Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Posted Sep 26, 2014 18:16 UTC (Fri) by jackb (guest, #41909)In reply to: Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica) by Creideiki
Parent article: Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Example: If you plant a tree people who drive past your house might enjoy the view. They are profiting from your labour without paying you.
The tree might cast shade on your neighbor's house, thereby lowering their electric bill for air conditioning. Again they are profiting from your labor without paying.
Every action that anyone could possibly take could be construed as creating profits that other people enjoy without payment.
The principle of "everyone owns the effects of their labor" is equivalent to "nobody can do anything at all without paying everyone else else they are committing theft."
Posted Sep 27, 2014 14:58 UTC (Sat)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (3 responses)
If we want *affordable* *popular* art that is professional, then copyright or something like it is a NECESSITY. Some sort of crowd funding.
For performance art (an orchestra, a pop band) you can have ticket sales. Performers can make a professional living from performance. But if you can't make a living from taking photographs, there will be no professional photographers. If you can't make a living from writing music, there will be no professional composers. Which means there will be NO PROFESSIONAL QUALITY photographs, or music for performers, etc etc.
There is a lot of evidence that says someone's "skill in the art" is VERY dependent on how much time you spend practicing - that's time spent over a lifetime! If you spend 10 hours a day earning a living, and three or four hours a night practicing, your "native ability" (which doesn't actually seem to exist!) will be far lower than somebody able to work at it for that same 10 hours a day.
What's the quote? "The average child prodigy has done more practice by the age of 11, than the average person achieves in their entire lifetime". "innate ability" really means that you *enjoy* *practicing* whatever it is. If you are prevented from practicing then you're never going to be any good.
And much as you may not like it, copyright (done properly) is a very good source of crowd funding. The problem is that the current implementation sucks massively - so massively as to be pretty much a blatant fraud :-(
Cheers,
Posted Sep 27, 2014 15:56 UTC (Sat)
by Creideiki (subscriber, #38747)
[Link] (2 responses)
Even assuming that "professional quality" is even a thing, and relevant, you have not successfully argued why the existing avenues for non-copyright-based income for artist are inadequate. A lot of art is produced on commission, because it needs to be specific, which makes it non-fungible. Look at all the graphics artists, designers and musicians who work in the advertising industry. Look at those employed by the movie industry. Are you saying that these do not count? Or that they can be replaced by clip-art from the Internet? Look at the ticket-selling pop band in your example. Are you saying that none of that money will ever go to commissioning the services of a songwriter? Or that they won't recognize the need until songwriters have become extinct? There really is a world of difference between that kind of art production and a web site which just wants a bug picture, which is fungible with any other bug picture. Or look at Patreon. It's not hard to find people who make several thousands of dollars per month (plus whatever they make from other avenues, such as ads), which I would count as "making a living" from their art. They get this not from copyright, not for something they've done in the past, but for the promise to continue to create.
Posted Sep 27, 2014 19:52 UTC (Sat)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (1 responses)
So you're saying that a crystal-clear, perfectly sharp, wonderfully coloured bug picture is fungible with a fuzzy, out-of-focus, overexposed bug picture taken with a cheap flare-ridden lens on a cheap low quality sensor?
It's like saying that a professional musician who - through years of training - can pretty much be guaranteed to hit the right note first time every time is interchangeable with a person who sings in the shower and is so tone deaf he can't even hear that he's way out of tune.
If a web site is happy with a grotty free picture, that's fine. What I'm saying is that if everybody is happy pirating those high-quality, professional pictures, then simple economics says the supply of those pictures will simply dry up. Nobody will be able to afford the investment needed to be *capable* of producing them!
And that's why copyright exists - so that those who make that investment get the chance to recoup their investment. They have no right to a return on the investment, they have no guarantee to a return on their investment. But without copyright or somesuch similar, they pretty much have a guarantee that they WON'T make a return on their investment. Which means that the supply will dry up. Which is why the American Constitution allows copyrights - to try and prevent the well running dry ...
Cheers,
Posted Sep 27, 2014 20:11 UTC (Sat)
by Creideiki (subscriber, #38747)
[Link]
And what I'm saying is that that is demonstrably not the case, since there is a market for commissioned photos.
Posted Sep 27, 2014 23:33 UTC (Sat)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link]
But *intent* matters.
If I plant a tree in my garden, I get the benefit of my labour. I enjoy the tree. If I plant a tree in my forest, I get the benefit. I cut it down and sell it for firewood, or furniture, or paper or whatever. If you benefit as a *side* *effect*, that's great. (If you suffer as a side effect, well that's what anti-social laws are for - in the UK you could be forced to chop the tree in your garden down).
This guy is taking photographs in order to make a living. I'm not even certain if it's him that's putting them up on the internet in the first place!
If *I* post *my* photos on the internet, and a side effect is to stop him making a living, then that's not anti-social. That's *fair* competition, and that's tough. But if *I* post *HIS* photos (quite likely without permission!) then that is unfair, unethical, illegal and anti-social.
Cheers,
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Wol
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Wol
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
What I'm saying is that if everybody is happy pirating those high-quality, professional pictures [...]
Bugging out: How rampant online piracy squashed one insect photographer (Ars Technica)
Wol