was huge expensive hardware and if you had one it meant you were a major industry player and therefore an easy target for copyright enforcement. I do suspect you are thinking about the industrial revolution, which came centuries later. Like 1760+ The Gutenberg press was something that relatively poor could produce, over time, in pieces with basic carpentry and blacksmithing (if you had the money), in the mid 1400s. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLctAw4JZXE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLctAw4JZXE You could make it even cheaper with purely wooden components (no double sided, sorry), which would require routine repair and was generally inefficient. Paper had been around since before the Egyptians but started becoming commonly understood and circulated in Germany around this time. It was difficult to obtain and make. Interestingly enough, you could use cloth/leather or another material instead. Gutenberg was relatively well funded once he started kicking out Bibles so he didn't think about these things, as he really just wanted nice Bibles produced. Innovative stop-gaps were part of how it's notoriety spread so rapidly. That left the traditional oil-based ink which could reasonably be made of anything (oil, sap, soot, filth, etc) with effort and a suitable substrate. Printing was manual before, which was slow and expensive. Within a century of "the press", the ability to read was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the Enlightenment period.
      - matheusmoreira 5y ago
        > Printing was manual before, which was slow and expensive. Within a century of "the press", the ability to read was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the Enlightenment period. Copying and distribution was slow and expensive before. Not even a century after computers, the ability to copy was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the age of information.
- simonh 5y ago
  You seem to be arguing that modern digital technology must by necessity drive a fundamental shift in the intellectual property economy that eliminates things like copyright forever. That simply isn't happening. It didn't happen to music, not to film and television, not even books. I'm a gamer and regularly buy games and supplements in PDF form, the hobby role-playing game market for indie games in PDF has never been stronger. You can argue until you're blue in the face that what's happening right now is impossible, but it is happening. Look at the massive investment Amazon, Netflix, Disney, HBO and Apple are putting into streaming video. They are very successful businesses fighting over massive revenue streams. We're 20 years into the post-napster digital online revolution, and this is the way things have worked out.

by simonh 5y ago

matheusmoreira 5y ago

> Cameras made it easy to copy things, so did printing presses, photocopiers Not at massive global scales. Not at negligible costs. Not with complete impunity. Not in a way that was accessible to everyone.

Supermancho 5y ago
> printing presses, The arrival of mechanical movable type printing in Europe in the Renaissance introduced the era of mass communication, which permanently altered the structure of society. - Wiki > photocopiers A primary obstacle associated with the pre-xerographic copying technologies was the high cost of supplies: a Verifax print required supplies costing US$0.15 in 1969, while a Xerox print could be made for $0.03 including paper and labor. - Wiki > Not at massive global scales. Not at negligible costs. Not with complete impunity. Not in a way that was accessible to everyone. You're trying to split hairs to justify a belief here. It doesn't seem like you're making a compelling case by stringing together conditions that you think are unique to the modern day.
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  How are modern day conditions not unique? The printing press changed the world but it was huge expensive hardware and if you had one it meant you were a major industry player and therefore an easy target for copyright enforcement. Copiers were also expensive machines owned by businesses and they also worked with physical paper. There were inherent limits to the scale of any copying operation. None of this is comparable to what we have today. Now everyone has a computer that fits in their pockets and is more than capable of instantly creating an unbounded number of copies of any data at nearly zero cost as well as transmitting those copies to anyone else connected to the global network. People infringe copyright every day, most of the time without even realizing it.
  - Supermancho 5y ago
    > The printing press changed the world but it was huge expensive hardware and if you had one it meant you were a major industry player and therefore an easy target for copyright enforcement. I do suspect you are thinking about the industrial revolution, which came centuries later. Like 1760+ The Gutenberg press was something that relatively poor could produce, over time, in pieces with basic carpentry and blacksmithing (if you had the money), in the mid 1400s. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLctAw4JZXE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLctAw4JZXE You could make it even cheaper with purely wooden components (no double sided, sorry), which would require routine repair and was generally inefficient. Paper had been around since before the Egyptians but started becoming commonly understood and circulated in Germany around this time. It was difficult to obtain and make. Interestingly enough, you could use cloth/leather or another material instead. Gutenberg was relatively well funded once he started kicking out Bibles so he didn't think about these things, as he really just wanted nice Bibles produced. Innovative stop-gaps were part of how it's notoriety spread so rapidly. That left the traditional oil-based ink which could reasonably be made of anything (oil, sap, soot, filth, etc) with effort and a suitable substrate. Printing was manual before, which was slow and expensive. Within a century of "the press", the ability to read was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the Enlightenment period.
    - matheusmoreira 5y ago
      > Printing was manual before, which was slow and expensive. Within a century of "the press", the ability to read was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the Enlightenment period. Copying and distribution was slow and expensive before. Not even a century after computers, the ability to copy was nearly ubiquitous. This jump-started the age of information.
simonh 5y ago
You seem to be arguing that modern digital technology must by necessity drive a fundamental shift in the intellectual property economy that eliminates things like copyright forever. That simply isn't happening. It didn't happen to music, not to film and television, not even books. I'm a gamer and regularly buy games and supplements in PDF form, the hobby role-playing game market for indie games in PDF has never been stronger. You can argue until you're blue in the face that what's happening right now is impossible, but it is happening. Look at the massive investment Amazon, Netflix, Disney, HBO and Apple are putting into streaming video. They are very successful businesses fighting over massive revenue streams. We're 20 years into the post-napster digital online revolution, and this is the way things have worked out.