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Do you buy anything based on what it may be worth 70 years after your death? Do you think any company thinks that long term? 1 year probably. 5 years pushing i

Do you buy anything based on what it may be worth 70 years after your death? Do you think any company thinks that long term? 1 year probably. 5 years pushing it. 10 years is basically off any reasonable financial projection any company is going to make.

tptacek 4y ago
Yes, clearly they all do. Media companies don't push for extended copyright terms just to spite you. They have easier ways of spiting you than that.
- wahern 4y ago
  They push for extended copyrights because of a very small number of valuable assets that are nearing expiration, not because they care about increasing the value of content being churned out anew. A prospective term extension's marginal increase in the future present value (FPV) of new works is a rounding error at this point. Now, for those small number of extremely popular works, an extension does ensure continued investment, at least in the same manner of previous investments. But that has to be weighed against the unfathomable amounts of other content that will continue to rot. Defenses of patents and copyrights always discuss the theory--how in theory they promote investment. They rarely if ever discuss the empirically proven results. "Against Intellectual Monopoly" does explore the empirically proven results, though they do so more persuasively for patents than with copyrights, if only because there's much more data with patents, and the argument against copyrights is strongest as it concerns reducing terms, not eliminating copyright altogether, IMO. (Also, in their accounting the evidence does justify pharmaceutical drug patents as necessary for recouping costs to overcome other extreme regulatory burdens.)
  - tptacek 4y ago
    The marginal value of any random piece of content is a rounding error. It's a hitmaker business; the winners pay for the enormous number of losers.
    - wahern 4y ago
      That's not how that works. Jerry Seinfeld's impressive car collection isn't paying writers' salaries. Which isn't to say he isn't reinvesting some of his windfall, but his dollars don't travel as much as if they otherwise could. It's like the difference between the marginal value of $1 to a pauper vs $1 to a prince; that $1 has much more worth to the pauper (i.e. the struggling artist who could benefit from public domain assets) than it does to the prince, even if the prince spends it on the poor. As other people keep pointing out, investment decisions don't much care about what might happen 50 years in the future. Windfalls that happen in the future increasingly inure haphazardly; they don't actually figure into the finances of how the industry works, not even as magic helicopter money. Economists have run the numbers. They have models for this. That's why extension advocates principally hide behind theory, not empirical evidence, because the empirical support is poor at this point.
      - tptacek 4y ago
        Jerry Seinfeld's impressive car collection isn't paying writers' salaries; it was rather the other way around. Seinfeld (and Larry David) were the lead writers for the series.
        wahern 4y ago
        My point is that his car collection isn't paying writers' salaries today. He's not investing all of his windfall back into the entertainment industry. I'm sure he's doing alot of good work, but you don't build an economy around philanthropy; you build it around economic incentives. And Seinfeld and David didn't need the incentive of the multi-billion dollar windfalls, above and beyond what they might have made with shorter terms, to take the risks they took; ditto for NBC's decisions to invest. EDIT: Let me put it a different way. If all that matters is any marginal effect (and especially if we ignore opportunity costs in the public domain, which is admittedly difficult to quantify), why not make the copyright term 1000 years? Or in perpetuity? If every time someone says, "let's extend it by 10 more years, and here's a hypothetical by which it might incentivize someone in theory", by what principle are you prepared to put your foot down? My principle would be evidence-based, and what evidence exists favors stopping terms extensions, and probably rolling them back somewhat. And fortunately that evidence is also consonant with economic theory, no less so than the hypothetical arguments for continued extension.
taneq 4y ago
Of course you do, because even if you're gonna sell it in one year, the amount you can sell it for is going to be determined by its long term value.
- benj111 4y ago
  Ok. What's the long term value of farm land? It's going to last forever so it's value should be approaching infinity right? Or is it based on a 10 year ish payback, with some modifiers for interest rates, the prospect of getting planning permission? Companies do not think that long term. They are not basing their investment decision on the residuals after 10 years, much less 70 Further what's the point of copyright? Is it to post hoc reward those that have already made successful things? Or is to encourage the creation of new works? If it's the latter, then the value after a year is entirely irrelevant. Further most new works basically make all their money in the first 12 months. 95% of copyrighted works are basically worthless after 12 months. So again you're just optimising this for a handful of big companies.

tptacek 4y ago

Yes, clearly they all do. Media companies don't push for extended copyright terms just to spite you. They have easier ways of spiting you than that.

wahern 4y ago
They push for extended copyrights because of a very small number of valuable assets that are nearing expiration, not because they care about increasing the value of content being churned out anew. A prospective term extension's marginal increase in the future present value (FPV) of new works is a rounding error at this point. Now, for those small number of extremely popular works, an extension does ensure continued investment, at least in the same manner of previous investments. But that has to be weighed against the unfathomable amounts of other content that will continue to rot. Defenses of patents and copyrights always discuss the theory--how in theory they promote investment. They rarely if ever discuss the empirically proven results. "Against Intellectual Monopoly" does explore the empirically proven results, though they do so more persuasively for patents than with copyrights, if only because there's much more data with patents, and the argument against copyrights is strongest as it concerns reducing terms, not eliminating copyright altogether, IMO. (Also, in their accounting the evidence does justify pharmaceutical drug patents as necessary for recouping costs to overcome other extreme regulatory burdens.)
- tptacek 4y ago
  The marginal value of any random piece of content is a rounding error. It's a hitmaker business; the winners pay for the enormous number of losers.
  - wahern 4y ago
    That's not how that works. Jerry Seinfeld's impressive car collection isn't paying writers' salaries. Which isn't to say he isn't reinvesting some of his windfall, but his dollars don't travel as much as if they otherwise could. It's like the difference between the marginal value of $1 to a pauper vs $1 to a prince; that $1 has much more worth to the pauper (i.e. the struggling artist who could benefit from public domain assets) than it does to the prince, even if the prince spends it on the poor. As other people keep pointing out, investment decisions don't much care about what might happen 50 years in the future. Windfalls that happen in the future increasingly inure haphazardly; they don't actually figure into the finances of how the industry works, not even as magic helicopter money. Economists have run the numbers. They have models for this. That's why extension advocates principally hide behind theory, not empirical evidence, because the empirical support is poor at this point.
    - tptacek 4y ago
      Jerry Seinfeld's impressive car collection isn't paying writers' salaries; it was rather the other way around. Seinfeld (and Larry David) were the lead writers for the series.
      - wahern 4y ago
        My point is that his car collection isn't paying writers' salaries today. He's not investing all of his windfall back into the entertainment industry. I'm sure he's doing alot of good work, but you don't build an economy around philanthropy; you build it around economic incentives. And Seinfeld and David didn't need the incentive of the multi-billion dollar windfalls, above and beyond what they might have made with shorter terms, to take the risks they took; ditto for NBC's decisions to invest. EDIT: Let me put it a different way. If all that matters is any marginal effect (and especially if we ignore opportunity costs in the public domain, which is admittedly difficult to quantify), why not make the copyright term 1000 years? Or in perpetuity? If every time someone says, "let's extend it by 10 more years, and here's a hypothetical by which it might incentivize someone in theory", by what principle are you prepared to put your foot down? My principle would be evidence-based, and what evidence exists favors stopping terms extensions, and probably rolling them back somewhat. And fortunately that evidence is also consonant with economic theory, no less so than the hypothetical arguments for continued extension.

taneq 4y ago

Of course you do, because even if you're gonna sell it in one year, the amount you can sell it for is going to be determined by its long term value.

benj111 4y ago
Ok. What's the long term value of farm land? It's going to last forever so it's value should be approaching infinity right? Or is it based on a 10 year ish payback, with some modifiers for interest rates, the prospect of getting planning permission? Companies do not think that long term. They are not basing their investment decision on the residuals after 10 years, much less 70 Further what's the point of copyright? Is it to post hoc reward those that have already made successful things? Or is to encourage the creation of new works? If it's the latter, then the value after a year is entirely irrelevant. Further most new works basically make all their money in the first 12 months. 95% of copyrighted works are basically worthless after 12 months. So again you're just optimising this for a handful of big companies.