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Copyright is wildly abused, for sure. But let's not baby-bathwater this. I quite like the formulation in the American Constitution: "To promote the progress
by markhahn 3y ago
Copyright is wildly abused, for sure. But let's not baby-bathwater this.
I quite like the formulation in the American Constitution:
"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries."
The good parts of this is that it has a purpose (which is NOT profits), and that the exclusivity should be time-limited.
- thomastjeffery 3y agoWhat baby? I am not even a tiny bit convinced that Copyright is helping us reach that goal. I can, however, find a dozen ways it is doing the opposite.
- indymike 3y agoThe baby is that copyright provides enough incentive for the creator to create. The problem comes from rent-seeking later down the line.
- naasking 3y agoCreators created before copyright existed. "Copyright is essential for creative work/innovation" is folklore that's stuck deep in people's heads but has little actual evidence behind it. Without copyright you probably wouldn't have an IP behemoth Disney, but that doesn't mean you wouldn't have animated features. I'm not sure the world would be worse off.
- randomdata 3y ago> The good parts of this is that it has a purpose (which is NOT profits) I don't see how the purpose is not profit. Profit is simply a unit of measure, one that measures the progress in delivering useful value to society. Which is exactly what the statement purports is the function of said formulation. Profit would merely measure the successfulness of a pursuit.
- tictorium 3y agoGoodhart's law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”
- randomdata 3y agoHence why most keep their financial affairs private. It cannot become a target if the actors contributing to profitability are not privy to the information.
- soperj 3y ago> one that measures the progress in delivering useful value to society Being a slumlord seems to be a profitable enterprise that provides nothing useful to society, instead it just leaches off of people who are actually doing useful things for society.
- randomdata 3y agoThat's why it is useful to have a tool of measure rather than relying on arbitrary human opinion. It may not seem like there is value, but the measured actions say otherwise.
- pabs3 3y ago> authors and inventors Maybe copyright should go away quicker if their copyrights are transferred to a company or another person.