Felten’s Pizzaright Principle
p2p news / p2pnet:- Lately, lots of bogus arguments for copyright expansion have been floating around, says Ed Felten.
A handy detector for bogus arguments is the Pizzaright Principle.
Read on >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
The Pizzaright Principle
By Edward W. Felten – Freedom to Tinker
Pizzaright – the exclusive right to sell pizza – is a new kind of intellectual property right. Pizzaright law, if adopted, would make it illegal to make or serve a pizza without a license from the pizzaright owner.
Creating a pizzaright would be terrible policy, of course. We’re much better off letting the market decide who can make and sell pizza.
The Pizzaright Principle says that if you make an argument for expanding copyright or creating new kinds of intellectual property rights, and if your argument serves equally well as an argument for pizzaright, then your argument is defective. It proves too much. Whatever your argument is, it had better rest on some difference between pizzaright and the exclusive right you want to create.
Let’s apply the Pizzaright Principle to two well-known bogus arguments for intellectual property expansion.
Suppose Alice argues that extending the term of copyright is good, because it gives the copyright owner a revenue stream that can be invested in creating new works. She could equally well argue that pizzaright is good, because it gives the pizzaright owner a revenue stream that can be invested in creating new pizzas.
(The flaw in Alice’s argument is that the decision whether to invest in a new copyrighted work, or a new pizza, is rationally based only on the cost of the investment and the expected payoff. Making a transfer payment to the would-be investor doesn’t change his decision, assuming that capital markets are efficient.)
Suppose that Bob argues that the profitability of broadcasting may be about to decrease, so broadcasters should be given new intellectual property rights. He could equally well argue that if the pizza business has become less profitable, a pizzaright should be created.
(The flaw in Bob’s argument was the failure to show that the new right furthers the interests of society as a whole, as opposed to the narrow interests of the broadcasters or pizzamakers.)
The Pizzaright Principle is surprisingly useful. Try it out on the next IP expansion argument you hear.
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September 30th, 2005 at 11:35 am
Great.
Blends nicely with something I wrote for another thread here on P2PNET:
AUTHOR PRODUCTIVITY HYPOTHESIS
The whole concept of copyrights is founded on the unproven hypothesis that more/better artistic works will reach the people if the authors are paid. Of course, no one has proven if the hypothesis is true because the social scientists are on the sidelines for reasons that cry for an explanation. This, I call the Author Productivity Hypothesis (APH)
So until APH is proved, any method to get authors paid or paid better may be missing the mark altogether. Imagine that the if APH is tested and it turns out that the more authors are paid, the worse the author productivity.
BTW, some of the gratest artist never made any money with the current system. My father was one of the great musicians (sorry for my immodesty) and he never made any money while many less talented musicians became millionaires from their art.
Rafael venegas
http://www.gvenegas.com
September 30th, 2005 at 5:21 pm
i think everything should be copyrighted, intellectual property-ized, trademarked, and owned by the elite companies before this crazy ‘free thinking’ thing gets out of hands.
I believe I speak for every 12 hour a day worker who makes almost enoung money to afford both a lovely shoebox style apartment, and occasionally food, that the rich people who own the collosal companies should own everything. Deep down, I know we as a people know that they are rich because of one thing: they are better then us and God loves them more.
On the other hand, I would like to copyright/trademark/hold the intellectual rights to sodomy. I hope no else has already gotten those rights. If not, I own sodomy(I called it first), so I should get a hefty percentage of all the riaa/mpaa/4letterfucks money they recieve for making the hole* world bend over and take it in the keister.
*a pun, i really hate puns, but if the unlubricated ramming device fits, i feel it’s now my registered trademark so I own it.
on a related note, is there any way we could possibly pass a law to make it illegal to send an e-mail with out also purchasing an envelope and a stamp? these horrible, horrible monsters who use email are devastating the envelope and stamp business, and it should be crushed. In a few years after all the toadsnot that wouldnt have been used for the glue will soon overrun the world. Please, think of the children!
I know a lot of people who would really like such a law. and maybe some kind of a midget tax, where small people have to still buy normal sized pants.
it’d probably be easier to just ban my ip#, i’m an idiot who really is disgusted with the way copyright/big brother is going, and i’m compelled to keep writing crap like this here until stopped.