Bill Patry on Copyright Alliance BS
p2pnet news view | P2P | Politics:- In an official press statement, Copyright Alliance mouthperson Lucinda Dugger (right) last week suggested US president Obama should look kindly upon CA members because they’ve been around since American was founded back in 1776, said p2pnet.
And she said the same of the RIAA, Sony (Japan), UMG (France) and News Corpse (Australia) “who, according to Dugger, were also around at the time,” we went on.
All other considerations aside, it’s a shocking indictment of the ‘alliance’ that it allowed such drivel to be published and widely disseminated in its name.
But that’s standard CA BS.
Its pathetic effort also caught the eye of respected copyright expert Bill Patry
“In my prior blog I would occasionally write about the buffoonery of the Copyright Alliance, a laughably, tragically inept DC front organization for large corporate copyright owners portraying itself as the voice of individual artists,” he wrote in his Moral Panics and the Copyright Wars blog, going on:
You know, the individual performing artists that the RIAA sought to deprive of their termination of transfer rights when the RIAA snuck in, in the dead of the night with no hearing, no bill, or no notice, legislation to convert them into employees for hire.
You know, the artists whom the RIAA sought to deprive of bankruptcy protection.
You know, the artists the MPAA has successfully prevented from gaining audiovisual performance rights in WIPO treaty negotiations.
You know, those artists.
The ‘alliance’ wants the US administration to, “increase their already massive efforts to act as taxpayer supported copyright enforcers on behalf of the corporate movie and music industries,” said p2pnet, also pointing to another striking example of CA ineptitude.
“The Copyright Alliance and its grassroots network of creators today announced circulation among creators nationwide of a letter to President Obama and Vice President Biden, asking the Administration to pursue policies supportive of the rights of artists,” said a pseudo press release under the heading, ‘Grassroots network of creators circulates letter’.
“You don’t get much more grass roots than the RIAA, Sony, UMG or News Corpse,” we observed. “Right? And what about Newspaper Association of America, the Walt Disney Company and American Intellectual Property Law Association.
“Grassroots all the way to the bank.”
In his blog, Patry goes on to quote various choice passages, stating »»»
It is very hard not to laugh in the face of such ugliness and to wonder where the reason is in such dysfunctional nonsense, but what came to my mind was Helen Reddy’s 1972 anthem, which began: “I am woman, hear me roar/In numbers too big to ignore.”
The moral panic in the Alliance’s letter is that the very essence of what makes America America is threatened by evil forces that supposedly have launched an assault demanding that Helen Reddy and her 11 million colleagues give their works away for free, that the evil doers be permitted to have their way with the vestal virgins of America’s copyright sweethearts. This is of course complete baloney. Name one piece of pending legislation that would accomplish what the Alliance claims. Name one lawsuit currently pending that would accomplish what the Alliance claims. There are none.
“So here is my plea, President Obama and Vice President Biden,” he says, adding, “throw the Alliance’s letters in the trash where they belong, and demand that we have effective copyright laws: not slogans, not inside the beltway bunkum, but instead change in our copyright laws we can believe in. Copyright laws that further creativity and innovation not smother them.”
(Cheers, Tom B)
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
p2pnet – More Copyright Alliance equine excreta, September 30, 2009
Moral Panics and the Copyright Wars – We Are Copyright Alliance, Hear Us Roar, September 29, 2009
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October 5th, 2009 at 9:45 am
They conveniently neglect to mention that in 1776 copyright lasted only 14 years.
October 5th, 2009 at 10:15 am
William Patry appears to be conflicted.
You can’t both have effective copyright laws and laws that foster creativity and innovation. They are a contradiction in terms. The reproduction monopoly suppresses cultural exchange in order to both control it and direct revenue to printers. Copyright does not foster creativity or reward artists (as the artists are now discovering). The printers will pay artists as little as possible – as all are only too aware (bar the few artists that become famous).
William Patry’s choice is:
Copyright: Wealthy printers trying to avoid paying artists, and vigorously persecuting the public for making unauthorised copies.
No copyright: Break even printers, with artists instead rewarded by their audiences, and the public’s cultural liberty restored.
The best change in copyright law is its abolition.
It is the absence of copyright law that best furthers creativity and innovation.
We’ve done without copyright for millions of years, why did we need it in the last 300? To enable the state to control the press, by granting the press the privilege of controlling reproduction. Nothing to do with creativity. Everything to do with protecting the state and the press it controls and favours.
And now the people are the press, and the state along with its favoured corporations would control the people.
It’s certainly a sticky situation, but nothing to do with creativity and innovation.
The cultural suppression of a reproduction monopoly vs the cultural liberty and artistic freedom without it.
Come on Bill, you can’t have it both ways. Fur lined manacles are not an option (except for masochists).
October 5th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Crosbie:
Agreed 100%
Not to mention the fact that copyright apologists have been systematically violating THEIR side of the deal for decades, with every (retroactive) extension of copyright term. They’ve been ROBBING the public domain for decades, so it’s no wonder that the public at large feel very little if any uneasiness about violating copyright en masse, on a global scale.
Thanks for calling “bullshit” on that, Crosbie.
October 5th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
“You can’t both have effective copyright laws and laws that foster creativity and innovation. They are a contradiction in terms. The reproduction monopoly suppresses cultural exchange in order to both control it and direct revenue to printers. Copyright does not foster creativity or reward artists (as the artists are now discovering).”
That’s not true. You’re making a mistake reminiscent of record labels and other copyright fanatics – only looking at half of the equation. The full equation is:
cultural value of creation = amount created * accessibility of created material.
You erroneously disregard the first term, while copyright fanatics disregard the second term. While you correctly point out that stronger copyright reduces the accessibility of created material, you miss the fact that copyright, when applied correctly (and within limits), increases the amount created. This is thus an optimization problem in two dependent variables; we want to maximize the product (mathematical product, not “corporate product”), not merely the second term; if copyright is too weak (or nonexistent) the product drops because the first term is too low, and if copyright is too strong the product drops because the second term is too low. We’re at the point where the second term is too low, and the total value of creation is thus less than optimal.
The only study I know of that tried to location the maximal point concluded that 14 years was the optimal copyright term to maximize total value.
Copyright is not the problem; abuse/perversion of copyright and corporate greed are the problem. We need copyright reform, not abolition.
October 6th, 2009 at 5:16 am
Justin, not only do you accuse me of disregarding a term in an alleged equation you have only just shown me, but you state it is an erroneous disregard. And all this to cast the aspersion that I disregard the cultural value of creation. Nice.
You appear to be assuming that the only way artists can be incentivised to produce creative works is if the public’s cultural liberty to share and build upon those works is suspended, i.e. that no-one can make copies without permission.
A monopoly can certainly be lucrative to those who are granted it, but monopolies are a net cost to society. They are a redistribution of wealth with an expensive overhead in terms of policing. When the number to be policed is small this overhead can be negligible (though the monopoly still impacts market efficiency and suppresses cultural improvement and evolution), but when the number increases from a few hundred printers to a billion, then you’re defending a one foot high sandcastle from a ten foot tide (instead of an inch high wave).
It is a mistake to believe that the commercial exploitation of a monopoly (the artist’s suspension of their audience’s liberty) is the only means by which the artist can be compensated by their audience. You should try an exchange in a free market some time: art for money, money for art.