3 ms·

My argument is that there is natural scarcity not of copies of a piece of information, but of the value that can be extracted from it. Scarcity is relevant to m

My argument is that there is natural scarcity not of copies of a piece of information, but of the value that can be extracted from it. Scarcity is relevant to movie tickets because only so many people want to see a particular movie this Friday night. Let's say that in San Francisco there are 1000 such people. If only 5 movie theaters can show the movie, they might sell 200 tickets each. If 50 movie theaters can show the movie, they're not going to sell 200 tickets each. Collectively they will still sell at most 1000 tickets. They have to divide a scarce resource -- the value of the information to moviegoers on that particular night in SF. Once the information is adequately distributed, no matter how many copies you make, you won't increase that value. So, instead of tracking the physical copies -- which I think we'd both agree are an irrelevant artifact of an antiquated distribution system -- I think we should talk about the value that is created for humanity when someone comes up with a new piece of information. When I make a movie, I've added a certain amount of value to the world. When I establish that a molecule can safely be used to treat a disease, I've added a certain amount of value to the world. It is hard to find units to measure this value (revenue potential in USD is a distorted one), but it is undoubtedly finite, and different for each movie or drug. None of this changes with your sci-fi replicator. The question is, should I as the creator of the information be able to capture all that value? Some of that value? None of that value? If we thought of IP as a natural right, we'd say "all." Copyright would be perpetual and there'd be no fair use. In a post-scarcity world where everyone got food and housing and paint and movie cameras for free, we might say "none" and hope (correctly I think) that people would still create for the pleasure of creation. Historically in the US we've said "some," nominally because we think it maximizes the rate of production of value for the commons, but in fact because of the natural vulnerability of our legislative system to capture by rent-seeking copyright aggregators. It is like a resonant frequency of democratic capitalism.

JoshTriplett 15y ago
It sounds like you've said not that scarcity exists in the supply, but rather than a limited amount of demand exists. That much certainly seems true (consider YouTube's statistics on how many days of video get uploaded per minute). However, I don't see how that leads to the conclusions you suggest; it certainly doesn't have the same effect as scarcity of supply. > The question is, should I as the creator of the information be able to capture all that value? Some of that value? None of that value? You have the right to try; you don't have any fundamental right to succeed, but you can certainly try. I agree with the concept that you create value when you create new information, rather than at some later time. That seems like the perfect time to attempt to extract value, since you can choose not to create the information if you can't get value for it, and you can choose to focus on creating information for which you can derive value. That model fits nicely with systems like Kickstarter: raise money to create something, then create it. If those become the primary model for funding creative work, they'll almost certainly attract more interest and more funding, which would otherwise go to copyright-subsidized creativity. Seems to me like a pretty reasonable model. Other sensible post-copyright models almost certainly exist; people just haven't thought of them yet, or haven't demonstrated that they can succeed.

JoshTriplett 15y ago

It sounds like you've said not that scarcity exists in the supply, but rather than a limited amount of demand exists. That much certainly seems true (consider YouTube's statistics on how many days of video get uploaded per minute). However, I don't see how that leads to the conclusions you suggest; it certainly doesn't have the same effect as scarcity of supply. > The question is, should I as the creator of the information be able to capture all that value? Some of that value? None of that value? You have the right to try; you don't have any fundamental right to succeed, but you can certainly try. I agree with the concept that you create value when you create new information, rather than at some later time. That seems like the perfect time to attempt to extract value, since you can choose not to create the information if you can't get value for it, and you can choose to focus on creating information for which you can derive value. That model fits nicely with systems like Kickstarter: raise money to create something, then create it. If those become the primary model for funding creative work, they'll almost certainly attract more interest and more funding, which would otherwise go to copyright-subsidized creativity. Seems to me like a pretty reasonable model. Other sensible post-copyright models almost certainly exist; people just haven't thought of them yet, or haven't demonstrated that they can succeed.