tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1883551996126668365.post7621027794131030326..comments2024-01-11T21:24:44.379-07:00Comments on A Blog of Tom: ExternalitiesTom Cantinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06234109728445439457noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1883551996126668365.post-24244152576888468062012-11-05T11:59:42.478-07:002012-11-05T11:59:42.478-07:00Thomas Phinney makes a distinction between problem...Thomas Phinney makes a distinction between problems created by DRM and problems created by copyright. Most non-lawyers would make the same distinction. But that distinction is based on an outdated understanding of copyright law as it has evolved since the 1996 WIPO treaty. <br /><br />More and more western countries are writing "anti-circumvention" provisions into their law. These provisions are viewed by their creators and by industry advocates as integral parts of "modern" copyright law. The recent amendments to the Canadian Copyright Act are one example. The DMCA in the USA is another. These provisions make it illegal to create, distribute, and possess software and devices that will do the things Tom Cantine was trying to do for his mother. <br /><br />The Copyright Act and the DMCA are the reason Tom C. doesn't have easy access to a user-friendly tools to transfer information onto his mother's iPad. Tom C. and his mother are among millions of people facing the same issues. If not for the legislation I alluded to above, clever programmers, motivated by altruism or by market forces, would almost certainly have created and distributed those tools.<br /><br />--NikolaiNikolaihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05357434176004958554noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1883551996126668365.post-11856220393686388442012-11-01T11:04:33.387-06:002012-11-01T11:04:33.387-06:00In the specific instance? Yes. But copyright itsel...In the specific instance? Yes. But copyright itself is also enforced in silly ways that make us all poorer. I mentioned the example of WKRP in Cincinnati, a TV show set in a rock radio station that, in the original episodes, had bits of currently popular music playing in the context of the show. I don't remember it ever playing a song all the way through, but apparently the royalties they wanted for the snippets that were there were more than they were willing to pay. Not sure which side to blame here, but the end result is that the show is NOT available in its original form. <br /><br />In an earlier post, I remarked on my garage band having to pay a levy on blank recording media to help reimburse the recording industry for illegal copying of their material. In other words, the not-yet (and in this case never-to-be) commercially successful musicians pay money to the already-commercially successful. A relatively minor barrier, to be sure, but it adds up. The enforcement of copyright claims in this case created a barrier to the publication of original creative material, when the basic rationale behind copyright (and patents) is to ENCOURAGE such publication.<br /><br />As I said in the post, there are lots and lots of examples, and DRM is just the one that happened to get my hackles up most recently. Ultimately, intellectual property is a fiction, a concept we invented in order to allow creators to profit from their efforts, but it's still a fiction. For it to work, we all have to buy into it, but there's a cognitive dissonance that appears when we're told that one kind of abstract "stealing" is wrong, while a closely related "stealing" (in this case of our time and the utility of our devices and cultural assets) is ignored. <br />Tom Cantinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06234109728445439457noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1883551996126668365.post-62579230186824735002012-11-01T10:29:37.480-06:002012-11-01T10:29:37.480-06:00I think your complaints here are mostly against DR...I think your complaints here are mostly against DRM rather than copyright. It's a question of how it's enforced as much as anything.Thomas Phinneyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10432856897419849483noreply@blogger.com