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This same person fought for years to get the Berlin Egyptian museum to release 3D scans of the famous Nefertiti bust. The museum also claimed it would undermine

This same person fought for years to get the Berlin Egyptian museum to release 3D scans of the famous Nefertiti bust. The museum also claimed it would undermine its revenue streams through the gift shop, but as the case progressed, that turned out to be very misleading - the museum had made less than 5000 EUR over ten years from 3D scans. https://reason.com/2019/11/13/a-german-museum-tried-to-hide-this-stunning-3d-scan-of-an-iconic-egyptian-artifact-today-you-can-see-it-for-the-first-time/ https://reason.com/2019/11/13/a-german-museum-tried-to-hide-...

trompetenaccoun 2y ago
Why would they lie about it then? These museums are subsidized by tax payers, not only just local money but often with additional EU funding as well. The scans were paid for by the public. This seems comically evil for no apparent reason.
- littlestymaar 2y ago
  > This seems comically evil for no apparent reason. Gervais Principle
  - romwell 2y ago
    >Gervais Principle Reference: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
- wiz21c 2y ago
  Although I agree(stuff bought with tax money should go to tax payers), you do realize that many people don't see it that way. Especially when their career rely on withholding the stuff in question. Another example: if people have access to 3D scans, then they might come to the museum anymore because they can make a virtual tour... (I doubt of that, but well, it's an example) But, of course, as a tax payer, I wanted these 3D scans (somebody voted for that at some point). So now the pandora's box is open. The problem, I guess, is that a museum is not there to be profitable. Unfortunately, "modern management" crept in there and now they have to be somehow profitable or at least make an effort to be so. And so, information withholding is a way to achieve that goal. As a society we have to choose: we keep museums so that everyone can enjoy art, or we think they have to be profitable first...
  - grahamj 2y ago
    > a museum is not there to be profitable This is so important. Museums (should) exist because the artifacts are rare and must necessarily be protected and confined. They should be overjoyed that scans allow everyone to enjoy these artifacts, even without visiting a museum. Anything else is corruption.
    - trinsic2 2y ago
      The problem is that every institution has been corrupted by the capitalistic viewpoint that everything needs to be profitable to work. Everyone believes that and lives there live around those principals there is not much room for a common domain any more.
  - tirant 2y ago
    > The problem, I guess, is that a museum is not there to be profitable Well, the most democratic way we have found in the West to understand if a product or an initiative is relevant for the population is to see if it’s profitable (via sales or donations), or in other words, via the free market. Otherwise you are imposing on the citizens the maintenance of an organization based on the criteria from either the political party in power or some bureaucrats. And we all know that their incentives are usually not aligned with their citizens, but mostly to perpetuate their position of power. I personally also believe Museums are important to preserve our history and facilitate research, but not all types and not at all costs. And specially they should not be a nest of corruption as I have observed. So I’m most inclined to let the free market decide, which includes private foundations or wealthy individuals owning museums (e.g. Getty Center in LA).
    - mejutoco 2y ago
      > Well, the most democratic way we have found in the West to understand if a product or an initiative is relevant for the population is to see if it’s profitable (via sales or donations), or in other words, via the free market. I would say the most democratic way we have found is voting. The free market is efficient, but not concerned with democracy.
- bombcar 2y ago
  Bureaucracies always argue for the continuation of the bureaucracy and its funding, no matter how insane or small. It's what they naturally do and you have to explicitly fight against it.
  - theendisney 2y ago
    First we pay for the scans then we also get to pay for the legal fight trying to not share it with us??? Then the fight should continue until it can dispose of dysfunctional beurocrats? Set an example? It seems normal to fire people who dont understand their work.
    - n_plus_1_acc 2y ago
      In germany, there is a current case going on where one ministry sues another, both with taxpayer money, obviously. Has led to to funny media reportings.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  Maintaining the status quo is almost always the path of least resistance for organizations like this. Saying no to something new is easy, to say yes puts you out on a limb with uncertain strength.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
  > Why would they lie about it then? T Because among copyright/IP maximalists, the whole point is that they own an idea or a picture or a look or a fashion and deserve to keep it to themselves forever. It's not a rational attitude, but it's a real one and unfortunately rather common.
  - warkdarrior 2y ago
    And what is the alternative? How do we get it applied to software copyrights?
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
      Flip the script and make everything public unless it has a sort-of "license" which explicitly restricts access. People can proactively restrict access to their work, which would allow for lawsuits, and others can see the potentially very restrictive licenses which some will put on their stuff and possibly learn to avoid such licenses. Hard to say how that would look or happen in practice but it's interesting to think about.
      - Suppafly 2y ago
        >Hard to say how that would look or happen in practice It's essentially how art worked up until last couple of hundred years, it worked just fine. During most of the most important periods of art history, copyright wasn't a thing.
        stavros 2y ago
        What also wasn't a thing: Copying an artwork in two seconds with a cost less than a cup of coffee.
        ipaddr 2y ago
        The person who created the art has been dead for a long time.
- astrange 2y ago
  If you hire a lawyer, they're going to try to make the strongest argument for your case, even if it's not good.
  - romwell 2y ago
    And the meta-question of "why did the museum choose to waste money on lawyers that way" is "bureaucrat X decided that the scans belong to the museum, so no further logic or rational thinking will be applied unless absolutely forced to". That's a common property of all large institutions: the reasons why a decision is made may as well be arbitrary, but by golly will they stick to it and die on the hill, if they can.
sokoloff 2y ago
It seems that with the advent/improvements in AR/VR that measuring the direct sales of scan data is the wrong way to look at the losses. If many people can experience a 75% compelling viewing of the bust (or the pyramids, Galapagos, Chichen Itza, etc.), the losses in tourism to those sites is far more than the lost sales of scan data.
- MichaelZuo 2y ago
  This doesn’t seem likely, the major tourist destinations during the busy season are so crowded, or slot limited, that it’s a pretty unpleasant experience. If anything it would reduce overcrowding .
  - thfuran 2y ago
    Unless you're suggesting that they'll increase prices proportionally, how would that not result in loss of revenue?
    - ipaddr 2y ago
      If the place is packed you should raise prices.
      - autoexec 2y ago
        Not really. Their goal shouldn't be to maximize profit and they should take care not to price people out from access to cultural artifacts. If the goal is just to reduce the number of visitors then a lottery system or limitations on ticket sales issued on a first come first served basis is far more fair.
        MichaelZuo 2y ago
        How is pricing by available time to wait any more fair than pricing by available money to spend? It’s not like the average tourist has unrestricted opportunities to visit any day of the year, usually it’s only a narrow number of dates.
yardstick 2y ago
Devils advocate: Maybe they were worried about sales of photos of the bust, and other products of the bust but not created using the scans? Could one take all the scans and produce a coffee table book of photos similar to what the gift shops often sell? Honestly the whole gift shop argument is weird. I have no sympathy for them. You can get plenty of knockoffs now if you wanted: the world is full of Statue of Liberty, Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, etc keychains and trinkets even without scans. Gift shops already have to compete with those.
- y-curious 2y ago
  Moreover, these museums get public funding for their operation AND the 3D scanning initiatives. It's not like the gift shop is the defining feature here.
- bhickey 2y ago
  Approximately no one is going to buy a museum gift shop coffee table book anywhere other than at a museum gift shop.
  - yardstick 2y ago
    Exactly! The amount of worry they have is stupid and nonsensical and ultimately used to disguise their real reasons of just not wanting to share anything.
whimsicalism 2y ago
They’re afraid of losing out on the revenue from selling replicas, etc. which is probably a very reasonable fear given that the guy filing suit and writing this blog post runs a company that creates replica artwork?
- squigz 2y ago
  The huge piles of revenue? > SPK confirmed it had earned less than 5,000 euro, total, from marketing the Nefertiti scan, or any other scan for that matter. SPK also admitted it did not direct even that small revenue towards digitization, explaining that it was not obliged to do so. In the nearly 10 years since it had created the Nefertiti scan, SPK had completely failed to commercially exploit the valuable data idling on its hard drives.
  - whimsicalism 2y ago
    Not sure if you are intentionally missing the distinction I’m making? Your comment just restates the GP
    - squigz 2y ago
      I'm not sure what distinction you're trying to make, no.
      - whimsicalism 2y ago
        Revenue from “marketing the 3d scans” is not the same as “revenue from selling replicas” and it is the latter that they are trying to protect, not the sale of the scans directly
        squigz 2y ago
        My impression from that article was that '3D scans' and 'replicas' were grouped together.
josefx 2y ago
That is 500€ a year they could spend on random crap. From my limited experience with the German government any actually viable income stream would immediately result in politicians cutting public funding and overcompensate significantly.
ballenf 2y ago
What's to stop a replica maker from scanning a replica bought from the gift shop? I am very skeptical that a trinket purchaser will care about or be able to identify any scanning errors introduced.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  You should look at what the guy behind this company actually sells - they are very upscale replicas going in famous American homes, my guess is the standards are quite high I have no clue if museums are in that space at all though

trompetenaccoun 2y ago

Why would they lie about it then? These museums are subsidized by tax payers, not only just local money but often with additional EU funding as well. The scans were paid for by the public. This seems comically evil for no apparent reason.

littlestymaar 2y ago
> This seems comically evil for no apparent reason. Gervais Principle
- romwell 2y ago
  >Gervais Principle Reference: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
wiz21c 2y ago
Although I agree(stuff bought with tax money should go to tax payers), you do realize that many people don't see it that way. Especially when their career rely on withholding the stuff in question. Another example: if people have access to 3D scans, then they might come to the museum anymore because they can make a virtual tour... (I doubt of that, but well, it's an example) But, of course, as a tax payer, I wanted these 3D scans (somebody voted for that at some point). So now the pandora's box is open. The problem, I guess, is that a museum is not there to be profitable. Unfortunately, "modern management" crept in there and now they have to be somehow profitable or at least make an effort to be so. And so, information withholding is a way to achieve that goal. As a society we have to choose: we keep museums so that everyone can enjoy art, or we think they have to be profitable first...
- grahamj 2y ago
  > a museum is not there to be profitable This is so important. Museums (should) exist because the artifacts are rare and must necessarily be protected and confined. They should be overjoyed that scans allow everyone to enjoy these artifacts, even without visiting a museum. Anything else is corruption.
  - trinsic2 2y ago
    The problem is that every institution has been corrupted by the capitalistic viewpoint that everything needs to be profitable to work. Everyone believes that and lives there live around those principals there is not much room for a common domain any more.
- tirant 2y ago
  > The problem, I guess, is that a museum is not there to be profitable Well, the most democratic way we have found in the West to understand if a product or an initiative is relevant for the population is to see if it’s profitable (via sales or donations), or in other words, via the free market. Otherwise you are imposing on the citizens the maintenance of an organization based on the criteria from either the political party in power or some bureaucrats. And we all know that their incentives are usually not aligned with their citizens, but mostly to perpetuate their position of power. I personally also believe Museums are important to preserve our history and facilitate research, but not all types and not at all costs. And specially they should not be a nest of corruption as I have observed. So I’m most inclined to let the free market decide, which includes private foundations or wealthy individuals owning museums (e.g. Getty Center in LA).
  - mejutoco 2y ago
    > Well, the most democratic way we have found in the West to understand if a product or an initiative is relevant for the population is to see if it’s profitable (via sales or donations), or in other words, via the free market. I would say the most democratic way we have found is voting. The free market is efficient, but not concerned with democracy.
bombcar 2y ago
Bureaucracies always argue for the continuation of the bureaucracy and its funding, no matter how insane or small. It's what they naturally do and you have to explicitly fight against it.
- theendisney 2y ago
  First we pay for the scans then we also get to pay for the legal fight trying to not share it with us??? Then the fight should continue until it can dispose of dysfunctional beurocrats? Set an example? It seems normal to fire people who dont understand their work.
  - n_plus_1_acc 2y ago
    In germany, there is a current case going on where one ministry sues another, both with taxpayer money, obviously. Has led to to funny media reportings.
lupusreal 2y ago
Maintaining the status quo is almost always the path of least resistance for organizations like this. Saying no to something new is easy, to say yes puts you out on a limb with uncertain strength.
NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
> Why would they lie about it then? T Because among copyright/IP maximalists, the whole point is that they own an idea or a picture or a look or a fashion and deserve to keep it to themselves forever. It's not a rational attitude, but it's a real one and unfortunately rather common.
- warkdarrior 2y ago
  And what is the alternative? How do we get it applied to software copyrights?
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2y ago
    Flip the script and make everything public unless it has a sort-of "license" which explicitly restricts access. People can proactively restrict access to their work, which would allow for lawsuits, and others can see the potentially very restrictive licenses which some will put on their stuff and possibly learn to avoid such licenses. Hard to say how that would look or happen in practice but it's interesting to think about.
    - Suppafly 2y ago
      >Hard to say how that would look or happen in practice It's essentially how art worked up until last couple of hundred years, it worked just fine. During most of the most important periods of art history, copyright wasn't a thing.
      - stavros 2y ago
        What also wasn't a thing: Copying an artwork in two seconds with a cost less than a cup of coffee.
        ipaddr 2y ago
        The person who created the art has been dead for a long time.
astrange 2y ago
If you hire a lawyer, they're going to try to make the strongest argument for your case, even if it's not good.
- romwell 2y ago
  And the meta-question of "why did the museum choose to waste money on lawyers that way" is "bureaucrat X decided that the scans belong to the museum, so no further logic or rational thinking will be applied unless absolutely forced to". That's a common property of all large institutions: the reasons why a decision is made may as well be arbitrary, but by golly will they stick to it and die on the hill, if they can.

sokoloff 2y ago

It seems that with the advent/improvements in AR/VR that measuring the direct sales of scan data is the wrong way to look at the losses. If many people can experience a 75% compelling viewing of the bust (or the pyramids, Galapagos, Chichen Itza, etc.), the losses in tourism to those sites is far more than the lost sales of scan data.

MichaelZuo 2y ago
This doesn’t seem likely, the major tourist destinations during the busy season are so crowded, or slot limited, that it’s a pretty unpleasant experience. If anything it would reduce overcrowding .
- thfuran 2y ago
  Unless you're suggesting that they'll increase prices proportionally, how would that not result in loss of revenue?
  - ipaddr 2y ago
    If the place is packed you should raise prices.
    - autoexec 2y ago
      Not really. Their goal shouldn't be to maximize profit and they should take care not to price people out from access to cultural artifacts. If the goal is just to reduce the number of visitors then a lottery system or limitations on ticket sales issued on a first come first served basis is far more fair.
      - MichaelZuo 2y ago
        How is pricing by available time to wait any more fair than pricing by available money to spend? It’s not like the average tourist has unrestricted opportunities to visit any day of the year, usually it’s only a narrow number of dates.

yardstick 2y ago

Devils advocate: Maybe they were worried about sales of photos of the bust, and other products of the bust but not created using the scans? Could one take all the scans and produce a coffee table book of photos similar to what the gift shops often sell? Honestly the whole gift shop argument is weird. I have no sympathy for them. You can get plenty of knockoffs now if you wanted: the world is full of Statue of Liberty, Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, etc keychains and trinkets even without scans. Gift shops already have to compete with those.

y-curious 2y ago
Moreover, these museums get public funding for their operation AND the 3D scanning initiatives. It's not like the gift shop is the defining feature here.
bhickey 2y ago
Approximately no one is going to buy a museum gift shop coffee table book anywhere other than at a museum gift shop.
- yardstick 2y ago
  Exactly! The amount of worry they have is stupid and nonsensical and ultimately used to disguise their real reasons of just not wanting to share anything.

whimsicalism 2y ago

They’re afraid of losing out on the revenue from selling replicas, etc. which is probably a very reasonable fear given that the guy filing suit and writing this blog post runs a company that creates replica artwork?

squigz 2y ago
The huge piles of revenue? > SPK confirmed it had earned less than 5,000 euro, total, from marketing the Nefertiti scan, or any other scan for that matter. SPK also admitted it did not direct even that small revenue towards digitization, explaining that it was not obliged to do so. In the nearly 10 years since it had created the Nefertiti scan, SPK had completely failed to commercially exploit the valuable data idling on its hard drives.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  Not sure if you are intentionally missing the distinction I’m making? Your comment just restates the GP
  - squigz 2y ago
    I'm not sure what distinction you're trying to make, no.
    - whimsicalism 2y ago
      Revenue from “marketing the 3d scans” is not the same as “revenue from selling replicas” and it is the latter that they are trying to protect, not the sale of the scans directly
      - squigz 2y ago
        My impression from that article was that '3D scans' and 'replicas' were grouped together.

josefx 2y ago

That is 500€ a year they could spend on random crap. From my limited experience with the German government any actually viable income stream would immediately result in politicians cutting public funding and overcompensate significantly.

ballenf 2y ago

What's to stop a replica maker from scanning a replica bought from the gift shop? I am very skeptical that a trinket purchaser will care about or be able to identify any scanning errors introduced.

whimsicalism 2y ago
You should look at what the guy behind this company actually sells - they are very upscale replicas going in famous American homes, my guess is the standards are quite high I have no clue if museums are in that space at all though