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The copyright model and the arts have thrived for the last few centuries because copyright was such a vast improvement on what came before it. It led to an expl

by Tycho 15y ago

The copyright model and the arts have thrived for the last few centuries because copyright was such a vast improvement on what came before it. It led to an explosion of creativity and entertainment industry. Now while a fatted arts industry will always contribute a lot of bloated, formulaic works (although I think people would have to admit that even the more braindead hollywood titles have a lot going for them beyond the plot and script), it also allows big money to spent on worthwhile projects. Think of all the great movies that have been made in the last 70 years - they may not have been the most expensive for their time but they were generally still pretty damn costly to make. And even the shoe-string budget attempts probably would not have been made if the possibility for a massive pay-day did not exist (eg. Blair Witch Project). I think people have got their priorities mixed up. Accessing art is not the problem. We have limited leisure time to spend, so even if we could, we would not want to buy every album/movie/book we could. These items are cheap, though, so since price is not really a concern, our worry should be ensuring that artists and the creative industries have economically viable roles. And do we really want to live in a world where the quality of the TV and film output never rises above the level of, say, Spain?

joebadmo 15y ago
"The copyright model and the arts have thrived for the last few centuries because copyright was such a vast improvement on what came before it. It led to an explosion of creativity and entertainment industry." You keep saying this and I keep not believing that that's all there was to it. It was also a matter of people having way more disposable income and leisure time than ever before, as well as the means of production becoming readily available to the masses. You're also mostly talking about an era during which the marginal cost of distribution was significantly greater than zero. That's not the case anymore. "our worry should be ensuring that artists and the creative industries have economically viable roles" I disagree with this. I think most of our enduring works of art come from a time before copyright. Some, e.g. works of oral tradition like Homer, the Ramayana, the Bible, Gilgamesh, etc. actually depend on the unrestricted free exchange of ideas. We just passed through a historical window in which the confluence of surplus disposable income and leisure and scarce distribution models made a few artists very rich (but a few corporations even richer). I would argue that this was never an optimal distribution. Anyway, it's coming to a close. Art will go on. "And do we really want to live in a world where the quality of the TV and film output never rises above the level of, say, Spain?" The only Spanish works I'm familiar with are Guillermo del Toro's The Devil's Backbone and various films by Pedro Almodovar. They were better than anything on, for example, this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films#Most_expensive_productions_.28adjusted_for_inflation.29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films#Mo...

by Tycho 15y ago

joebadmo 15y ago

"The copyright model and the arts have thrived for the last few centuries because copyright was such a vast improvement on what came before it. It led to an explosion of creativity and entertainment industry." You keep saying this and I keep not believing that that's all there was to it. It was also a matter of people having way more disposable income and leisure time than ever before, as well as the means of production becoming readily available to the masses. You're also mostly talking about an era during which the marginal cost of distribution was significantly greater than zero. That's not the case anymore. "our worry should be ensuring that artists and the creative industries have economically viable roles" I disagree with this. I think most of our enduring works of art come from a time before copyright. Some, e.g. works of oral tradition like Homer, the Ramayana, the Bible, Gilgamesh, etc. actually depend on the unrestricted free exchange of ideas. We just passed through a historical window in which the confluence of surplus disposable income and leisure and scarce distribution models made a few artists very rich (but a few corporations even richer). I would argue that this was never an optimal distribution. Anyway, it's coming to a close. Art will go on. "And do we really want to live in a world where the quality of the TV and film output never rises above the level of, say, Spain?" The only Spanish works I'm familiar with are Guillermo del Toro's The Devil's Backbone and various films by Pedro Almodovar. They were better than anything on, for example, this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films#Most_expensive_productions_.28adjusted_for_inflation.29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films#Mo...