“This ‘groundbreaking’ AI proposal that they gave us yesterday, they proposed that our background performers should be able to be scanned, get one day’s pay, and their companies should own that scan, their image, their likeness and should be able to use it for the rest of eternity on any project they want, with no consent and no compensation. So if you think that’s a groundbreaking proposal, I suggest you think again.”
Sorry for the wall of text but I just don’t get your motivation for that thinking besides not being able to accept that life will never be fair.
We have means to protect our physical property. Copyright and patents are just a form of protection for intellectual property. If we get rid of patents and copyright, we could use the same argument to allow burglaries and theft.
Copyrights are to some extend a way to stop others from profiting of your work but its also a register of originality. A good real world example is researching blues and soul songs. Since a lot of them predate copyright laws (or, due to African American origin were less likely to go through copyright procedures during time of segregation) figuring out who the genius behind a melody or poetic lyrics was, gets quite messy.
Patents are a different story. They often refer to ideas that are not set in motion yet. This can be due to limitations in the patent holders ability to act upon his idea. Limitations are often monetary or lack of networking and experience. A patent guaratees that the person who came up with something has enough time to develop a plan to bring his idea into reality. Furthermore, if a person sees no way of reaching this goal he can sell or open the patent to let others try. Most (corporate) patents aren’t for things but for procedures anyway. Everybody can think of some magical device that does whatever and patent it. But figuring out how to do a complex process in great detail and efficiency is where the real value of labor lies.
If we abolish patent law - as soon as an idea is formulated the entity with the biggest capability would scoop it up because they already have a foot in the game and the necessary funds to back it up. Essential somebody could come up with a solution to humanities problems and would have to buy his own invention from somebody else. This would either induce secracy and demotivate progress, or be the exact opposite of what you wanted. The people that need money would be left in the dirt by people who already have it.
We already have the reality of Chinas very loose interpretation of copyright and patent laws (especially foreign ones) for consumer goods. And as a consequence, Chinese off-brand goods aren’t exactly the creme de la creme of quality manufacturing. The term “Chinese Knock-Off” is tied to a balant copy of unprotected originality. While all the high quality Chinese made parts are a product of enforced contracts and quality control procedures most of which are detailed in aforementioned patents.
I’m aware of the issue of corporation sitting on patents or investing in R&D just to be the first to patent something without actually using the new technology to avoid making their current tech (and income) obsolete. But these issues pale in comparison to the consquences of abolishing patent law.
And to bring the discussion back to the topic of the post, the issue goes even further. The copyright doesn’t just involve a persons idea or product, but their whole likeliness. Actors already have to put in the work to maintain their apperence and somehow the studio now gets to own all of that. Its already hard enough to break into the industry even as an background actor, but now the studio scans you and says, “thanks, your services are no longer required, go devote your life to another skill or craft”. Money aside, ownership implies that the studios can use your likeliness hower they please. What stops a studio from saying “Either you will show up for 20h shoots for the next week with minimum pay and shut up about it, or we will release a video of you raping a child.”? Because as history has shown Hollywood is moraly so far above that. If not for solid copyright laws, those would be plausible consequences.
On the other hand, if studios could save a few bucks and not pay their actors, would streaming services suddenly become cheaper? Would ticket prices at cinemas go down? Be real here. Somebody will line their pockets and its not the people who need the money.
Nobody ever said life is fair.
If you’re having trouble understanding my point, I can put it in clear and concise terms for you.
The disparity in wealth should shrink instead of grow.
I didn’t read that wall of text. If you agree with the above statement, copyright and patent laws need to die. I assume you think the disparity in wealth should grow instead of shrink, that’s why you’re defending making money off of imaginary property. Please correct me if I am wrong in my assumption.
You should, it’s a good read. But I now see where you’re coming from, I spend some time writing an argument and you didn’t value that time. A patent or a copyrighted product doesn’t mean anything to you because you don’t value the time behind it.
If you’re still up for a read, I wrote the following before realizing you’d probably skip it.
I’m not going to correct you on your assumption of my intention because you are making a strawman argument here. But I’ll put my personal opinion at the end none the less. I’m going to try to correct your understanding of copyright and patent law. These laws are in place to protect wealthy entities to steal ideas or products from the poor because they have the actual funds to put them to use.
You’re metaphorically suggesting stopping air polution by burning all the oil fields down. You have cause and effect mixed up. Copyright and patent laws are what keeps the wealth gap from expanding further.
But as I see your point. Every idea or product should be open to everybody. I should be able to put some other artists songs on a CD and sell them as my own. Or print out a couple pictures I found on google and sell them as artwork at a street corner or put them on t-shirts when times get rough. My competitor should also know how I managed to increase part yield without affecting quality to stay competetive in hope that they won’t use their higher production capabilities to outbid me at every corner essentialy failing my business and bringing them one step closer to monopoly. That will surely close the gap in wealth.
“If everything is free to use by everyone, what’s my motivation to create something new? I can just wait for the next guy to come up with it and then take it for myself.” said everybody, everywhere, all at once.
The wealth gap is a simple problem but our greasy little fingers made it complex. Partially mathematical partialy mental. Money flows to money 1% of $100 is $1 and 1% of a $10,000,000 its $10,000. Hard to loose if you get more bang for your buck. And we are still animals that are hoarders at heart. We just switched berries and meat for dollars and dimes. We take more than we need - sometimes because we expect hard times coming - sometimes just to show that we can. I don’t think the wealthy should get richer and the poor poorer. But poor people should be able to get rich by profiting of their own creativity. Copyright and patents allow that. We had millennia to solve this issue and nobody came up with something and lived to tell. If life wasn’t actively working against entropy we’d be a warm sphere of chemicals orbiting the sun. Wealth distribution is in a way entropy and life is actively working against it too, if you want to get philosophical. Its like salt- and freshwater divided by a membrane you get pressure between them, you just need to make sure the membrane is possible to cross.
It’s just not that easy.
Sure, you know what. I’ll read it just because you said.
I’m not even joking.
Hey man, now that I read back what I wrote, I don’t know why I was being so pushy and aggressive. I respect your difference in opinion. Thinking about it, I actually found it hard to choose my word as to not accidently prove you right, so there must be something to you argument. I’m now thinking about how Philips is cavaliering the integrated ambient lightning for TVs through a patent which pisses me of honestly and I wish they couldn’t (because their TVs are kinda meh). You’re alright.